Memorial for David Johnson of the San Quentin 6
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A Trial Date Is Set on August 26 for Alejandro Orellana, Join the Call for National Protests to Drop the Charges!
https://stopfbi.org/news/a-trial-date-is-set-on-august-26-for-alejandro-orellana-join-the-call-for-national-protests-to-drop-the-charges/
A trial date of August 26 was set for immigrant rights activist Alejandro Orellana at his July 3 court appearance in front of a room packed with supporters. Orellana was arrested by the FBI on June 12 for protesting against ICE in Los Angeles. He faces up to 5 years in prison for two bogus federal charges: conspiracy to commit civil disorder, and aiding and abetting civil disorder.
The Committee to Stop FBI Repression is calling for a national day of protests on the first day of Orellana's trial, August 26th, to demand that the charges be dropped. To everyone who believes in the right to free speech, to protest ICE, and to say no to deportations, we urge you to organize a local protest on that day at the nearest federal courthouse.
Orellana has spent much of his adult life fighting for justice for Chicanos, Latinos, and many others. He has opposed the killings of Chicanos and Latinos by the LAPD, such as 14-year-old Jesse Romero, stood against US wars, protested in defense of others targeted by political repression, and has been a longtime member of the activist group, Centro CSO, based out of East LA. His life is full of examples of courage, integrity, and a dedication to justice.
In contrast, the US Attorney who charged him, Bilal Essayli, believes in Trump's racist MAGA vision and does a lot to carry it out. He defended Trump's decision to defy the state of California and deploy the California National Guard to put down anti-ICE protests. Essayli has charged other protesters, including David Huerta, the president of the Service Employees International Union California, who was held on a $50,000 bond.
Another Centro CSO immigrants rights activist, Verita Topete, was ambushed by the FBI on June 26. They served her a warrant and seized her phone. Orellana and his fellow organizers like Topete stand for the community that protested Trump last month. Essayli represents Trump’s attempts to crush that movement.
This case against Orellana is political repression, meant to stop the growth of the national immigrants rights movement. The basis for his arrest was the claim that he drove a truck carrying face shields for protesters, as police geared up to put down protests with rubber bullets. People of conscience are standing with Orellana. because nothing he did or is accused of doing is wrong. There is no crime in protesting Trump, deportations, and ICE. To protest is his - and our - First Amendment right. It’s up to us to make sure that Essayli and Trump fail to repress this movement and silence Orellana's supporters.
Just as he stood up for immigrants last month, we call on everyone to stand up for Orellana on August 26 and demand the charges be dropped. On the June 27 National Day of Action for Alejandro Orellana, at least 16 cities held protests or press conferences in front of their federal courthouses. We’ll make sure there are even more on August 26. In addition to planning local protests, we ask that organizations submit statements of support and to join in the call to drop the charges.
You can find protest organizing materials on our website, stopfbi.org. Please send information about your local protests and any statements of support to stopfbi@gmail.com. We will see you in the streets!
On August 26, Protest at Your Federal Courthouse for Alejandro Orellana!
Drop the Charges Now!
Protesting ICE Is Not a Crime!
Copyright © 2025 Committee to Stop FBI Repression, All rights reserved.
Thanks for your ongoing interest in the fight against FBI repression of anti-war and international solidarity activists!
Our mailing address is:
Committee to Stop FBI Repression
PO Box 14183
Minneapolis, MN 55414
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Dear Organization Coordinator
I hope this message finds you well. I’m reaching out to invite your organization to consider co-sponsoring a regional proposal to implement Free Public Transit throughout the San Francisco Bay Area.
This initiative directly supports low-income families, working people, seniors, youth, and others who rely on public transportation. It would eliminate fare barriers while helping to address climate justice, congestion, and air pollution—issues that disproportionately affect disadvantaged communities.
We believe your organization’s mission and values align strongly with this proposal. We are seeking endorsements, co-sponsorship, and coalition-building with groups that advocate for economic and racial equity.
I would love the opportunity to share a brief proposal or speak further if you're interested. Please let me know if there’s a staff member or program director I should connect with.
A description of our proposal is below:
sharethemoneyinstitute@gmail.com
Opinion: San Francisco Bay Area Should Provide Free Public Transportation
The San Francisco Bay Area is beautiful, with fantastic weather, food, diversity and culture. We’re also internationally famous for our progressiveness, creativity, and innovation.
I believe the next amazing world-leading feature we can add to our cornucopia of attractions is Free Public Transportation. Imagine how wonderful it would be if Muni, BART, Caltrain, AC Transit, SamTrans, SF Bay Ferries, and all the other transportation services were absolutely free?
Providing this convenience would deliver enormous, varied benefits to the 7.6 million SF Bay Area residents, and would make us a lovable destination for tourists.
This goal - Free Public Transportation - is ambitious, but it isn’t impossible, or even original. Truth is, many people world-wide already enjoy free rides in their smart municipalities.
New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani is promoting free transit, with a plan that’s gained the endorsement of economists from Chile, United Kingdom, Greece, and the USA.
The entire nation of Luxembourg has offered free public transportation to both its citizens and visitors since 2020. Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, has given free transit to its residents since 2013. In France, thirty-five cities provide free public transportation. Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia, offers free rides to seniors, disabled, and students. In Maricá (Brazil) – the entire municipal bus system is free. Delhi (India) – offers free metro and bus travel for women. Madrid & Barcelona (Spain) offer free (or heavily discounted) passes to youth and seniors.
Even in the USA, free public transit is already here. Kansas City, Missouri, has enjoyed a free bus system free since 2020. Olympia, Washington, has fully fare-free intercity transit. Missoula, Montana, is free for all riders. Columbia, South Carolina, has free buses, and Chapel Hill, North Carolina, has enjoyed free transit for over a decade. Ithaca, New York, and Madison, Wisconsin, offer free transit to students.
But if the San Francisco Bay Area offered free transit, we’d be the LARGEST municipality in the world to offer universal Free Transit to everyone, resident and visitor alike. (Population of Luxembourg is 666,430. Kansas City 510,704. Population of San Francisco Bay Area is 7.6 million in the nine-county area)
Providing free transit would be tremendously beneficial to millions of people, for three major reasons:
1. Combat Climate Change - increased public ridership would reduce harmful CO2 fossil fuel emissions. Estimates from Kansas City and Tallinn Estonia’s suggest an increase in ridership of 15 percent. Another estimate from a pilot project in New York City suggests a ridership increase of 30 percent. These increases in people taking public transportation instead of driving their own cars indicates a total reduction of 5.4 - 10.8 tons of emissions would be eliminated, leading to better air quality, improved public health, and long-term climate gains.
2. Reduce Traffic Congestion & Parking Difficulty - Estimates suggest public transit would decrease traffic congestion in dense urban areas and choke points like the Bay Bridge by up to 15 percent. Car ownership would also be reduced. Traffic in San Francisco is the second-slowest in the USA (NYC is #1) and getting worse every year. Parking costs in San Francisco are also the second-worst in the USA (NYC #1), and again, it is continually getting worse.
3. Promote Social Equity - Free transit removes a financial cost that hits low-income residents hard. Transportation is the second-biggest expense after housing for many Americans. In the Bay Area, a monthly Clipper pass can cost $86–$98 per system, and much more for multi-agency commuters. For people living paycheck-to-paycheck, this is a significant cost. People of color, immigrants, youth, seniors, and people with disabilities rely more heavily on public transit. 55–70% of frequent transit riders in the Bay Area are from low-to moderate-income households, but these riders usually pay more per mile of transit than wealthy drivers. Free fares equalize access regardless of income or geography.
Free transit would help people 1) take jobs they couldn’t otherwise afford to commute to, thus improving the economy, 2) Stay in school without worrying about bus fare, 3) Get to appointments, child care, or grocery stores without skipping meals to afford transit.
To conclude: Free Public Transit should be seen as a civil rights and economic justice intervention.
The Cost? How can San Francisco Bay Area pay for Free Transit throughout our large region?
ShareTheMoney.Institute estimates the cost as $1.5 billion annually. This sum can acquired via multiple strategies. Corvallis, Oregon, has had free public bus service since 2011, paid for by a $3.63 monthly fee added to each utility bill. Missoula, Montana, funds their fare-free Mountain Line transit system, via a property tax mill levy. Madison, Wisconsin’s transit is supported by general fund revenues, state and federal grants, and partnerships/sponsorships from local businesses and organizations.
Ideally, we’d like the funds to be obtained from the 37 local billionaires who, combined, have an approximate wealth of $885 billion. The $1.5 billion for free transit is only 0.17% of the local billionaire's wealth. Sponsorship from the ultra-wealthy would be ideal. Billionaires can view the “fair transit donation” they are asked to contribute not as punishment or an “envy tax”, but as their investment to create a municipality that is better for everyone, themselves included. They can pride themselves on instigating a world-leading, legacy-defining reform that will etch their names in history as leaders of a bold utopian reform.
