Latest news with #Mar-a-Lago-style
Time of India
4 hours ago
- Politics
- Time of India
Trump Brings Mar-a-Lago to D.C. — Rose Garden lawn torn up for new patio and towering Presidential flagpole
Donald Trump is making a new mark on the White House lawn, and it's raising questions. The president has begun tearing down the historic Rose Garden to create a more "functional" space that echoes the aesthetic of his private Florida resort, Mar-a-Lago. President Donald Trump is transforming the iconic White House Rose Garden into a Mar-a-Lago-style patio with two towering flagpoles. Critics argue that the historic lawn is being erased in favor of Trump's personal style and agenda. According to a report by the Daily Beast, bulldozers have begun tearing up the grass and laying the groundwork for a new flagpole, fulfilling President Donald Trump's intention to install a patio in the Mar-a-Lago style. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Schlechter Stuhlgang? Diese Methode funktioniert wie "auf Knopfdruck" Darmschutz Ratgeber Undo Why is Donald Trump tearing up the Rose Garden lawn? According to the AP, Trump approached reporters to check the work and informed them that he was erecting two "beautiful" flagpoles that he had "paid for" because the grounds "needed flagpoles for 200 years." The American flag and the POW/MIA flag are already flown daily from the White House's roof. Live Events The president had already declared in mid-February that he would remove the Rose Garden lawn, which frequently serves as the location for press conferences, award presentations, bill-signing ceremonies, and formal dinners. Later, he clarified that it was because women found it difficult to walk in high heels on the wet grass. During a March White House tour, he told Fox News that the grass just doesn't work when they use it for press conferences; people fall into the wet grass. ALSO READ: Pope Leo to speak virtually in Chicago — and it will happen right when Trump military parade rolls out Are Donald Trump's renovations erasing history? There are two rose gardens at the White House, the Jacqueline Kennedy Garden , which is south of the East Terrace Colonnade, and the Rose Garden, which is situated along the West Wing. Former First Lady Edith Roosevelt redesigned both flagpoles for the Kennedys in the early 1960s, following their original design in 1903. According to Rose Garden designer Rachel Lambert Mellon, President John F. Kennedy had the idea to revitalize the Rose Garden and turn the lawn that Trump is razing into a venue for formal events. What changes are being made to the White House grounds? Trump has promised to construct a $100 million ballroom that is comparable to the Grand Ballroom at Mar-a-Lago, the president's private club in Palm Beach, Florida, besides renovating the garden. To honor John F. Kennedy Jr., a big magnolia tree was chopped down and replaced with a smaller one outside the Oval Office window last month. The renovation project was started on Monday by staff from the National Park Service, which looks after the White House grounds. According to the Associated Press, they anticipate wrapping up sometime in the first half of August. FAQs Why is President Trump rebuilding the Rose Garden? Donald Trump claims wet grass made it difficult for women wearing heels and wants a more usable, Mar-a-Lago-inspired space. What else is changing? Along with a new patio and flagpoles, Donald Trump intends to construct a $100 million ballroom and has already replaced a historic magnolia tree .
Daily Maverick
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Daily Maverick
What will the Antichrist look like? According to Western thought, an authoritarian king
In casting himself as supreme leader and pope, Donald Trump inadvertently invoked the Christian understanding of the Antichrist. The US presidency and the papacy came together on May 3 when Donald Trump posted an AI-generated photograph of himself dressed as the pope to Truth Social. The image was then shared by the White House's accounts. Seated in an ornate (Mar-a-Lago-style) golden chair, he was wearing a white cassock and a bishop's hat, with his right forefinger raised. Trump has since told reporters he 'had nothing to do with it […] somebody did it in fun'. — The White House (@WhiteHouse) May 3, 2025 See the full post here: This image of 'Pope Donald I' is of historical significance, for reasons of which, no doubt, the White House and Trump were blissfully unaware. It is the first ever image to combine the two most important understandings of the figure of the Antichrist in Western thought: on the one hand, that of the pope, and on the other, that of the authoritarian, despotic world emperor. On April 22, the day after Pope Francis' death, Trump declared 'I'd like to be pope. That would be my number one choice'. On April 28, Trump told The Atlantic 'I run the country and the world'. So, both pope and world emperor. The Imperial Antichrist In the New Testament, the First Letter of John says, before Christ came again, the Antichrist will appear: the most conspicuous sign that the end of the world was near. The Antichrist would be the archetypal evil human being who would persecute the Christian faithful. He would be finally defeated by the forces of good. As Sir Isaac Newton suggested, 'searching the Prophecies which [God] hath given us to know Antichrist by' is a Christian obligation. The first life of the Antichrist was written by a Benedictine monk, Adso of Montier-en-Der, around 1,100 years ago. According to Adso, the Antichrist would be a tyrannical evil king who would corrupt all those around him with gold and silver. He would be