Marco Rubio heading to Middle East as Trump pushes Gaza displacement plan
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Gulf Today
2 minutes ago
- Gulf Today
EPA proposes to end US fight against climate change
Jody Freeman, Tribune News Service President Donald Trump has been trying to eliminate climate regulations since his first day back in office when he signed an executive order declaring the primacy of fossil fuels. But his administration's most radical step came last week, when the Environmental Protection Agency unveiled a proposal that would rescind its 2009 'endangerment finding' — the scientific conclusion that greenhouse gases contribute to global warming and harm human health and well-being. This isn't just another regulatory rollback. It's an assault on the foundation of all federal climate policy. The endangerment finding originally applied to vehicle emissions, but it also underpins every major federal climate rule in America: car and truck emissions standards, power plant regulations and limits on oil and gas facilities. By removing this cornerstone, Trump's EPA is repudiating federal authority to limit greenhouse gases, our most powerful tool for fighting climate change. The irony is that no industry asked for this extreme step. Car makers need stable federal rules to compete globally. Power companies have invested billions in renewable energy, which regulatory uncertainty puts at risk. Even most oil and gas companies support a national approach to limiting methane. Companies may stay quiet to avoid crossing a vengeful administration, but they know climate change is real and that some federal regulation makes business sense. As the federal government retreats, states such as California will try to fill the void. But Trump is trying to block them too, directing the Justice Department to challenge state climate policies. With its cap-and-trade program, renewable energy standards and clean transportation incentives, California is helping to cut harmful emissions, and it could do more. Yet even the most ambitious state measures can't substitute for the national standards needed to tackle a problem the size of climate change. The legal foundation the administration is attacking seemed unshakeable. The Clean Air Act requires the EPA to regulate air pollutants that endanger human health and welfare. In 2007, in Massachusetts vs. EPA, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that greenhouse gases are air pollutants, and that the endangerment decision must be based on science. Two years later, after the EPA reviewed studies by the National Climate Assessment, the National Research Council and the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, it found that greenhouse gases accumulating in the atmosphere are a danger, pointing to higher temperatures, worse air quality, extreme weather events, spreading drought and more food- and water-borne pathogens. Following the process set out in the Clean Air Act, the agency then established national emission standards for the sources in each sector of the US economy that contribute to this problem. To unravel all of this, the Trump administration proposal offers a medley of strained legal and scientific arguments. First, it claims that greenhouse gases are not pollutants because they have global, not local, effects. This argument is hard to square with the Supreme Court's ruling to the contrary, but they are trying it anyway. The proposal also asserts that US emissions don't contribute to harms from climate change because climate impacts are too remote and American emissions are too small a share of the global total to matter. The first point demands a direct link between U.S. emissions and specific climate impacts, which is impossible to prove given that the effects of climate change are the result of global pollution from numerous sources. The second point rests on a contrived method for calculating emissions piecemeal, which makes them appear vanishingly small. No category of sources, whether cars or power plants, would produce a large enough share of greenhouse gases to justify regulation under this approach. It's a test designed to be impossible to pass. (Studies show, to the contrary, that every ton of emissions avoided counts when it comes to reducing climate risks, and that even incremental reductions bring significant public health and economic gains.) The proposal goes on to attack the scientific basis for the endangerment finding, calling it unreliable based largely on a report from the Department of Energy written by five handpicked scientists known for their outlier views. The report asserts, among other things, that global warming is on balance more beneficial than harmful, that cold temperatures are the greater threat and that extreme weather events are not worse than they have been historically. To say that such claims defy the consensus is an understatement. Relying on a commissioned report by a closed group looks especially suspect given that Trump disbanded the National Climate Assessment, a congressionally mandated periodic review conducted by hundreds of climate scientists and involving more than a dozen government agencies, which has warned of climate dangers in five reports since 2000. The proposal also folds policy objections into the scientific assessment, asserting that regulating greenhouse gases simply costs too much and accomplishes too little. But this muddles the issues. Whether climate change is harmful is a purely scientific assessment. How stringently to regulate is a separate question that must weigh both costs and benefits. On that score, the proposal's cost analysis is highly skewed, citing the burdens of regulation while ignoring the substantial public health and economic benefits of limiting warming. In all, the proposal's scattershot justifications seem designed to offer the conservative supermajority on the Supreme Court — where the issue will likely land — a variety of ways to agree. After all, the five members of the Massachusetts vs. EPA majority have retired or died, while three of the four dissenters remain. The current court has steadily limited that decision's reach by narrowing the EPA's authority. Given their recent rulings, the justices could well reject the proposal's most far-fetched arguments while concluding that the EPA simply has broad discretion not to regulate greenhouse gases. Even if the administration ultimately loses in court, it wins by paralysing climate action for years. As EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin put it in announcing the proposal, the administration is 'driving a dagger through the heart of climate change religion.' But climate change isn't a religion — it's physics and chemistry. And science doesn't care about politics. We can't solve climate change with regulation alone. But we certainly can't solve it by pretending the problem doesn't exist. The administration's assault on climate action won't change the evidence or reality of climate change. As scientists have predicted, storms are growing more intense, heat waves more deadly, wildfires more destructive. We spend billions annually on disaster response while other countries surge ahead in clean energy innovation and manufacturing. China now dominates solar panel and electric vehicle production; Europe leads in offshore wind. The question isn't whether we'll eventually return to responsible climate policy — we will because we must. The question is how much time we'll lose, and how much damage we'll suffer, while politics masquerades as good policy.