Our motto: “we want to move freely around our beautiful bay”
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Hank Pellissier - Share The Money Institute
Reverend Gregory Stevens - Unitarian Universalist EcoSocialist Network
*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*  Russia Confirms Jailing of Antiwar Leader Boris Kagarlitsky In a secret trial on June 5, 2024, the Russian Supreme Court’s Military Chamber confirmed a sentence of five years in a penal colony for left-wing sociologist and online journalist Boris Kagarlitsky. His crime? “Justifying terrorism” — a sham charge used to silence opponents of Putin’s war on Ukraine. The court disregarded a plea for freedom sent by thirty-seven international luminaries. Kagarlitsky, a leading Marxist thinker in Russia’s post-Soviet period, recently addressed socialists who won’t criticize Putin: “To my Western colleagues, who…call for an understanding of Putin and his regime, I would like to ask a very simple question. [Would] you want to live in a country where there is no free press or independent courts? In a country where the police have the right to break into your house without a warrant? …In a country which…broadcasts appeals on TV to destroy Paris, London, Warsaw, with a nuclear strike?” Thousands of antiwar critics have been forced to flee Russia or are behind bars, swept up in Putin’s vicious crackdown on dissidents. Opposition to the war is consistently highest among the poorest workers. Recently, RusNews journalists Roman Ivanov and Maria Ponomarenko were sentenced to seven, and six years respectively, for reporting the military’s brutal assault on Ukraine. A massive global solidarity campaign that garnered support from thousands was launched at Kagarlitsky’s arrest. Now, it has been revived. This internationalism will bolster the repressed Russian left and Ukrainian resistance to Putin’s imperialism. To sign the online petition at freeboris.info —Freedom Socialist Party, August 2024 https://socialism.com/fs-article/russia-jails-prominent-antiwar-leader-boris-kagarlitsky/#:~:text=In%20a%20secret%20trial%20on,of%20Putin's%20war%20on%20Ukraine. Petition in Support of Boris KagarlitskyWe, the undersigned, were deeply shocked to learn that on February 13 the leading Russian socialist intellectual and antiwar activist Dr. Boris Kagarlitsky (65) was sentenced to five years in prison. Dr. Kagarlitsky was arrested on the absurd charge of 'justifying terrorism' in July last year. After a global campaign reflecting his worldwide reputation as a writer and critic of capitalism and imperialism, his trial ended on December 12 with a guilty verdict and a fine of 609,000 roubles. The prosecution then appealed against the fine as 'unjust due to its excessive leniency' and claimed falsely that Dr. Kagarlitsky was unable to pay the fine and had failed to cooperate with the court. In fact, he had paid the fine in full and provided the court with everything it requested. On February 13 a military court of appeal sent him to prison for five years and banned him from running a website for two years after his release. The reversal of the original court decision is a deliberate insult to the many thousands of activists, academics, and artists around the world who respect Dr. Kagarlitsky and took part in the global campaign for his release. The section of Russian law used against Dr. Kagarlitsky effectively prohibits free expression. The decision to replace the fine with imprisonment was made under a completely trumped-up pretext. Undoubtedly, the court's action represents an attempt to silence criticism in the Russian Federation of the government's war in Ukraine, which is turning the country into a prison. The sham trial of Dr. Kagarlitsky is the latest in a wave of brutal repression against the left-wing movements in Russia. Organizations that have consistently criticized imperialism, Western and otherwise, are now under direct attack, many of them banned. Dozens of activists are already serving long terms simply because they disagree with the policies of the Russian government and have the courage to speak up. Many of them are tortured and subjected to life-threatening conditions in Russian penal colonies, deprived of basic medical care. Left-wing politicians are forced to flee Russia, facing criminal charges. International trade unions such as IndustriALL and the International Transport Federation are banned and any contact with them will result in long prison sentences. There is a clear reason for this crackdown on the Russian left. The heavy toll of the war gives rise to growing discontent among the mass of working people. The poor pay for this massacre with their lives and wellbeing, and opposition to war is consistently highest among the poorest. The left has the message and resolve to expose the connection between imperialist war and human suffering. Dr. Kagarlitsky has responded to the court's outrageous decision with calm and dignity: “We just need to live a little longer and survive this dark period for our country,” he said. Russia is nearing a period of radical change and upheaval, and freedom for Dr. Kagarlitsky and other activists is a condition for these changes to take a progressive course. We demand that Boris Kagarlitsky and all other antiwar prisoners be released immediately and unconditionally. We also call on the authorities of the Russian Federation to reverse their growing repression of dissent and respect their citizens' freedom of speech and right to protest. Sign to Demand the Release of Boris Kagarlitskyhttps://freeboris.infoThe petition is also available on Change.org *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* *..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........*..........* |
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Mumia Abu-Jamal is Innocent!
FREE HIM NOW!
Write to Mumia at:
Smart Communications/PADOC
Mumia Abu-Jamal #AM-8335
SCI Mahanoy
P.O. Box 33028
St. Petersburg, FL 33733
Join the Fight for Mumia's Life
Since September, Mumia Abu-Jamal's health has been declining at a concerning rate. He has lost weight, is anemic, has high blood pressure and an extreme flair up of his psoriasis, and his hair has fallen out. In April 2021 Mumia underwent open heart surgery. Since then, he has been denied cardiac rehabilitation care including a healthy diet and exercise.
Donate to Mumia Abu-Jamal's Emergency Legal and Medical Defense Fund, Official 2024
Mumia has instructed PrisonRadio to set up this fund. Gifts donated here are designated for the Mumia Abu-Jamal Medical and Legal Defense Fund. If you are writing a check or making a donation in another way, note this in the memo line.
Send to:
Mumia Medical and Legal Fund c/o Prison Radio
P.O. Box 411074, San Francisco, CA 94103
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Updates From Kevin Cooper
A Never-ending Constitutional Violation
A summary of the current status of Kevin Cooper’s case by the Kevin Cooper Defense Committee
On October 26, 2023, the law firm of Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, LLP wrote a rebuttal in response to the Special Counsel's January 13, 2023 report upholding the conviction of their client Kevin Cooper. A focus of the rebuttal was that all law enforcement files were not turned over to the Special Counsel during their investigation, despite a request for them to the San Bernardino County District Attorney's office.
On October 29, 2023, Law Professors Lara Bazelon and Charlie Nelson Keever, who run the six member panel that reviews wrongful convictions for the San Francisco County District Attorney's office, published an OpEd in the San Francisco Chronicle calling the "Innocence Investigation” done by the Special Counsel in the Cooper case a “Sham Investigation” largely because Cooper has unsuccessfully fought for years to obtain the police and prosecutor files in his case. This is a Brady claim, named for the U.S. Supreme court’s 1963 case establishing the Constitutional rule that defendants are entitled to any information in police and prosecutor's possession that could weaken the state's case or point to innocence. Brady violations are a leading cause of wrongful convictions. The Special Counsel's report faults Cooper for not offering up evidence of his own despite the fact that the best evidence to prove or disprove Brady violations or other misconduct claims are in those files that the San Bernardino County District Attorney's office will not turn over to the Special Counsel or to Cooper's attorneys.
On December 14, 2023, the president of the American Bar Association (ABA), Mary Smith, sent Governor Gavin Newsom a three page letter on behalf of the ABA stating in part that Mr.Cooper's counsel objected to the state's failure to provide Special Counsel all documents in their possession relating to Mr.Cooper's conviction, and that concerns about missing information are not new. For nearly 40 years Mr.Cooper's attorneys have sought this same information from the state.
On December 19, 2023, Bob Egelko, a journalist for the San Francisco Chronicle wrote an article about the ABA letter to the Governor that the prosecutors apparently withheld evidence from the Governor's legal team in the Cooper case.
These are just a few recent examples concerning the ongoing failure of the San Bernardino County District Attorney to turn over to Cooper's attorney's the files that have been requested, even though under the law and especially the U.S. Constitution, the District Attorney of San Bernardino county is required to turn over to the defendant any and all material and or exculpatory evidence that they have in their files. Apparently, they must have something in their files because they refuse to turn them over to anyone.
The last time Cooper's attorney's received files from the state, in 2004, it wasn't from the D.A. but a Deputy Attorney General named Holly Wilkens in Judge Huff's courtroom. Cooper's attorneys discovered a never before revealed police report showing that a shirt was discovered that had blood on it and was connected to the murders for which Cooper was convicted, and that the shirt had disappeared. It had never been tested for blood. It was never turned over to Cooper's trial attorney, and no one knows where it is or what happened to it. Cooper's attorneys located the woman who found that shirt on the side of the road and reported it to the Sheriff's Department. She was called to Judge Huff's court to testify about finding and reporting that shirt to law enforcement. That shirt was the second shirt found that had blood on it that was not the victims’ blood. This was in 2004, 19 years after Cooper's conviction.
It appears that this ongoing constitutional violation that everyone—from the Special Counsel to the Governor's legal team to the Governor himself—seems to know about, but won't do anything about, is acceptable in order to uphold Cooper's conviction.
But this type of thing is supposed to be unacceptable in the United States of America where the Constitution is supposed to stand for something other than a piece of paper with writing on it. How can a Governor, his legal team, people who support and believe in him ignore a United States citizen’s Constitutional Rights being violated for 40 years in order to uphold a conviction?
This silence is betrayal of the Constitution. This permission and complicity by the Governor and his team is against everything that he and they claim to stand for as progressive politicians. They have accepted the Special Counsel's report even though the Special Counsel did not receive the files from the district attorney that may not only prove that Cooper is innocent, but that he was indeed framed by the Sheriff’s Department; and that evidence was purposely destroyed and tampered with, that certain witnesses were tampered with, or ignored if they had information that would have helped Cooper at trial, that evidence that the missing shirt was withheld from Cooper's trial attorney, and so much more.
Is the Governor going to get away with turning a blind eye to this injustice under his watch?
Are progressive people going to stay silent and turn their eyes blind in order to hopefully get him to end the death penalty for some while using Cooper as a sacrificial lamb?
An immediate act of solidarity we can all do right now is to write to Kevin and assure him of our continuing support in his fight for justice. Here’s his address:
Kevin Cooper #C65304
Cell 107, Unit E1C
California Health Care Facility, Stockton (CHCF)
P.O. Box 213040
Stockton, CA 95213
www.freekevincooper.org
Call California Governor Newsom:
1-(916) 445-2841
Press 1 for English or 2 for Spanish,
press 6 to speak with a representative and
wait for someone to answer
(Monday-Friday, 9:00 A.M. to 5:00 P.M. PST—12:00 P.M. to 8:00 P.M. EST)
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Resources for Resisting Federal Repression
https://www.nlg.org/federalrepressionresources/
Since June of 2020, activists have been subjected to an increasingly aggressive crackdown on protests by federal law enforcement. The federal response to the movement for Black Lives has included federal criminal charges for activists, door knocks by federal law enforcement agents, and increased use of federal troops to violently police protests.