brought up in all forms of wickedness. Evil spirits would be his instructors and his constant companions. Seeking his own glory, as Adso put it, this king 'will call himself Almighty God'. The Antichrist was opposite to everything Christ-like. According to the Christian tradition, Christ was fully human yet absolutely 'sin free'. The Antichrist, too, was fully human, but completely 'sin full'. The Antichrist was not so much a supernatural being who became flesh as a human being who became fully demonised. Influenced by Christian stories of the Antichrist, Islam and Judaism constructed their own Antichrists – al-Dajjal, the Antichrist of the Muslims, and Armilus, the Antichrist of the Jews. Both al-Dajjal and Armilus are king-like messiahs. Over the centuries, many world leaders have been labelled 'the Antichrist' – the Roman emperors Nero and Domitian were Antichrist figures, and the French emperor Napoleon was named the Antichrist in his own time. There have been more recent leaders who have been likened to the Antichrist, among them former president of Iraq Saddam Hussein, King Charles III, former Russian leader Mikhail Gorbachev, al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden, and Trump. The Papal Antichrist In the year 1190, King Richard I of England, on his way to the Holy Land, was informed by the Italian theologian Joachim of Fiore (c.1135–1202) that the next pope would be the Antichrist. In the history of the Antichrist, this was a momentous occasion. From this time on, the tyrannical Antichrist outside of the Church would be juxtaposed with the papal deceiver within it. That the Catholic pope was the Antichrist was the common reading of the pope in the 16th-century Protestant Reformation. Martin Luther (1483–1546), the founder of the Protestant revolution, declared the pope 'is the true […] Antichrist who has raised himself over and set himself against Christ'. Just as all Christians would not worship the Devil as God, he went on to say, 'so we cannot allow his apostle the pope or Antichrist, to govern as our head or lord'. As he was about to be burned by the Catholic Queen Mary for his Protestant beliefs, the Anglican bishop Thomas Cranmer (1489–1556) declared, 'as for the pope, I refuse him, as Christ's enemy and antichrist with all his false doctrine'. Even in 1988, as Pope John Paul II addressed the European Parliament, the Northern Ireland hardline Protestant leader Ian Paisley roared, 'Antichrist! I renounce you and all your cults and creeds' – to which, we are told, the pope gave a slight, bemused smile. Except among the most extreme of Protestant conservatives, the idea of the papal Antichrist no longer has any purchase. The papal Antichrist has vacated the Western stage for the imperial Antichrist. The Antichrist and the end of the world In the history of Christianity, the idea of the Antichrist was a key part of Christian expectations about the return of Christ and the end of the world. In the final battle between the forces of good and evil, the Antichrist would be defeated by the forces of Christ. In short, the rise of the world emperor who was the Antichrist was a sign that the end of the world was at hand. In the light of the Western history of 'the Antichrist', the image of the imperial and papal US president is a powerful sign that the global order, at least as we have known it for the last 80 years, may be at an end. DM
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Trump's personal diplomacy and family business intersect in Gulf tour
LONDON − It won't be his first ceremonial sword dance. President Donald Trump, who arrived in Saudi Arabia for the start of three days of summits among wealthy Persian Gulf rulers, first traveled to the region in 2017 where, in an ornate, Mar-a-Lago-style ballroom in the Saudi capital, he promised "partnership, based on shared interests and values." Ahead of a state dinner, he swayed to the "ardah," a traditional performance combining dance, poetry and swordplay. Now Trump is back in the Middle East, blending business and diplomacy from May 13 to 16. In addition to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, he will visit Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates and Doha, Qatar. "What Trump really wants to get out of this trip is success," said Frank Lowenstein, a former Middle East envoy in the Obama administration. Trump to Turkey? President mulls joining Russia-Ukraine peace talks, expects ceasefire "He wants to make big announcements, especially those that he can say are benefiting the American public, but also to the extent possible that are consistent with his agenda and his narrative, which is, 'I end foreign wars and I get hostages home,'" Lowenstein said. Trump is again diverging from U.S. presidential habit by choosing the Middle East, not Canada or Mexico, for the first foreign trip of his second term. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump is returning eight years after his first-term trip for "commerce and cultural exchanges." Edan Alexander: Hamas frees US-Israeli hostage; Israel says no ceasefire Saudi Arabia, UAE and Qatar are three of the world's richest nations and they invest deeply in military and security technologies. Saudi Arabia has already pledged to invest $600 billion in American companies. In March, Trump said he wanted the petro-kingdom to commit to $1 trillion. All three countries serve as intermediaries in conflicts from Gaza to Ukraine. On the day of Trump's departure, Hamas released U.S.