Gulf Today
9 minutes ago
- Gulf Today
Saudi Arabia condemns any Israeli move to take control of Gaza
Saudi Arabia on Friday rejected Israel's plan to take over Gaza city, lambasting it for the "starvation" and "ethnic cleansing" of Palestinians in the blockaded territory. Riyadh said it "condemns in the strongest and most forceful terms the decision of the Israeli occupation authorities to occupy the Gaza Strip", in a foreign ministry statement on X. It added that it "categorically condemns its persistence in committing crimes of starvation, brutal practices, and ethnic cleansing against the brotherly Palestinian people". Nations around the world expressed concern Friday over Israel's plan to wrest control of Gaza City, saying it would only worsen the conflict and lead to more bloodshed. Here is what they said: UN UN human rights chief Volker Turk said the plan must be "immediately halted". Israel should instead allow "the full, unfettered flow of humanitarian aid" and Palestinian armed groups must unconditionally release hostages, he added. EU "The Israeli government's decision to further extend its military operation in Gaza must be reconsidered," EU chief Ursula von der Leyen said on X. She called for a ceasefire, the release of all hostages and "immediate and unhindered access" for humanitarian aid in Gaza. Hamas Hamas denounced the Israeli government's plan as "a new war crime that the occupation army intends to commit against" Gaza and warned that the operation would "cost it dearly". UK "This action will do nothing to bring an end to this conflict or to help secure the release of the hostages," Prime Minister Keir Starmer said, adding that it would "only bring more bloodshed". China "Gaza belongs to the Palestinian people and is an inseparable part of Palestinian territory," a foreign ministry spokesperson told AFP. "The correct way to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and to secure the release of hostages is an immediate ceasefire." Germany Chancellor Friedrich Merz said it was "increasingly difficult to understand" how the Israeli military plan would help achieve legitimate aims. "Under these circumstances, the German government will not authorise any exports of military equipment that could be used in the Gaza Strip until further notice," he added. Turkey Turkey urged global pressure to halt the plan. "We call on the international community to fulfil its responsibilities to prevent the implementation of this decision, which aims to forcibly displace Palestinians from their own land," said a foreign ministry statement. Spain "We firmly condemn the decision of the Israeli government to escalate the military occupation of Gaza," said Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares. "It will only cause more destruction and suffering." He added that "a permanent ceasefire, the immediate and massive entry of humanitarian aid, and the release of all hostages are urgently needed". Belgium Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prevot said on X that the Israeli ambassador had been summoned to express "our total disapproval of this decision". Jordan A statement issued by the Royal Court said King Abdullah condemned a move "which undermines the two-state solution and the rights of the Palestinian people". Egypt Egypt's foreign affairs ministry condemned "in the strongest possible terms" Israel's plan for Gaza.
Dubai Eye
29 minutes ago
- Dubai Eye
Azerbaijan and Armenia to sign peace agreement, White House says
Azerbaijan and Armenia will sign an initial peace agreement on Friday to boost economic ties between the two countries after decades of conflict, the White House said, with President Donald Trumpset to welcome the leaders of both nations for a signing ceremony at the White House. White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly told reporters that Trump would sign separate deals with both Armenia and Azerbaijan on energy, technology, economic cooperation, border security, infrastructure and trade. No further details were provided. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan are due to arrive at the White House for talks and the signing ceremony around 2:30 p.m. (10:30 p.m. GST), one of the officials said. The agreement includes exclusive U.S. development rights to a strategic transit corridor through the South Caucasus, dubbed the "Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity." "What's going to happen here with the Trump route is, this isn't charity. This is a highly investable entity," said one senior administration official, adding that at least nine companies had been in touch in recent days to discuss possible investments. Senior administration officials told reporters the agreement was the first to end one of several frozen conflicts on Russia's periphery since the end of the Cold War and said it would send a powerful signal to the entire region. "This isn't just about Armenia. It's not just about Azerbaijan. It's about the entire region, and they know that that region is going to be safer and more prosperous with President Trump," a senior administration official said. Armenia and Azerbaijan have been at odds since the late 1980s when Nagorno-Karabakh - an Azerbaijani region that had a mostly ethnic-Armenian population - broke away from Azerbaijan with support from Armenia. Both Armenia and Azerbaijan won independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. A peace deal could transform the South Caucasus, an energy-producing region neighboring Russia, Europe, Turkey and Iran that is criss-crossed by oil and gas pipelines but riven by closed borders and longstanding ethnic conflicts. Under a carefully negotiated section of the documents the leaders will sign on Friday, Armenia plans to award the United States exclusive special development rights for an extended period on a transit corridor that will be named the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, and known by the acronym TRIPP, the officials told Reuters this week.