The NLG National Office is releasing this resource page for activists who are resisting federal repression. It includes a link to our emergency hotline numbers, as well as our library of Know-Your-Rights materials, our recent federal repression webinar, and a list of some of our recommended resources for activists. We will continue to update this page.
Please visit the NLG Mass Defense Program page for general protest-related legal support hotlines run by NLG chapters.
Emergency Hotlines
If you are contacted by federal law enforcement, you should exercise all of your rights. It is always advisable to speak to an attorney before responding to federal authorities.
State and Local Hotlines
If you have been contacted by the FBI or other federal law enforcement, in one of the following areas, you may be able to get help or information from one of these local NLG hotlines for:
Portland, Oregon: (833) 680-1312
San Francisco, California: (415) 285-1041 or fbi_hotline@nlgsf.org
Seattle, Washington: (206) 658-7963
National Hotline
If you are located in an area with no hotline, you can call the following number:
National NLG Federal Defense Hotline: (212) 679-2811
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1) Despite Opposition, Netanyahu’s Cabinet to Discuss Gaza Military Push
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet with his cabinet on Thursday as the families of the hostages warn that moving into new areas could endanger the captives.
By Isabel Kershner, Reporting from Jerusalem, Aug. 6, 2025
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu plans to convene his security cabinet on Thursday to discuss expanding Israel’s military campaign into the rest of Gaza, even amid growing domestic criticism that such a step would endanger the lives of Israeli hostages held by Hamas and other armed groups in the enclave.
Mr. Netanyahu’s high-stakes proposal comes as the last military operation, which began in mid-March, has come to a virtual standstill and as negotiations with Hamas for a cease-fire and a hostage-for-prisoner exchange have reached an impasse.
A hunger crisis in Gaza, which many aid agencies and foreign governments blame on Israeli policies, has spurred an international diplomatic backlash against Israel, including from some of its closest traditional allies.
In Israel, the proposal to extend the military takeover of the enclave into the heart of Gaza City and central areas of the territory, where officials believe hostages are being held, is causing growing concern, especially among the families of the hostages and their supporters.
After two brief cease-fires and some rescue missions, 50 hostages remain in the enclave, of whom 20 are believed to be alive, according to Israeli officials.
The military says it already controls more than 75 percent of Gaza. Polls have shown that most Israelis want the war to end in a deal that would see the hostages released. But the Israeli government’s stated goal of “total victory” over Hamas has yet to be achieved.
“Hamas’s refusal to release the hostages obligates us to take additional decisions regarding the way to advance the goals of the war,” Israel Katz, Israel’s defense minister, said in a statement on Wednesday.
He listed those goals as “eliminating Hamas while creating the conditions for the hostages’ release and ensuring the safety of the Israeli communities,” meaning those near the Gaza border.
Mr. Netanyahu’s office told some Israeli reporters this week that he was discussing expanding the military campaign into the rest of Gaza, including areas where the hostages are thought to be held. The prime minister’s office said the military was opposed to maneuvering in those areas for fear of endangering the hostages.
But officials briefed on the government’s thinking said that no final decision had been made, and some Israeli analysts said that the proposal may be meant as a threat to try to pressure Hamas into making concessions for a deal.
Hamas has said it won’t agree to a deal without firm guarantees that the war will end. Israel is conditioning any end of the war on the group disarming, a demand Hamas has rejected so far.
Far-right members of Mr. Netanyahu’s governing coalition have been pressing for a full Israeli occupation of Gaza to pave the way for renewed Jewish settlement there 20 years after Israel withdrew its forces and settlers from the enclave. Mr. Netanyahu relies on their support to remain in power.
On Tuesday, thousands of Israelis protested around the country against the government’s plans to expand the fighting and take over all of Gaza.
“We will not allow the hostages to be sacrificed on the alter of a forever war — there must be a deal now,” the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a grass roots organization that has advocated for the captives and their families, said in a statement.
About 1,200 people were killed in the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which ignited the war, and about 250 more were taken to Gaza, according to the Israeli government.
Videos released over the weekend showed two living captives looking emaciated and frail, shocking many Israelis and raising questions about how much longer the men could survive.
More than 60,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel’s counteroffensive in Gaza, including thousands of children, according to Gaza health officials, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants. Most of the enclave’s two million residents have been displaced, often more than once, and much of the territory has been reduced to rubble.
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2) Trump demands a new U.S. census that excludes undocumented immigrants.
By Tyler Pager, Tyler Pager is a White House correspondent. He reported from Washington, August 7, 2025
President Trump said on Thursday that he had ordered the Commerce Department to begin work on a new census that excludes undocumented immigrants.
A new census would be a significant departure for a process stipulated by the Constitution to occur every 10 years. Historically, the census has counted all U.S. residents regardless of their immigration status, a process that helps determine both the allotment of congressional seats and billions of dollars in federal money sent to states.
“People who are in our Country illegally WILL NOT BE COUNTED IN THE CENSUS,” Mr. Trump wrote in a post on social media.
The push comes as Mr. Trump and his allies press Republican-led states to redraw their congressional maps to benefit the party. Congressional maps are redrawn after the census is completed based on the new data. The next census is scheduled for 2030.
Mr. Trump tried a similar move in 2020 to keep undocumented immigrants out of the census, but a federal court rejected that attempt, and the Supreme Court declined to intervene, saying at the time that doing so was premature. The president’s efforts to exert pressure on the Census Bureau, which is part of the Commerce Department, were also unsuccessful.
A spokesman for the Commerce Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
Later in the day, Vice President JD Vance is scheduled to travel to Indianapolis to meet with Gov. Mike Braun of Indiana and other top Republicans in the state to discuss redistricting. Mr. Trump and his allies have grown frustrated with their resistance to redraw maps to benefit Republicans.
Mr. Trump and his allies are engaged in other pressure campaigns in Texas, Missouri and Ohio as they try to squeeze out any additional seats before the midterm elections next year. With Republicans holding only a narrow majority in the House, they are worried that Democrats will regain control, start investigations into Mr. Trump and his administration, and hobble any legislative goals.
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3) As Trump Administration Plans to Burn Contraceptives, Europeans Are Alarmed
The U.S. government intends to incinerate $9.7 million in already-purchased birth control in Belgium after U.S.A.I.D shut down. Destruction may have already started.
By Jeanna Smialek and Stephanie Nolen, Aug. 7, 2025
The warehouse in Geel, Belgium, where millions of contraceptives bought by U.S.A.I.D. were stored when the U.S. government defunded the agency. Hilary Swift for The New York Times
The Trump administration’s plans to incinerate $9.7 million in birth control pills and other contraceptives stored in a Belgian warehouse have left European governments struggling as they try to prevent the destruction.
When the Trump administration abruptly defunded and dismantled the United States Agency for International Development, or U.S.A.I.D., earlier this year, millions of contraceptives it had purchased were stuck in Geel, Belgium. The pills, intrauterine devices and hormonal implants were destined for clinics in the poorest countries in Africa.
With the contraceptives in limbo, the contractor managing the supply explored selling it to outside organizations, including the United Nations’ main sexual and reproductive health agency, the U.N. Population Fund. The nonprofit MSI Reproductive Choices offered to take over the warehousing and redistribute the contraceptives at no cost to the United States.
But last month it emerged that the U.S. government had instead decided to burn the supplies, at a cost to the government of more than $160,000 in transport and incineration fees.
“U.S.A.I.D. was allegedly dismantled to prevent future wastage and to deliver value for money for the American people,” said Sarah Shaw, the associate director of advocacy at MSI Reproductive Choices. “It’s just egregious that they’re willing to waste $9 million worth of contraceptives that are so desperately needed.”
She added, “Women are going to die because they’ve not had access to those contraceptives.”
The decision to destroy the contraceptives has created alarm in Brussels and France as politicians scramble to figure out if the supplies have physically left the warehouse and how they can prevent their destruction.
The State Department confirmed in a statement that “a preliminary decision was made to destroy certain” birth control products. It declined to say exactly why the decision was made or to specify the current location or status of the products.
The department said the contraceptives that had been flagged for destruction were “abortifacient,” meaning that they work by inducing abortion. None of the supplies registered for storage in the Belgian warehouse fit that description, and U.S.A.I.D. was forbidden by law to purchase such products.
The department did not reply to repeated requests for clarification.
While earlier reports suggested that the supplies would be destroyed by the end of July in France, European governments, advocacy groups and an American congressional office all said they did not know whether the burning had actually begun.
“The guiding principle of my work is ‘go there.’ I want to hear directly from the people who are affected by disease, or lack of access to a new drug. I’ve been writing about global health for 30 years and have reported from more than 80 countries.”
It is not clear why the government would not sell or donate the contraceptives. The department, in its statement, referred to policies preventing the U.S. government from providing aid to overseas nongovernmental organizations that provide or help with access to abortions, based on a rule that the Trump administration reinstated.
And the United States recently refused to work with the U.N. Population Fund, citing other government policies.
The dissolution of U.S.A.I.D. has created a huge gap in the supply chain of contraceptives for the world’s poorest countries, because the United States was a major donor.
Siobhan Perkins, who was the procurement adviser for the U.S.A.I.D. contraception supply chain, said the products slated for destruction were enough to prevent approximately 362,000 unintended pregnancies, 110,000 unsafe abortions and 718 maternal deaths.
The contraceptive supplies in the Belgian warehouse would have been enough to supply Senegal for three years, Ms. Shaw, of the reproductive health group, said. Most of the products have a remaining shelf life of several years.
European governments are still hoping to stop the incineration. The Belgian government’s foreign office has been in talks with its American counterparts about an alternative plan.
“Foreign Affairs is exploring all possible avenues to prevent the destruction of these stocks, including their temporary relocation,” Florinda Baleci, a spokeswoman for the department, said in an email on Tuesday. She said that she could not confirm or deny whether the stock was still in Geel and that Belgium had “not officially received any information to the contrary.”
Attempts at negotiating a solution have, so far, been unsuccessful. The U.N. population agency spent weeks in April trying to buy the contraceptives from the United States’ contractor, said Udara Bandara, the U.N. official handling those negotiations.