-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander, believed to be the last living American captive in Gaza. Hamas said his release was part of efforts to reach a fresh ceasefire in the war that began on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas forces rampaged across southern Israel. Israel has yet to commit to a new ceasefire. More: Trump in talks to accept luxury jet from Qatar's royal family In his first term, Trump brokered a series of landmark deals, known as the Abraham Accords, under which Arab states including the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco for the first time recognized Israel. The goal was to provide economic incentives for peace. But the accords barely mentioned Palestinians and their desire for a future state, one of several factors that prevented Saudi Arabia from signing on. Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has insisted there can be no Saudi normalization until Tel Aviv halts its military campaign in Gaza. However, Trump's Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff told an audience at the Israeli Embassy in Washington on May 5 that he expected progress in expanding the Abraham Accords. "We think we will have some or a lot of announcements very, very shortly, which we hope will yield progress by next year," Witkoff said in a video of his speech. Still, some experts say Trump's visit is in danger of blurring business and politics. "It's hard to know what the main mission will be," said Khaled Elgindy, a visiting scholar at Georgetown University's Center for Contemporary Arab Studies. "Part of the problem is that with Trump the personal and geopolitical are all intertwined. He's doing business, partly on behalf of the U.S., partly on what looks like his own behalf." Trump Organization: Dubai tower signals growth in the Gulf region In fact, all three stops on Trump's Middle East tour are places where he and his family have major business interests. In recent weeks, the president's sons Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., who now run The Trump Organization, the holding company for Trump's personal business ventures and investments, visited the UAE and Qatar to preside over deals involving family real estate and cryptocurrency ventures. In late April, Dar Global, a London-based Saudi Arabian real-estate developer with close ties to the kingdom's royal family, and The Trump Organization, announced a new luxury hotel in Dubai. Dar Global and The Trump Organization are also pairing up to build a second high-end residential tower in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The Trump family firm recently struck a deal to a build an 18-hole golf course and resort in Qatar that will feature Trump-branded beachside villas. For this, it's partnering with Qatari Diar, a firm owned by Qatar's government. In the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, a government-backed investment firm recently made a $2 billion investment in a crypto business deal that could serve as a major boost for the Trump family crypto venture World Liberty Financial, according to Zach Witkoff, its cofounder and the son of Trump's Middle East envoy. In recent days Trump has defended the idea of possibly accepting the gift of a Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet from the royal family of Qatar for use as Air Force One. More: How much money did Trump make in first 100 days? Crypto deals raise questions Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, a Washington think tank, said it was no surprise Trump chose to visit wealthy Gulf allies. "These are the three countries you would choose to visit in the region whether your name is Trump or not, whether you have businesses there or not," said Parsi, who noted Trump recently built a golf course in nearby Oman, a country he is not visiting and that's hosting nuclear talks between the U.S. and Iran. The Trump Organization didn't return a request for comment. "It's frankly ridiculous anyone in this room would suggest President Trump is doing anything for his own benefit. He left a life of luxury and a life of running a very successful real estate empire for public service," said Leavitt, the White House press secretary. Greg Swenson, an investment banker who chairs the United Kingdom-based chapter of Republicans Overseas, said Trump should avoid blurring personal business and diplomacy. "The Saudis and Emiratis are our friends. They also have boatloads of money," he said. "But you don't want to bridge that fine line of influence-peddling," Swenson added, noting that former President Joe Biden's son Hunter was involved in overseas business deals. One person hoping to profit − not economically − from Trump's visit to Saudi Arabia is Saad Ibrahim Almadi, a 75-year-old dual U.S.-Saudi citizen. He was arrested in Riyadh in November 2021 when he arrived for a family visit. Almadi was found guilty of seeking to "destabilize" the kingdom, based on a series of now-deleted social media posts he sent that raised concerns about poverty and the demolition of old parts of the cities of Mecca and Jeddah. The posts also referenced the murdered Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a U.S. resident who U.S. intelligence agencies concluded was ambushed, strangled and dismembered by a 15-member squad of Saudi government operatives inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul in 2018. Trump brushed aside the grisly killing of Khashoggi in his first term. Almadi's son, Ibrahim, is hoping his father, who spent a year in a Saudi jail and has since been banned from leaving the country, won't face a similar fate. He has appealed to Trump via Speaker Mike Johnson to help get his father home. "He fears that every knock on the door is someone coming to take him back to prison," Ibrahim, who lives in Florida, said of his father. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump tours Middle East with eye on business and diplomacy
