Marines detain man as LA protests continue
US Marines have detained a man in Los Angeles, as a political fight continues between the California's leaders and US President Donald Trump over protests aimed at his immigration raids.
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News.com.au
25 minutes ago
- News.com.au
NEWS OF THE WEEK: Finneas tear-gassed at protest in Los Angeles
The singer-songwriter and brother of Billie Eilish took to social media to detail his experience with the National Guard. 'Tear gassed almost immediately at the very peaceful protest downtown - they're inciting this.' The musician had attended a protest against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) department's operations in Los Angeles over the weekend. The protests, which began on Friday and carried on through until Sunday, saw numerous people stage a peaceful demonstration, campaigning against ICE's raids of several workplaces in Los Angeles for alleged immigration violations.
The Australian
an hour ago
- The Australian
Israel-Iran: How Donald Trump decided to back Israel's attacks on Iran
The first act of 'Les Misérables' had just ended at the Kennedy Center Wednesday night when Sen. Lindsey Graham (Republican, South Carolina) pulled President Trump aside for a quick conversation about Iran. Graham applauded the Trump administration's handling of the nuclear issue without people getting killed. 'Yeah, we're trying,' Trump said about the sputtering negotiations with Tehran. 'But sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do,' he said. Graham took that remark to mean Trump was referring to the possibility of an Israeli strike on its longtime enemy. The encounter came midway through a week that would see Trump go from trying to head off an Israeli attack to backing its sudden campaign of air strikes targeting Iran's nuclear facilities and senior military and civilian leaders, an abrupt shift that underscored the fraying prospects for a deal. Trump said Friday that he had been aware of Israel's attack plans and argued that the punishing operation makes a nuclear deal even more likely, though Iran said they were pulling out of a sixth round of talks scheduled for Sunday. 'They should have made a deal and they still can make a deal while they have something left — they still can,' Trump told The Wall Street Journal. Trump had seemed far less optimistic earlier in the week. On Sunday, he summoned his national-security team to Camp David and told them during a discussion on the Middle East that he was increasingly pessimistic Tehran would agree to a deal, according to US officials. Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were due to speak the next day, and the president said he would tell the Israeli leader to delay any attacks until special envoy Steve Witkoff's diplomatic effort had run its course, US officials recounted. In a letter to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in March, Trump had set a two-month time limit once talks got under way to reach a deal, a deadline that was due to expire this week. But Khamenei rejected a US proposal to allow Iran to temporarily continue uranium enrichment in the country if it agreed to eventually halt its domestic centrifuge operation. Always in the background was Netanyahu's push to launch strikes against Iran's nuclear sites, a threat that loomed ever larger. In a call Monday with Netanyahu, Trump said he wanted to see diplomacy with Tehran play out a little longer, according to US officials. But even Trump was losing faith in his strategy. Netanyahu raised his oft-expressed objection that Iran wouldn't make the deal Trump wanted and that Israel needed to keep preparing strikes, the officials added. Trump seemed to internalise the message. 'I'm getting more and more — less confident about it,' he said of the prospects for a nuclear deal with Iran in a New York Post interview published Wednesday. 'They seem to be delaying, and I think that is a shame, but I'm less confident now than I would have been a couple of months ago.' Netanyahu had been seeking to head off a US-led negotiation with Iran over its nuclear program for years, arguing that only the destruction of its vast enrichment centrifuges and other facilities could guarantee Tehran wasn't secretly developing a bomb. The Israeli leader rejoiced when Trump in his first term tore up the 2015 nuclear deal brokered by then President Barack Obama, and he recoiled when Trump pushed for a tougher agreement during his second term in office. US intelligence agencies concluded in January that Israel was considering strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities. The intelligence analysis concluded Israel would push Trump's new team to back the assault, viewing the incoming president as more likely to join an attack than former President Joe Biden. The Israelis, according to the assessment, believed the window for halting Tehran's pursuit of a nuclear weapon was closing. In a sign of mounting concern about an Israeli attack and Iranian response, the State Department on Wednesday ordered the departure of all non-essential personnel from the US Embassy in Baghdad and authorised the departure of non-essential personnel and family members from Bahrain and Kuwait. At the same time, Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth authorised the voluntary departure of military dependants from across the Middle East. Army Gen. Erik Kurilla, the top US commander in the Middle East, cancelled a congressional testimony scheduled for the next day and returned to Central Command's headquarters in Tampa. As anxiety grew in the Middle East and Washington, Trump was enjoying the performance of his favourite musical at the Kennedy Center, joined by Graham and other supporters. When Trump and