He said the American side missed an April 25 deadline to discuss the terms of the deal and then missed another deadline on April 30. On May 8, the contractor wrote to ask if the U.N. group was still interested in the purchase. It was.
Mr. Bandara said he never heard back.
If the Belgian talks fall through, it is not clear what else European officials can do.
Politicians on the left in France have urged the government to seize the stockpile.
“We cannot allow an anti-choice ideology to be imposed on us within our own borders,” Marine Tondelier, the head of France’s Green party, wrote last month in an open letter to President Emmanuel Macron.
But France’s government has suggested that it cannot legally seize the drugs.
And while Mélissa Camara, a French member of European Parliament for the Greens, wrote the European Commission was asking it to intervene diplomatically, the commission has merely said it is monitoring the situation and exploring solutions.
Aurelien Breeden and Koba Ryckewaert contributed reporting.
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4) How a Pro-Palestinian Group Fell Foul of a Long Unused U.K. Terrorism Law
The protest group Palestine Action does not promote violence against people. But after it damaged military property, the British government banned it as a terrorist organization.
By Lizzie Dearden, Aug. 7, 2025
Lizzie Dearden has reported on terrorism cases in Britain since 2014.
A demonstration in London in July. The British government has put Palestine Action, a protest group, on the same legal footing as groups like Al Qaeda in response to actions related to property damage. Credit...Dan Kitwood/Getty Images
Days before the American-led invasion of Iraq, five protesters broke into a British military base, intent on disabling aircraft that were set to be deployed in bombing missions.
It was March 2003, and the group said it wanted to prevent war crimes and protect civilians. Among those who later defended them in court was a 43-year-old human rights lawyer.
His name was Keir Starmer.
In a strange echo, 22 years later, Mr. Starmer would face a similar case, but now as prime minister of Britain.
In June, activists from a group called Palestine Action broke into a Royal Air Force base, sprayed red paint into aircraft engines and damaged the planes with crowbars. Like the 2003 group, the protesters argued that their actions were a justified response to mass civilian harm — this time in Gaza.
Both cases raised serious concerns about the security of Britain’s military bases. But a very different result ensued. While the protesters in 2003 were prosecuted under criminal laws against property damage, in June, Mr. Starmer’s government announced that Palestine Action would be added to its list of banned terrorist organizations, alongside groups including Al Qaeda, Hezbollah and Atomwaffen Division, a neo-Nazi group.
It was the first time in modern British history, according to the government’s adviser on counterterrorism laws, that a protest group that does not call for violence against people had been proscribed as a terrorist organization. The decision has fueled an intense debate over the Starmer government’s attitude toward protest and free speech.
The home secretary, Yvette Cooper, who is responsible for law enforcement and national security, said that Palestine Action had put national security at risk and that it met the government’s legal definition of terrorism because those terms included “serious damage to property.” The group has repeatedly damaged facilities linked to military companies, including Elbit Systems, an Israeli weapons manufacturer, and also vandalized President Trump’s Turnberry golf resort in Scotland in March.
But the United Nations’ human rights chief, Volker Türk, publicly called for the British government to drop the ban, which he called a “disproportionate and unnecessary” move that stretched counterterrorism powers beyond “clear boundaries.”
The origins of this moment can be traced back a quarter-century, when the legislation used to ban Palestine Action was introduced.
The Terrorism Act of 2000 was drawn up to replace years of piecemeal security laws that had largely targeted dissident Irish republican groups like the Irish Republican Army. In a 1998 document outlining its proposals, the government of Prime Minister Tony Blair said it wanted a future-proof definition that could apply to “all forms of terrorism,” voicing concerns about potential violence from Islamist extremists, nationalists and animal rights groups.
The resulting law is conspicuously broad. It defines terrorism as “the use or threat of action” that: involves serious violence against a person or endangers someone’s life, or serious damage to property; creates a serious risk to the health or safety of the public, or is designed to seriously disrupt or interfere with an electronic system.
To meet the definition, these threats or actions must be designed to influence the government or intimidate the public, and be “for the purpose of advancing a political, religious, racial or ideological cause.”
The inclusion of the “damage to property” clause was sharply criticized from the start, with several lawmakers trying to remove it from the legislation as it passed through Parliament.
One lawmaker, Mark Fisher, called it “baffling and disturbing,” while another, Simon Hughes, said the proposed definition of terrorism “stretches the English language too far,” and added: “If someone attacks a field of corn, there is perfectly good legislation dealing with criminal damage and damage to property.” (At the time, Britain was dealing with direct action protests against genetically modified food.)
But the government, which had a large majority, overruled them. The Home Office minister at the time, Charles Clarke, told Parliament the clause was needed because of I.R.A. bombings that destroyed buildings but did not injure people as a result of advance warnings.
Another government minister at the time, Mike Gapes, rejected the idea that people protesting against genetically modified food would be prosecuted as terrorists, calling those warnings “scare-story scenarios that are designed to frighten people off from introducing effective legislation to combat terrorism.”
For a time, it seemed the concerns were indeed overblown. Until this year, no government had invoked the “damage to property” clause alone to ban a group, and its existence had largely disappeared from public debate.
Labour says it is using it now because of Palestine Action’s escalating campaign of “direct criminal action” since it was created in 2020. David Hanson, a Home Office minister, told Parliament last month the group targeted “key national infrastructure and defense firms that provide services and supplies to support our efforts in Ukraine, NATO, our Five Eyes allies and the U.K. defense enterprise.”
He accused some members of responding violently to the police or security guards who tried to stop them, and he added: “We would not tolerate this activity from organizations if they were motivated by Islamist or extreme right-wing ideologies, and therefore I cannot tolerate it from Palestine Action.”
But for several lawmakers, the ban distorts the definition of terrorism and has far-reaching and disturbing implications.
Peter Hain, a Labour former government minister who now sits in the House of Lords, argued in response to Mr. Hanson that his own direct action against apartheid in South Africa would have led to his being “stigmatized as a terrorist today” and noted that Britain’s suffragettes “used violence against property in a strategic manner to demand voting rights for women.”
Raza Husain, a lawyer representing Palestine Action, argued in the High Court in London last month that the government had not presented evidence of any risk to national security, calling its decision an “authoritarian abuse of statutory power” that “demeans the notion of terrorism.”
Now that Palestine Action is banned, any show of support for it — including wearing a T-shirt displaying its logo — can result in arrest, as can donating to the group, being a member or arranging meetings.
In July, hours after the order came into force, 29 people, including an 83-year-old priest, were arrested outside Parliament for holding signs reading: “I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action.”
On Thursday, three people arrested at that protest became the first in England and Wales to be charged as a result of the ban, the Crown Prosecution Service said. The Metropolitan Police announced that two women, ages 53 and 71, and a 71-year-old man were being prosecuted for “showing support for Palestine Action.”
On Saturday, hundreds of protesters in London are expected to hold signs bearing the same statement as those held by protesters in July as part of a demonstration against the ban. The police said they could “expect to be arrested” and “investigated to the full extent of the law.”
Other protesters have been swept up in the policing crackdown. On July 14, Laura Murton was demonstrating in Canterbury, southeast of London, with a Palestinian flag and signs reading “Free Gaza” and “Israel is committing genocide” when she was approached by two armed police officers.
A video filmed by Ms. Murton shows an officer telling her she could be arrested for “expressing an opinion or belief that is supportive” of Palestine Action, while Ms. Murton repeatedly says she had not expressed support for the group.
One officer says they are “trying to be fair,” adding: “We could have jumped out, arrested you, dragged you off in a van.”
Ms. Murton told The New York Times she felt “intimidated” into giving her details to the officers, and only found out she was not being investigated for any offense when she read news media coverage of the episode.
“When you give these additional sweeping powers,” she said, “we end up in a situation where we have people in the police who make broad interpretations of the law.”
On July 30, Palestine Action won permission from the High Court to bring a legal challenge against the ban, but the case will not be heard until November at the earliest. The judge, Martin Chamberlain, said in his ruling that the “police and others appear to have misunderstood the law on some occasions,” and that their actions were “liable to have a chilling effect on those wishing to express legitimate political views.”
Milo Comerford, who has been researching the evolution of counterterrorism in Britain at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a research institute in London, told The New York Times that it was “very clear how the Terrorism Act related to the threat landscape” in the era dominated by Al Qaeda after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. But he said the law was “designed to deal with very different” types of organization than Palestine Action.
Mr. Comerford questioned whether the government had “effectively made the case” for using “extraordinary” powers against the group. Numerous Palestine Action activists had previously been prosecuted under criminal damage laws.
In an earlier ruling on the case, Justice Chamberlain acknowledged that designating Palestine Action as a terrorist group “may have wider consequences for the way the public understands the concept of ‘terrorism’ and for public confidence” in Britain’s counterterrorism laws.
But he added: “If it is problematic that those who use or threaten action which involves serious damage to property but do not target or aim to endanger people are ‘terrorists,’ the problem lies with the statute and has existed for 25 years.”
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5) Netanyahu Says Israel Wants to Take Military Control of All of Gaza
Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, made the remarks ahead of a security cabinet meeting, although military leaders are wary of expanding operations in the territory.
The Israeli military says it controls about 75 percent of Gaza. The coastal strip stretching from Gaza City in the north of the enclave to Khan Younis in the south is the main area that is outside Israeli control. Ohad Zwigenberg/Associated Press
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that Israel planned to take control of all of Gaza, bucking the advice of the Israeli military and warnings that expanding operations could endanger the hostages being held there and kill more Palestinian civilians.
Mr. Netanyahu made the comments in an interview with Fox News ahead of a security cabinet meeting to discuss a proposal to expand military operations in Gaza. They came as talks to achieve a cease-fire and the release of the hostages have hit an impasse, with Israeli and Hamas officials blaming each other for the deadlock.
When asked whether Israel would take over all of Gaza, he responded, “We intend to.”