Middle East Eye
05-02-2025
- Business
- Middle East Eye
Sorry Trump, Palestinians aren't going to fall for 'Make Gaza Great Again'
So the Gaza Strip has been added to US President Donald Trump's wide geopolitical vision of remaking the world. After Greenland, Canada and the Panama Canal, Trump is eyeing the world's biggest open-air rubble storage site. He has vowed to rebuild the 'hellish' territory into a wonderful real-estate development, perhaps including a series of Mar-a-Lago-style resorts along the Mediterranean coast. The setting for this announcement was ripe with macabre irony, as he made it sitting next to the man who over the past year has turned Gaza into a hellscape: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Sadly, no journalist among those admitted into the Oval Office dared to highlight these outrageous circumstances. In addition to MAGA (Make America Great Again) and Elon Musk's MEGA (Make Europe Great Again), we now have a version for Palestine: 'Make Gaza Great Again'. It is not yet clear how serious Trump's statement is. The last time the US tried to build something in Gaza - a $320m floating pier to facilitate the entry of humanitarian aid for the devastated Palestinian population - it was operational for just a few weeks, and allowed just a tiny fraction of the massive amount of needed aid into the enclave. The project was swiftly abandoned. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters This time, US spending could be different, overseen by Musk's 'Department of Government Efficiency'; perhaps, for the first time, the government could give real meaning to the obsessive Biden-era slogan of 'Build Back Better'. But there is a major problem: what happens to the approximately two million Palestinians who live in Gaza while reconstruction is under way? Trump has indicated that they cannot stay there while their land becomes a construction site for his massive proposed real-estate development. Hard facts Trump seems confident that neighbouring countries will take Palestinians in, but when thinking about neighbours, his notion is quite limited, and excludes the country that shares the longest land border with Gaza: Israel. In his view, Palestinians should go to Egypt, Jordan and elsewhere. Trump does not appear to care about the joint statement issued by Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates on 1 February, in which they rejected the idea of a forced transfer of the Palestinian population. Follow Middle East Eye's live coverage of the Israel-Palestine war Perhaps he is confident that he can change their minds. If persuasion doesn't work, he has other tools at his disposal, such as tariffs - which he has used to push Canada and Mexico to implement stringent border measures - or cutting aid. Why shouldn't this work with Arab states? But as far as we know, Palestinians in Gaza will not accept being deported. In recent weeks, hundreds of thousands of them have been marching from the south to the north of Gaza to return to where their houses are - or were. Full text of Trump and Netanyahu's explosive news conference Read More » They preferred to go back to their now-scorched land, rather than to consider alternatives. These are the hard facts that Trump and Netanyahu should be aware of. More than seven decades of tragic historical experience have taught a hard lesson to all Palestinians: if they vacate their land, they will never be allowed to return. And if the Israeli army, with its endless funding and ruthless military tactics, could not prevail over Hamas during the recent 15-month war, it is safe to assume that no one else will. To achieve what he is dreaming about in Gaza, Trump would have to deploy US armed forces to dislodge the Palestinian people. Does he really want to inaugurate his presidency and cut further into the US budget by deploying American military forces in another Middle Eastern war - a war that one of the world's best-equipped armies has been unable to win? Dangerous trade-off If all the hundreds of billions of dollars that the US has spent in supporting Israel, which itself has used the funds in its decades-long quest to destroy the Palestinian people, had instead been given to Palestinians, then each household would have had the resources to resettle in luxury anywhere in the world. Unfortunately, for people accustomed to monetising everything, like Trump and Netanyahu, it is not possible to understand that there is something money cannot buy: dignity. Are Trump and Netanyahu sure that owning Gaza is worth the loss of Egypt and Jordan? Palestinians want self-determination in their own independent and sovereign state, built on their land, which even today is just around one-fifth of historical Palestine. Their rights and dignity are not for sale. But there is another crucial point that the US president and Israeli prime minister are dangerously missing. Transferring two million Palestinians to Egypt and Jordan, two fragile economies riddled with significant internal tensions, could collapse their ruling systems. Egypt and Jordan are not just two Arab states neighbouring Israel; they are also its main local security partners through the deep cooperation among their respective security and intelligence services, engaged in preventing daily hostile actions against Israel. The collapse of the Egyptian and Jordanian regimes would compromise this cooperation. Are Trump and Netanyahu sure that owning Gaza is worth the loss of Egypt and Jordan? The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.