Netanyahu spoke again on Thursday, the Israeli leader told Trump that it was the last day of his 60-day timeline for Iran to make a deal. Israel could wait no longer, Netanyahu said, according to officials familiar with the call. Israel had to defend itself and enforce the deadline Trump himself had set. Trump responded that the US wouldn't stand in the way, according to administration officials, but emphasised that the US military wouldn't assist with any offensive operations. At the White House, Trump told reporters he wouldn't describe an attack as imminent, 'but it is something that could very well happen.' While the US and Iran were close to a deal, he claimed, Israeli strikes could 'blow it.' Israel launched its operation as Trump was at a picnic Thursday evening on the White House grounds for members of Congress. He later joined Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Hegseth, and Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and other senior officials in the Situation Room to monitor events. Israel had acted unilaterally and the US played no role in the attack, Rubio said in a statement that acknowledged Israel notified Washington before the operation began. That was the only comment from the US as the attack unfolded. Bombs struck and damaged a key Iranian nuclear facility at Natanz, and senior military leaders including Major Gen. Hossein Salami, commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, were killed. In all, Iran claimed that Israel's first attack killed 78 people and injured around 320 more in multiple waves of Israeli strikes. Netanyahu pledged that the operation would last for as long as necessary. Trump, who began the week resistant to an assault on Iran, quickly embraced it as a successful campaign that could boost his diplomatic effort. 'Iran must make a deal, before there is nothing left,' he posted on social media Friday, 'and save what was once known as the Iranian Empire.' Wall Street Journal Read related topics: Donald TrumpIsrael The Wall Street Journal The conflict in the Middle East is exacerbating a schism between conservatives over foreign policy. The Wall Street Journal Tehran's bruising fight with Israel has left its military weakened and unable to respond in kind to Israeli attacks.
News.com.au
2 hours ago
- News.com.au
Point Roberts, Washington: the US town that only exists due a mistake made 180 years ago
'If I want a pizza or sushi, I have to go to another country,' said Steve O'Neill. 'There are three million people right next door and some days I will walk down the beach and see no one.' For Mr O'Neill life in Point Roberts is bucolic but full of absurdities. Perhaps the biggest of which is that this American outpost might not even exist today were it not for the thickness of a pencil – and potentially the thickness of the people using that pencil – almost 180 years ago in 1849. 'It can feel like the film The Truman Show,' he added of the exclave of Washington state. 'You can walk but there's also this limit to how far you can walk.' The limit Mr O'Neill is referring to is the border between the US and Canada. The two nations have one of the world's longest frontiers but few parts are as odd as here in Point Roberts. A rural hinterland which directly abuts the vast suburbs of Vancouver, Canada's third largest city. The US exclave is located on the base of a peninsula whose only land connection is to Canada. A tiny part of the US, barely 13 sqkm in size, seemingly forgotten by America and almost entirely dependent on a foreign nation. 'We're a no man's land, separated from the US, not part of Canada,' said Mr O'Neill, who has lived there since 1999. For decades, the border was just a daily wrinkle for Point Roberts' residents: a cheery wave to border guards as Americans headed north for pizza and sushi – and school and work – as Canadians headed south for cheap petrol and to pick up packages from the US avoiding international postage. Then Covid came and Canada sealed the border decimating business for two years. The border is back open but US President Donald Trump's continued mutterings of Canada becoming the '51st state' have delivered another economic blow with many Canadians now refusing to pop across to Point Roberts. 'Trump hit us hard' From Sunday, Canada hosts the G7 summit of the world's wealthiest nations. Australia's Anthony Albanese will be a special guest at the chin wag which will discuss tariffs, wars and the environment. But all eyes will be on Mr Trump. Any further annexation talk by the US president will be met with disdain by Canada's new Prime Minister Mark Carney and with despair in Point Roberts. 'The 'elbows up' Canadian boycott election stunt hit hard,' Point Roberts local Kathryn Trainor told 'Right now the exchange rate and our gasoline carbon taxes make it cheaper to buy fuel in Canada. 'It's pretty grim and some people super duper hate Trump being president again.' Point Roberts is beautiful – but bonkers. Forty minutes from Vancouver's CBD, the skyscrapers give way to neat Canadian suburbia that wouldn't look out of place in Australia. Semi-detached homes with double garages face well maintained parks with outdoor barbecues. Small strips of takeaways, laundrettes and convenience stores are close by. Then it all comes to a sudden, shuddering halt. A row of yellow bollards and warning signs marks of both the end of suburbia – and Canada. It would be easy to just walk over the unguarded barrier to the seeming wilderness of maple and cedar trees beyond. But to do so would be a felony of international proportions. Use the tiny borders crossing instead. On the US side, in Point Roberts, live around 1300 people. On the Canadian side, in the suburb of Tsawwassen which covers a similar area, there are 24,000 people – almost 20 