Mr. Netanyahu said the move would “assure our security,” remove Hamas from power, and would enable the transfer of the civilian administration of Gaza to another party.
“We want to liberate ourselves and the people of Gaza from the awful terror of Hamas,” he said in an excerpt from the interview, without providing details on any planned operation.
The prime minister, however, suggested Israel was not interested in maintaining permanent control over the entirety of Gaza. “We don’t want to keep it,” he added.
Israel’s security cabinet, a group of senior ministers, was set to convene on Thursday evening.
Even if the security cabinet votes in favor of seeking to take over the remainder of Gaza, it could be days or weeks before Israeli soldiers begin pushing deeper into the territory.
Expanding military action would also be in defiance of many countries’ urging Israel to end the nearly two-year war in Gaza. In recent weeks, Israel has come under growing pressure from some longstanding allies to do more to address a hunger crisis in the enclave.
The Israeli military’s chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, has pushed back against the potential plan, according to four Israeli security officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive issues. He has shared concerns about the exhaustion and fitness of reservists and about the military becoming responsible for governing millions of Palestinians, they said.
The military leadership would prefer a new cease-fire instead of ramping up fighting, according to three of the officials.
In earlier stages of the war, Mr. Netanyahu and the Israeli military clashed about strategy. But the latest episode appeared to be the most significant showdown since the government appointed General Zamir in February.
At the time, members of the governing coalition hoped that he would be more closely aligned with their approach than his predecessor. In recent days, however, he has been criticized by some supporters of the government.
The Israeli military released comments made by General Zamir on Thursday in which he said “the culture of debate” was “a vital component of the I.D.F.’s overall culture — both internally and externally,” referring to the Israel Defense Forces.
“We will continue to express our position without fear,” he added. “That is the expectation we have of our commanders as well. The responsibility lies here, at this very table.
The military believes it could seize the remaining parts of Gaza within months, but setting up a system similar to the one it oversees in the Israeli-occupied West Bank would require up to five years of sustained combat, three of the security officials said. .
Israeli officials have emphasized that Mr. Netanyahu has not made a final decision on whether to expand the military campaign. Some analysts have said that he is threatening to widen the offensive to compel Hamas to offer concessions in the cease-fire negotiations.
On Tuesday, Mr. Netanyahu’s office said in a statement that the Israeli military would carry out any decision made by the security cabinet.
The Israeli military has said that it has conquered roughly 75 percent of Gaza. The coastal strip stretching from Gaza City in the north to Khan Younis in the south is the main area that is outside Israeli control. Many of the two million Palestinians in Gaza, including those displaced from their homes in the territory, have squeezed into tents, makeshift shelters and apartments in those areas.
“I think we’re going in the direction of a victory in the Gaza Strip,” Miki Zohar, Israel’s culture and sports minister, said in an interview on Wednesday with Channel 14, a right-wing Israeli television station. “That means a complete conquering of the strip and control of every area in the strip.”
Members of Israel’s opposition and the families of the hostages held by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza have also cautioned against expanding the military operation.
“Conquering Gaza is a bad operational idea, a bad moral idea and a bad economic idea,” Yair Lapid, the leader of the parliamentary opposition, told reporters on Wednesday after a meeting with Mr. Netanyahu.
The families of hostages worry that extending Israeli control could lead to the military inadvertently killing their loved ones or to Hamas executing them.
About 250 people were taken hostage during the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, and more than three dozen hostages have been killed while in captivity, according to an investigation by The New York Times.
“Hamas is a brutal terrorist organization, and they’ll kill hostages if the military comes near them,” said Elhanan Danino, whose son, Ori, was killed by his captors a year ago when Israeli soldiers were operating near a tunnel in which he was being held in southern Gaza.
“Every moment they are being held there — being starved — puts their lives at risk,” Mr. Danino added. “I don’t want to see other hostages die the same way our son did.”
For Palestinian civilians, the possibility that Israel could escalate its operation has heightened fears that many more residents could be killed and that their already miserable living conditions in Gaza could become even worse.
“They’re talking about occupying areas that are packed with so many people,” said Mukhlis al-Masri, 34, who was forced to leave his home in northern Gaza and is now in Khan Younis. “If they do that, there will be incalculable killing. The situation will be more dangerous than anyone can imagine.”
On Sunday, Mr. al-Masri said that his brother, brother-in-law and four nephews and nieces had been killed and that his sister had been seriously wounded when a school-turned-shelter was bombed in Khan Younis. He said that he was staying in a tent near Al-Nasr Hospital in the city to be near his sister, who is in the intensive care unit there.
The Israeli military asked for more information about the incident but did not provide further comment. The military has said in the past that its strikes target militants and their weapons infrastructure in Gaza and has stressed that Hamas has embedded itself in civilian spaces.
Patrick Kingsley contributed reporting from Jerusalem.
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6) Trump Directs Military to Target Foreign Drug Cartels
The president has ordered the Pentagon to use the armed forces to carry out what in the past was considered law enforcement.
By Helene Cooper, Maggie Haberman, Charlie Savage and Eric Schmitt, Reporting from Washington, Aug. 8, 2025
“The order provides an official basis for the possibility of direct military operations at sea and on foreign soil against cartels.”
President George H.W. Bush sent more than 20,000 into Panama in 1989 in an action condemned by the United Nations. Manoocher Deghati/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
President Trump has secretly signed a directive to the Pentagon to begin using military force against certain Latin American drug cartels that his administration has deemed terrorist organizations, according to people familiar with the matter.
The decision to bring the American military into the fight is the most aggressive step so far in the administration’s escalating campaign against the cartels. It signals Mr. Trump’s continued willingness to use military forces to carry out what has primarily been considered a law enforcement responsibility to curb the flow of fentanyl and other illegal drugs.
The order provides an official basis for the possibility of direct military operations at sea and on foreign soil against cartels.
U.S. military officials have started drawing up options for how the military could go after the groups, the people familiar with the conversations said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive internal deliberations.
But directing the military to crack down on the illicit trade also raises legal issues, including whether it would count as “murder” if U.S. forces acting outside of a congressionally authorized armed conflict were to kill civilians — even criminal suspects — who pose no imminent threat.
It is unclear what White House, Pentagon and State Department lawyers have said about the new directive or whether the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel has produced an authoritative opinion assessing the legal issues.
Already this year Mr. Trump has deployed National Guard and active duty troops to the southwest border to choke off the flow of drugs as well as immigrants, and has increased surveillance and drug interdiction efforts.
When he returned to office in January, Mr. Trump signed an order directing the State Department to start labeling drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations.
In February, the State Department designated Tren de Aragua, Mara Salvatrucha (known as MS-13) and several other groups as foreign terrorist organizations, saying that they constituted “a national-security threat beyond that posed by traditional organized crime.”
Two weeks ago, the Trump administration added the Venezuelan Cartel de los Soles, or Cartel of the Suns, to a list of specially designated global terrorist groups, asserting that it is headed by President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela and other high-ranking officials in his administration.
On Thursday, the Justice and State Departments announced that the United States government is doubling a reward — to $50 million — for information leading to the arrest of Mr. Maduro, who has been indicted on drug trafficking charges. The administration again described him as a cartel head, and Attorney General Pam Bondi said he “will not escape justice and he will be held accountable for his despicable crimes.”
Asked about Mr. Trump’s authorization for military force against the cartels, Anna Kelly, a White House spokeswoman, said in an email that “President Trump’s top priority is protecting the homeland, which is why he took the bold step to designate several cartels and gangs as foreign terrorist organizations.”
The Defense Department declined to comment on the new directive.
Unilateral military assaults on cartels would be a marked escalation in the long drive to curb drug trafficking, putting U.S. forces in a lead role on the front lines against often well-armed and well-financed organizations. A sustained campaign would also likely raise further issues related to Mr. Trump’s push to use the military more aggressively to back a variety of his policies, often in the face of legal and constitutional constraints.
Past U.S. military involvement in countering drug operations in Latin America have sometimes pushed at legal limits. But those operations were framed as providing support for law enforcement authorities.
In 1989, President George H.W. Bush sent more than 20,000 troops into Panama to arrest its strongman leader, Manuel Noriega, who had been indicted in the United States on charges of drug trafficking.
Ahead of the operation, William P. Barr, who then led the Office of Legal Counsel and was the attorney general in Mr. Trump’s first term, wrote a disputed memo saying it was within Mr. Bush’s authority to direct law-enforcement arrests of fugitives overseas without the consent of foreign states. The United Nations General Assembly condemned the Panama action as a “flagrant violation of international law.”
In the 1990s, the U.S. military assisted Colombian and Peruvian antidrug law enforcement activities by sharing information about civilian flights suspected of carrying drugs — like radar data and communications intercepts. But after those governments started shooting down such planes, the Clinton administration in 1994 halted the assistance for months.
The Office of Legal Counsel produced an opinion saying that military officers who provided such information while knowing it would be used to summarily shoot down those aircraft could be putting themselves at risk of later prosecution. Congress eventually modified U.S. law to permit such assistance.
And the Navy has long participated in intercepting vessels in international waters that are suspected of smuggling drugs toward the United States. But naval ships typically do so as a law enforcement operation, working under the command of a U.S. Coast Guard officer. Under an 1878 law called the Posse Comitatus Act, it is generally illegal to use the military to perform law enforcement functions.
The U.S. military has also conducted joint antidrug training exercises with other countries, including with Colombian and Mexican troops. The military also provided equipment and aircraft to former Drug Enforcement Administration squads that mentored and deployed with — and sometimes got into firefights alongside — local antidrug officers in countries like Honduras. The program ended in 2017.
But Mr. Trump’s new directive appears to envision a different approach, focused on U.S. forces directly capturing or killing people involved in the drug trade.
Labeling the cartels as terrorist groups allows the United States “to use other elements of American power, intelligence agencies, the Department of Defense, whatever, to target these groups if we have an opportunity to do it,” Marco Rubio, the secretary of state and national security adviser, said on Thursday in an interview with the Catholic news outlet EWTN. “We have to start treating them as armed terrorist organizations, not simply drug dealing organizations.”