times as much. From the air at night it can look a bit like North and South Korea. Busy Vancouver shines brightly. Then a straight line and just a few lights flicker in Point Roberts. The 1849 pencil stroke the ricochets today 'We're minutes from downtown Vancouver but people would be hard pressed to find us on a map,' Mr O'Neill told Blame the maps on the British. In the 19th century, the UK and US were still battling it out as to who would control the North American continent. In Washington and London pencil lines were furiously drawn on maps. The result was the 1849 Treaty of Oregon which set the border in the west at the 49th parallel. The British were savvy enough to ensure the entirety of the strategically important Vancouver Island, south of the 49th parallel, was in its column. But when the pencil lines were drawn the Point Roberts peninsula was so small that the British didn't realise they had handed over the tiniest southern tip of it to the US. Realising their error, London belatedly asked the US to allow Point Roberts to be within British – now Canadian – control. Reportedly, they received no reply and the treaty stood. Ms Trainor moved to Point Roberts from Texas to bring her children up in peace and quiet. 'The kids go to the beach and do nature walks every day. They have more of a holistic experience which is really good.' Compact houses dot the tree lined lanes of Point Roberts. The area's one supermarket, a big box which seems out of place in the rural setting, flies the US and Canadian flags and accepts both currencies But Point Roberts comes with challenges. Students that choose US over Canadian schools endure a daily coach trip that's 40 minutes each way and crosses an international frontier four times. Any fire that erupts in Point Roberts has to be extinguished by volunteer fire fighters from Canada. Few Americans visit or settle in Point Roberts because the multiple border crossings make it hard to get too – so it generally relies on Canadians. But US visa rules mean Canadians can only visit for 180 days a year so few of them are able to settle in Point Roberts even if they wanted too. A stark sign of that is house prices in Point Roberts are around three times less than just a few metres away across the border. When the border was closed during Covid things went downhill. For a time locals couldn't even drive through Canada to get to the US. While visits to Canadian doctors were no longer allowed. At great expense Washington state laid on a ferry to the US mainland so residents weren't entirely stranded. Residents would trek up to the frontier, next to a stone obelisk marking the border, and mingle with their Canadian neighbours. But they had to remain on their side of the 49th parallel or risk the wrath of the border guards. For two years, barely a Canadian visited the exclave. But now the border is open, the ferry has stopped and the people of Point Roberts set about enticing Canadians back. Tremendous beauty Mr O'Neill's dream is to open the Blackfish resort, in an old fish cannery. It would be a boutique hotel, restaurant and spa that he hopes will entice Canadians year round to revel in Point Roberts' city adjacent wildlife and wilderness. 'It's got a tremendous natural beauty. I see eagles and blue herons every day; I've kayaker with Orcas hundreds of times. 'We get people coming down here for gas and parcels but what if they could get a cup of coffee, lunch, and a cocktail? 'It would make Point Roberts more accessible, and every business would be better off,' he said. 'We need that. I've got three children that left because there's no opportunities.' 'Our regulars are offended' Neil and Krystal King, who own a souvenir shop in Point Roberts, had a quirky idea to give visitors a quirky reason to linger. The pair opened the world's only rubber duck museum. 'We already sold rubber ducks in our shop. We did research, and were like 'wait, the history of rubber ducks is really interesting and nobody is telling it',' said Mr King. The modest museum has a rubber duck from 1911, an original moulding from the first mass-produced Disney Donald Duck toy from the 1930s and a modern Taylor Swift duck. Of course, there are copious ducks in all hues for sale. Mr King said border guards would tell them that when they asked why people were coming to Point Roberts many said it was because of the ducks. 'The day we opened, we had a line going through the store'. But since spoke to the Kings, everything has changed. 'Our regulars are all saying the same thing,' Mrs King told the US' National Public Radio in May. 'They're offended by the rhetoric from the White House. 'They don't like their sovereignty being threatened. They feel the only tool they have is boycotting the US and keeping those tourist dollars out.' It's tariffs too. Mostly made in China, the price of importing rubber ducks skyrocketed for the Kings. They're now moving their museum to the Canadian side of the border. 'We love having our quaint little shop here. 'But it's not a choice between moving the ducks to Canada or keeping them here; it's a choice between moving to Canada or closing.' No country has been Abel to spoil it Despite the seeming remoteness and peace of Point Roberts, the world isn't far away. Container ships to and from Vancouver's port and ferries connecting the islands of British Columbia glide silently by in the distance; the lights of the Canadian metropolis shimmer on the horizon. Wouldn't it just have been easier if Point Roberts had been officially detached from the US all those years ago? 'If Point Roberts was part of the contiguous United States or Canada it would be strip malls like the rest of the place,' said Mr O'Neill. 'It's unique because it's the bastard stepchild. 'Neither country has been able to spoil it'.