Legal specialists said that under U.S. law, imposing sanctions against a group by declaring it a “terrorist” entity can block its assets and make it harder for its members to do business or travel, but does not provide legal authority for wartime-style operations targeting it with armed force.
In his first term, Mr. Trump became captivated by the idea of bombing drug labs in Mexico, an idea his defense secretary at the time, Mark T. Esper, later portrayed as ludicrous in his memoir, and which provoked outrage from Mexican officials.
The idea of using military force, however, took root among Republicans and became a talking point in the 2024 election cycle. Mr. Trump vowed on the campaign trail to deploy Special Operations troops and naval forces to, as he put it, declare war on the cartels.
The retired Rear Adm. James E. McPherson, who served as the top uniformed lawyer for the navy in the early 2000s, said it would be “a major breach of international law” to use military force in another country’s territory and without its government’s consent unless certain exceptions were met, but that such limits do not apply to unflagged vessels in international waters.
There are also domestic legal constraints. Congress legally authorized the use of military force against Al Qaeda after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, but that authorization does not extend to any and all groups the executive branch calls terrorists.
That means military action against cartels would apparently have to rely on a claim about Mr. Trump’s constitutional authority to act in national self-defense, perhaps against fentanyl overdoses. Admiral McPherson noted that the administration has pushed aggressively broad understandings of Mr. Trump’s unilateral power.
It is not clear what rules of engagement would govern military action against cartels. But any operation that set out to kill people based on their suspected status as members of a sanctioned cartel, and outside the context of an armed conflict, would raise legal issues involving laws against murder and a longstanding executive order banning assassinations, said Brian Finucane, a former State Department lawyer who is a specialist in the laws of war.
“Under traditional executive branch lawyering, it would be hard to see some random drug trafficker meeting the threshold for the self-defense exception to the assassination ban,” he said.
Alternatively, the military could carry out capture operations, reserving lethal force for self-defense if troops met resistance.
But captures could raise other tricky legal issues, Mr. Finucane added, including about the scope of the military’s ability to hold prisoners as wartime-style detainees without congressional authorization. Or the military could instead transfer any prisoners to the Justice Department for prosecution in civilian court.
In February, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth fired the top lawyers for the military services, or judge advocates general. The three-star uniformed lawyers are supposed to give independent and nonpolitical advice about international laws of war and domestic legal constraints on the armed forces.
The administration has also largely sidelined the Office of Legal Counsel, the Justice Department arm that traditionally serves as a powerful gatekeeper in American government, including by deciding whether proposed policies are legally permissible.
Late last month, the Senate confirmed Earl Matthews to be Pentagon general counsel, and T. Elliot Gaiser to lead the Office of Legal Counsel. Interpreting what would be legally permissible in terms of using military force against cartels may be an early test for both of the new appointees.
The push to label cartels as terrorist organizations has extended to several that are based in Mexico, as well as a coalition of Haitian gangs that have helped plunge their country into chaos.
In April, Mr. Trump proposed to President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico that she allow the U.S. military to fight drug cartels on her nation’s soil, but she rejected the idea.
In announcing two weeks ago that it was imposing sanctions on the Venezuelan group Cartel de los Soles, the Treasury Department accused the cartel of providing material support to Tren de Aragua and the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico, which it said in turn were “threatening the peace and security of the United States.”
Two days later, Mr. Rubio issued a statement accusing Mr. Maduro of stealing elections and saying he was not the president of Venezuela and that his “regime is not the legitimate government.”
“Maduro is the leader of the designated narco-terrorist organization Cartel de los Soles, and he is responsible for trafficking drugs into the United States and Europe,” Mr. Rubio said. “Maduro, currently indicted by our nation, has corrupted Venezuela’s institutions to assist the cartel’s criminal narco-trafficking scheme into the United States.”
The question of how to combat cartels trafficking drugs, people and other illicit goods has animated much of Mr. Trump’s domestic and foreign policy in his second term.
Early on, the United States stepped up secret drone flights over Mexico to hunt for fentanyl labs, according to U.S. officials.
The covert program began under the Biden administration but intensified under Mr. Trump as he and his C.I.A. director, John Ratcliffe, vowed more aggressive action against Mexican cartels.
The C.I.A. has not been authorized to use the drones to take lethal action, and officials do not envision employing that option. For now, C.I.A. officers in Mexico pass information collected by the drones to Mexican officials.
In addition to the C.I.A.’s efforts, the U.S. military’s Northern Command has also expanded its surveillance of the border. But the U.S. military, unlike the spy agency, is not entering Mexican airspace. The Northern Command has conducted about 330 surveillance flights over the U.S. border with Mexico using a variety of surveillance aircraft including U-2s, RC-135 Rivet Joints, P-8s and drones, according to military officials.
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7) Netanyahu, Aiming to Capture Gaza City, Risks Ending in Familiar Deadlock
Time and again, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has pledged to defeat Hamas by force. The decision to capture Gaza City repeats a strategy that has failed in the past.
By Patrick Kingsley, Reporting from Jerusalem, Aug. 8, 2025
A camp on the Gaza coast for displaced Palestinians. Many civilians in the enclave have been trapped in a dystopian nightmare by the Israeli military campaign. Saher Alghorra for The New York Times
Throughout the war in Gaza, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has repeatedly said that he just needs one more military maneuver to finally defeat Hamas.
In April last year, Mr. Netanyahu said that Israel was merely “a step from victory” — as long as it captured Rafah, a city in southern Gaza. This March, with Rafah long decimated and Hamas still refusing to surrender, Mr. Netanyahu started a campaign that he promised would finally give Israel victory. When it did not, he launched an even broader operation in May that, three months later, has failed to dislodge Hamas’s battered remnants, while leaving many Palestinian civilians on the brink of starvation.
Now, Mr. Netanyahu is planning another major push after his cabinet voted on Friday to prepare to capture Gaza City, the main city in the enclave. That followed his announcement on Thursday that Israel would finally defeat Hamas by occupying all of Gaza and then handing it to “Arab forces that will govern it properly without threatening us.”
This latest endeavor, which may take weeks to begin, risks ending the same way as all his previous efforts: in a strategic dead-end, with Hamas still holding on by its fingertips, Israeli hostages still in Hamas’s grip, and Palestinian civilians trapped in a dystopian nightmare. Israel captured much of Gaza City in the first months of war, seizing some areas more than once, before relinquishing it all on the false assumption that Hamas had been defeated.
Mr. Netanyahu’s decision to expand the campaign yet again, despite intense international pressure to end the war, is even at odds with the views of Israel’s military leadership. The army is depleted after fighting what is already the longest high-intensity war in the country’s history. Fewer reservists, who form the bulk of Israel’s fighting force, are showing up for duty. The military’s stocks of munitions and spare parts are running down, officials say. And there has been a rise in deaths by suicide among discharged soldiers.
Once again, Mr. Netanyahu has prioritized his political needs by choosing to extend the war. Overriding top generals, some of whom say that Hamas has been damaged enough, the Israeli prime minister has given precedence to his far-right coalition allies, who say the war must continue until Hamas’s total destruction.
“Netanyahu has set himself an unachievable definition of success, and therefore the operation will never succeed,” said Thomas R. Nides, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel.
“The definition of success should be that Hamas can never attack Israel as it did on Oct. 7, 2023 — and that has already been achieved,” Mr. Nides said. “What Netanyahu defines as success — the complete elimination of every last Hamas member — is simply not achievable.”
In his pledge on Thursday to occupy all of Gaza, Mr. Netanyahu appeared to anticipate and try to soften such criticism by simultaneously promising that Israel would not seek to control the territory in the long term. In a concession to foreign critics, he said that Israel would eventually cede Gaza to Arab partners, a move that would upset his coalition partners, who want Israel to annex the territory and resettle it with Jewish civilians.
If Mr. Netanyahu is serious, his plan could offer a more hopeful future for the strip — one in which neither Hamas nor Israel controls it. It would also be a rare example of Mr. Netanyahu publicly engaging with the kind of fraught postwar planning that alienates much of his domestic base but that is necessary for the war to end.
Yet for now, Mr. Netanyahu’s thinking is still unacceptable for many in the Arab world.
The Egyptian foreign minister, Badr Abdelatty, said this week that his country was open to the idea of allowing an international force to keep the peace in Gaza.
But he also indicated that such a move needed to be in the context of a diplomatic process, rather than renewed hostilities, and one that led to the creation of a Palestinian state.
In general, analysts say, Arab governments only want to engage in Gaza at the invitation of the Palestinian Authority, the internationally recognized Palestinian leadership in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, rather than on the coattails of another deadly Israeli military campaign.
Yet the Israeli cabinet announced on Friday that, in addition to capturing Gaza City, Israel would always retain “security control” over Gaza and would not allow the Palestinian Authority to govern it.
Unless Mr. Netanyahu moderates or cancels the plan, Israel’s renewed campaign will probably make Arab leaders less likely to engage with Israel on Gaza’s postwar future, said Ibrahim Dalalsha, a Palestinian analyst.
“It is both ironic and maddening that Prime Minister Netanyahu now speaks of the need to reoccupy Gaza in order to later ‘hand it over’ to Arab forces, as if this were a new and strategic revelation,” said Mr. Dalalsha, the director of the Horizon Center, a research group in Ramallah, West Bank.
“Netanyahu’s current framing ignores the reality that Arab leaders have already indicated willingness to play a constructive role in Gaza’s future, but within the framework of a negotiated cease-fire and broader political solution and a request by the Palestinian Authority, not the government of Israel,” Mr. Dalalsha added. “That opportunity was within reach — until Israel unilaterally withdrew from talks.”
It is also possible that Israel stops short of completely occupying Gaza, or even of beginning any new operation. Though the Israeli cabinet announced its intended plan on Friday, it will take days or weeks to plan such a large maneuver and to call up enough reserve soldiers, during which time the operation could be called off.
Israeli commentators said that the discussion of occupation could be a negotiating tactic to persuade Hamas to give up without a fight.
“I don’t see him going all the way,” Nadav Shtrauchler, a former adviser to Mr. Netanyahu, said of the Israeli prime minister. “He wants a deal, and from his perspective, every time he put more military pressure on Hamas, he got a better option for a deal.”
Whether or not the operation proceeds, the threat that it might has already won Mr. Netanyahu some breathing space at home. The far right appears to have been placated, at least for now, by Mr. Netanyahu’s pledge to occupy Gaza, even if it has angered relatives of hostages, who fear that their loved ones will not survive a full Israeli assault.
Weeks ago, Mr. Netanyahu had seemed likely to forge a truce in Gaza once the Israeli Parliament broke for its summer recess in late July, since it is procedurally difficult for members of his coalition to bring down the government while lawmakers are not in session. His decision to intensify rather than halt the war suggests he wants to keep his coalition intact beyond Parliament’s return in the fall.
Now, “Netanyahu has time and space to experiment with any number of options,” said Aaron David Miller, a former U.S. diplomat who joined negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians during the 1990s.
“He keeps his right wing on board, maybe presses Hamas back to the table and shows a skeptical military chief of staff who’s boss,” Mr. Miller added. “Typically Netanyahu, no end game and more than a few exit ramps.”
Aaron Boxerman contributed reporting from Jerusalem, and Johnatan Reiss from Tel Aviv.
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8) Israel Says It’s Preparing to Take Control of Gaza City. What Does That Mean?
The decision to expand operations in the enclave went against the recommendations of the military.
By Ephrat Livni, Aug. 8, 2025
The Israeli security cabinet early Friday approved a plan by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to expand military action in Gaza, in a decision that went against the recommendation of his military.
Mr. Netanyahu’s office said in a statement after the meeting that the Israeli military would “prepare to take control of Gaza City.”
Hamas indicated in a statement on Friday that it would resist any Israeli offensive, warning Israel that “it won’t be a picnic.”
Why does Israel want to control Gaza City?
Mr. Netanyahu said in interviews on Thursday that an expanded operation would ensure Israel’s security, drive Hamas from power and enable the return of hostages.
On Friday, after the meeting, his office said the security cabinet had adopted “five principles for concluding the war,” including disarming Hamas, bringing back the hostages, demilitarizing Gaza, establishing Israeli security control over the enclave and setting up “an alternative civilian administration that is neither Hamas nor the Palestinian Authority.”
The announcement by his office seemed to stop short of saying Israel would take full control of the Gaza Strip, which Mr. Netanyahu earlier said was his plan.
Where is Israel’s military now?
After nearly two years of war, the Israeli military says it controls about 75 percent of Gaza. The United Nations says more than 86 percent of Gaza is within the Israeli militarized zone or under evacuation orders.
The main part outside its control is a coastal strip stretching from Gaza City in the north to Khan Younis in the south. Many of the two million Palestinians in Gaza have squeezed into tents, makeshift shelters and apartments in that stretch of land.
Mr. Netanyahu’s office said the military would prepare to take control of Gaza City while providing humanitarian aid to the civilian population outside the fighting zones.
What would it mean for civilians?
For civilians in Gaza, the possibility of an escalated operation has raised fears that many more of them could be killed and that their living conditions, already miserable, could get even worse.
The humanitarian crisis in Gaza is devastating, with many people going without food for days at a time, according to the United Nations. Many Gazans have been displaced more than once since the war began, and more than 60,000 have been killed, according to the local health authorities, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
“They’re talking about occupying areas that are packed with so many people,” said Mukhlis al-Masri, 34, who left his home in northern Gaza and is now in Khan Younis, where six of his relatives died in a recent bombing. “If they do that, there will be incalculable killing.”
How long would it take?
It would most likely take the military days or weeks to call up the reserve forces necessary for a push into Gaza City and to allow time for the forced evacuation of tens of thousands of Palestinians from the new areas of combat.
If the government decides to go further, the military believes it could seize the remaining parts of Gaza within months.
Who would govern?
Mr. Netanyahu said on Thursday that Israel did not want permanent authority over Gaza. “We don’t want to keep it,” he said. “We don’t want to govern it. We don’t want to be there as a governing body. We want to hand it over to Arab forces.”
Arab states could agree to participate in an international force, possibly handling security and administration, perhaps with foreign peacekeepers or contractors. But they would most likely want approval from, and a role for, the Palestinian Authority, which currently administers part of the West Bank and governed in parts of Gaza before Hamas came to power in 2007.
That means the Israeli security cabinet’s insistence on excluding the Palestinian Authority from any civilian government, as outlined in its announcement, could make it even harder to secure international engagement for its contentious plan.
What will Hamas do?
On Friday, Hamas said occupying Gaza City and evacuating its residents would constitute “a new war crime.”
“We warn the criminal occupation that this criminal adventure will exact a great price,” Hamas said in a statement.
The militants did not say in detail how they would respond. But Hamas has resisted calls to surrender throughout the war, and despite heavy losses among its leadership, it has continued to recruit new fighters.
The Israeli military’s chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, is among those who pushed back against Mr. Netanyahu’s plan, according to Israeli security officials. He expressed concern that expanded operations would endanger the hostages, about 20 of whom are believed to still be alive in Gaza, and that it would put more strain on already-exhausted resources and troops and make the armed forces responsible for governing two million Palestinians, the officials said.
At a U.N. Security Council meeting on Tuesday, Miroslav Jenca, the U.N.’s assistant secretary-general for Europe, Central Asia and the Americas, said expanded military operations “would risk catastrophic consequences for millions of Palestinians and could further endanger the lives of the remaining hostages.”
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9) Netanyahu Broadly Criticized at Home and Abroad After New Gaza Plan
International allies and families of hostages condemned Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to take control of Gaza City, with the British prime minister calling it “wrong.”
By Adam Rasgon, Reporting from Tel Aviv, Aug. 8, 2025
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel in Jerusalem last month. His office said the Israeli military “will prepare for taking control of Gaza City” while distributing aid to civilians “outside the combat zones.” Ronen Zvulun/Reuters
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faced criticism at home and abroad on Friday after his office announced that the Israeli military would escalate its nearly two-year-old campaign in the Gaza Strip by taking control of Gaza City, a move that would likely further endanger Palestinian civilians and Israeli hostages and deepen Israel’s international isolation.
The chorus of condemnation from longstanding European allies, Arab governments and the families of hostages held by militant groups in Gaza reflected Mr. Netanyahu’s intensifying clash with foreign nations and the supporters of hostages.
It laid bare Israel’s isolation as its government decides, against the advice of its military’s top command, to expand a war that has reduced cities to rubble, killed tens of thousands of Palestinians, and caused a widespread hunger crisis.
“The Israeli Government’s decision to further escalate its offensive in Gaza is wrong, and we urge it to reconsider immediately,” Keir Starmer, the prime minister of Britain, said in a statement. “This action will do nothing to bring an end to this conflict or to help secure the release of hostages. It will only bring more bloodshed.”
Chancellor Friedrich Merz of Germany said that, “until further notice,” his country would not export military equipment that could be used in Gaza, a significant step and a break with the country’s postwar past of support for Israel.
In recent weeks, many European countries have urged Israel to end the war in Gaza. The Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, which ignited the war, killed about 1,200 people and about 250 others were taken captive to Gaza.
Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry said the “inhumane ideas and decisions” being adopted by the Israeli government “affirm once again that it does not grasp the emotional, historical, and legal connection of the Palestinian people to this land.” The Turkish and Jordanian foreign ministries also condemned the move.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a group representing many families of hostages, said the Israeli government had issued a “death sentence to the living hostages” and ”a disappearance sentence” to the bodies of those killed in captivity.
“There has never been a government in Israel that has acted with such great determination against the national interest,” the group said in a statement. “The security cabinet chose another march of folly on the backs of the hostages, the fighters, and all of Israeli society.”
On Friday, Israel’s security cabinet approved a plan to expand the war by taking control of Gaza City, a pivotal and risky decision that went against the recommendations of the Israeli military.
Before the meeting, Mr. Netanyahu had told Fox News that Israel intended to take control of Gaza, bucking concerns in the leadership of the military about the exhaustion of reservist soldiers and the burdens of governing millions of Palestinians. The prime minister office’s announcement did not explicitly state that the military would carry out a full military takeover of Gaza.
The military leadership would prefer a new cease-fire instead of ramping up fighting, according to three Israeli security officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive issues.
On Friday, Hamas said occupying Gaza City and evacuating its residents was “a new war crime that the occupation’s military intends to perpetrate.”
“We warn the criminal occupation that this criminal adventure will exact a great price,” Hamas said in a statement. “It won’t be a picnic.”
The retired Maj. Gen. Gadi Shamni, one of the last commanders of Israeli forces in Gaza before it withdrew from the territory in 2005, said Mr. Netanyahu’s plan was “more of the same.” It would result in the deaths of more soldiers and hostages, further isolate Israel on the international stage, and deepen the rift between the government and the military, he said.
“This won’t bring progress in any way at all,” he said. “This won’t bring back the hostages and it won’t lead to the defeat of Hamas or make it give up its weapons.”
Since the start of the war, the Israeli military has raided Gaza City several times. But each time, Hamas fighters succeeded in regrouping in neighborhoods where Israeli soldiers had conducted operations.
General Shamni said another raid on Gaza City would fail to bring about a fundamental change to Hamas’s power in Gaza or its position in cease-fire negotiations. And if Israel planned to take over the city ahead of a potential long-term occupation of Gaza, he said, it would take years before the military managed to set up a functioning military government and to degrade Hamas enough to stabilize the situation.
“The state of Israel doesn’t even have the resources for such a thing,” he said. “Where will Israel get all of the money for this?”
Many of the people kidnapped on Oct. 7 have been freed in exchange for Palestinian prisoners; more than three dozen hostages have been killed in captivity, according to an investigation by The New York Times. The bodies of 30 others, according to the Israeli authorities, are being held in Gaza. Up to 20 hostages are believed to still be alive, they said.
“The probability of hostages being killed again is now intensifying,” said Ruby Chen, the father of the American-Israeli soldier Itay Chen, who was abducted by Hamas in the October attack. The Israeli authorities now presume that Mr. Chen’s son is dead.
The prospect of Israel moving into Gaza City also stoked fears among Palestinians in Gaza, who have been repeatedly displaced and struggle to find food, clean water and electricity.
There’s frustration and despair,” said Abdullah Shehab, 32, who has been staying at his sister’s home in Gaza City since he was forced to leave his hometown, Jabalia, at the end of May. “I feel like we’re waiting for a new hell to be brought upon us.”
He said when he saw planes parachuting aid into Gaza on Friday, he imagined a rope extending to the ground and climbing on board.
“I’m ready to leave,” he said. “I love Gaza, but I can’t handle the misery anymore.”
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10) The Desperate Struggle to Squeeze Aid Into a Starving Gaza
An increasing number of Palestinians are dying from hunger-related causes. Others are weak from months of extreme deprivation and vulnerable to illnesses in a territory short on crucial medical supplies, fuel and clean water, aid workers say.
By Vivian Yee, Reporting from Cairo, Aug. 8, 2025
Gazans waited to receive meals at a charity kitchen this month. Nearly one in three people in the territory is not eating for days at a time, the United Nations said. Saher Alghorra for The New York Times
An increasing number of Palestinians are dying from hunger-related causes. Others are weak from months of extreme deprivation and vulnerable to illnesses in a territory short on crucial medical supplies, fuel and clean water, aid workers say.
Gazans waited to receive meals at a charity kitchen this month. Nearly one in three people in the territory is not eating for days at a time, the United Nations said.Saher Alghorra for The New York Times
Despite what Israel says are its efforts to bring more food and other aid into Gaza in recent days, the United Nations and other aid groups say it is falling catastrophically short of what is needed to stop fast-accelerating starvation there.
International experts warn that Gaza is fast plunging into famine, with the number of Palestinians dying from hunger-related causes shooting upward over the past month.
Gaza reached that point after Israel escalated its prior siege of the territory to block virtually all aid from March to May, aiming to pressure Hamas into releasing hostages still in Gaza. When Israel allowed aid back in, it did so mostly under a contentious new aid delivery system that resulted in the killings of hundreds of Palestinians and kept all but the strongest and luckiest from getting food.
Now Israel is pausing the fighting in some parts of Gaza each day to help aid convoys move, approving some imported food for sale in Gaza and allowing aid to be airdropped. But all of it is far too little, far too late, aid officials say. Nothing less than a cease-fire will allow the necessary avalanche of aid to flow safely into Gaza, they say.
Israeli leaders’ decision to take control of Gaza City throws the aid system into further doubt.
To have a real impact, aid agencies say Israel needs to allow in the hundreds of thousands of pallets of aid languishing outside Gaza — enough to cover around 100 soccer fields, they say — and help ensure that the aid can be distributed safely. Letting in small numbers of trucks and airdropping supplies is little more than a public relations stunt, aid officials contend.
“It’s a joke, it’s all just theatrics,” Bushra Khalidi, an aid official working on Oxfam’s response in Gaza, said last week.
“We’re talking about two million people. It’s not 100 trucks or a pausing or a few hours of calm that is going to meet the needs of a population that has been starved for months,” Ms. Khalidi said. “Starvation has a long-term impact, and it affects growth of children, and it’s not something that you can reverse by throwing energy bars from the sky.”
Israel says that the level of hunger has been exaggerated and that it is doing its best to lessen it. Israel’s military spokesman has said there is no starvation in Gaza. The Israeli agency coordinating aid for Gaza did not respond to a request for comment.
Israel has also blamed the United Nations for not bringing in more food, while the organization says that Israel frequently denies or delays its requests to bring in convoys, among other challenges.
Many aid workers say airdrops endanger desperate people while feeding only a few, and only those physically able to retrieve it. During previous airdrops, people have been injured by falling aid; others have drowned or crossed into combat zones to retrieve packages that fell there, officials say.
When he recently saw a plane drop aid by parachute, Mohammed Abu Taha, 43, who is sheltering in southern Gaza, ran toward it. By the time he arrived, other Palestinians were fighting over the remaining bags of food. “People are too desperate,” he said. “I ran a lot and got nothing at all.”
Each airdrop delivers at most two truckloads of aid, and usually less, aid officials said.
“Airdrops are the most ineffective, expensive way of delivering aid possible,” said Bob Kitchen, who oversees emergency response at the International Rescue Committee, a group working in Gaza. With nearly one in three people going without food for days at a time, according to the United Nations, clinics treating malnutrition are at or over capacity. Children are becoming too weak to scavenge through trash for food or even to cry, aid workers say.
An international group of experts said in late July that famine thresholds had been reached across much of Gaza. Health officials there say scores of people have died from malnutrition, including dozens of children, though aid workers say that is probably an undercount.
Aid workers say that number could potentially climb to the tens or hundreds of thousands without a rapid surge in aid.
Weakened by months of extreme deprivation, people have few defenses left to stop illnesses as ordinary as diarrhea from killing them.
And those diseases are rampant. The number of people with acute watery diarrhea increased by 150 percent from March to June, and those with bloody diarrhea by 302 percent, health data from aid agencies shows. Those figures, which include only people who can reach medical centers, are most likely an undercount, according to Oxfam.
Staving off famine therefore depends not only on food, but also on fuel to run hospitals, cooking gas to make meals and clean water and sanitation to keep waterborne diseases in check — all of which are absent or nearly absent from Gaza, aid workers say.
Aid agencies have received 200 to 300 trucks in Gaza each day for the past several days, the Israeli agency coordinating aid said. They mainly carried flour along with prepared meals, infant formula, high-energy biscuits, diapers, vaccines and fuel, the United Nations said. Before the war, Gaza received 500 to 600 trucks a day of aid and goods for sale.
The flour provides calories, but will not save those who are severely malnourished after nearly two years of deprivation, aid workers say. Malnourished people need specialized feeding and care. Yet hospitals have few supplies left.
David M. Satterfield, who served as special envoy for Middle East humanitarian issues in the Biden administration, said the only practical solution was to “flood the zone” with aid.
“It’s not rocket science,” he said.
It is too late to reverse developmental and cognitive harm to young children who have been malnourished for months, experts say.
“The damage is already done, and that’s going to be a lifelong impact for a lot of people,” said Beckie Ryan, the Gaza response director for CARE. “What we can do is mitigate that going forward and stop it getting worse. But it does require a huge amount of supplies and aid to be able to come in as soon as possible.”
The death toll from the war has passed 60,000, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
Israel cut off aid to Gaza in retaliation for the October 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel in which some 1,200 people were killed and around 250 were taken hostage. Limited aid deliveries later resumed under a United Nations-run system, until March, when Israel imposed another total blockade.
In May, Israel largely replaced the U.N. aid system by backing a new operation mainly run by American contractors. Israeli officials said that was the only way to ensure the food would not fall into Hamas’s hands.
At least 859 Palestinians seeking food from the private sites have been killed since May 27, in most cases by Israeli soldiers, according to the U.N. Human Rights Office. Israeli officials have said they fired shots in the air when crowds came too close or endangered their forces.
The violence has renewed calls to allow the United Nations to resume managing aid. The New York Times reported that the Israeli military had never found proof that Hamas systematically stole aid from the United Nations — a charge Israel frequently repeated.
“We are struggling to understand why you need to come out with parallel shadow systems, when we had a fully functional aid distribution system in Gaza managed by the U.N. and international agencies,” said Jamil Sawalmeh, who oversees ActionAid’s Gaza response.
Even with Israeli pauses in fighting, it is dangerous for aid trucks to move around Gaza. While Israel is approving more movement by aid groups, which have to be coordinated in advance, teams still faced delays and other obstacles, the United Nations said.
The American ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, said on Wednesday that the number of the U.S.-backed sites could soon quadruple.
An Israeli security official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity in line with military rules, said Israel was increasing the number of trucks entering Gaza, including by withdrawing some forces and working to open a third crossing into the enclave.
Even when trucks can move, little makes it to the aid warehouses where humanitarian agencies collect supplies before distributing them.
Most of it is taken by the thousands of Palestinians, including some armed gangs, who regularly wait near the trucks’ route to grab whatever they can, aid workers say. But doing so can be deadly, with 514 killed since May 27, mostly by Israel’s military, according to U.N. figures.
On Wednesday, Ehab Fasfous, 52, a resident of the southern Gazan city of Khan Younis, inched toward the trucks’ route, aware, he said, that Israeli soldiers could open fire if he ventured too close. He shared a series of videos of the mayhem he saw next: hundreds, perhaps thousands of people closing in on the trucks from every direction.
At one point in the videos, which he said he took, a man menaces another person with a knife near a bag of flour.
Mr. Fasfous went home empty-handed.
“They’ve deprived us of so much that now we’re behaving like animals,” he said.
Only those who can brave such dangers get aid, aid officials say. The people most in need — like pregnant women, older adults or the sick — receive only what aid groups bring them, unless they can pay the astronomical prices of what little food is available in markets, aid workers say.
“We have to find a way for assistance to reach the weakest,” said Antoine Renard, the World Food Program’s director for the Palestinian territories, who visited Gaza this week.
The price of flour has dropped precipitously in recent days, according to Gaza government statistics, but it remains unaffordable for all but the few who still have resources.
Yaser Shaban, 58, spends his salary as a Palestinian civil servant and his savings on flour, canned food and herbs at the market.
If he goes to a privately run center or tries to take aid from a truck, “I have no guarantees I’ll bring something back,” he said. “And if I get killed, what chances does my family have then?” he said.
Adam Rasgon and Abu Bakr Bashir contributed reporting.
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