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French National Assembly Speaker Again Highlights Record Levels of Antisemitism Amid New Hate Crime Statistics
French National Assembly speaker Yaël Braun-Pivet. Photo: Screenshot
The speaker of the French National Assembly has warned that the resurgent antisemitism in the wake of the Oct. 7 Hamas pogrom in Israel posed a threat to “the foundations of our republic and what we are, as French people.”
In an interview on Sunday with broadcaster France Inter, Yaël Braun-Pivet — who is Jewish — spoke of her alarm at the spread of bigotry targeting Jews and at her own experience of antisemitism in the wake of the Hamas massacre.
Referring to what she called “the liberation of speech,” Braun-Pivet noted that antisemitism was spreading in the mainstream media as well as on social media platforms. Increasingly, she said, antisemitic opinions are being expressed on camera without those articulating it feeling the need to “hide their identity.”
Braun-Pivet revealed that she had filed 23 separate complaints over antisemitic barbs directed at her. “They send me yellow stars, they regret that my family was not completely exterminated in the [concentration] camps,” she said, referring to the six pointed Star of David which the Nazis forced Jews to wear on their outer clothing.
Braun-Pivet’s interview came at the end of a week in which France’s main Jewish organization published disturbing statistics for the current wave of antisemitism.
In a report last Wednesday, the French-Jewish umbrella organization Crif disclosed that 1676 antisemitic incidents had been recorded in 2023 — four times the number registered during the previous year and an unprecedented record,
While in past years the majority of the incidents involved vandalism of property, in 2023, 58 percent of the incidents recorded were directed against people, with 13 percent occurring in schools.
The Oct. 7 atrocities had “acted like a catalyst for hatred by activating latent antisemitism,” Crif president Yonathan Arfi told the AFP news agency.
The assault “could have had an effect of compassion, like a vaccination,” Arfi added. “The opposite has been the case.”
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Trump Administration to Release Over $5 Billion School Funding That It Withheld
US Secretary of Education Linda McMahon and President Donald Trump, in the East Room at the White House in Washington, DC, US, March 20, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Carlos Barria
President Donald Trump’s administration will release more than $5 billion in previously approved funding for K-12 school programs that it froze over three weeks ago under a review, which had led to bipartisan condemnation.
“(The White House Office of Management and Budget) has completed its review … and has directed the Department to release all formula funds,” Madi Biedermann, deputy assistant secretary for communications at the U.S. Education Department, said in a statement, adding funds will be dispersed to states next week.
Further details on the review and what it found were not shared.
A senior administration official said “guardrails” would be in place for the amount being released, without giving details.
Early in July, the Trump administration said it would not release funding previously appropriated by Congress for schools and that an initial review found signs the money was misused to subsidize what it alleged was “a radical leftwing agenda.”
States say $6.8 billion in total was affected by the freeze. Last week, $1.3 billion was released.
After the freeze, a coalition of mostly Democratic-led states sued to challenge the move, and 10 Republican US senators wrote to the Republican Trump administration to reverse its decision.
The frozen money covered funding for education of migrant farm workers and their children; recruitment and training of teachers; English proficiency learning; academic enrichment and after-school and summer programs.
The Trump administration has threatened schools and colleges with withholding federal funds over issues like climate initiatives, transgender policies, pro-Palestinian protests against U.S. ally Israel’s war in Gaza and diversity, equity and inclusion practices.
Republican US lawmakers welcomed the move on Friday, while Democratic lawmakers said there was no need to disrupt funding in the first place.
Education Secretary Linda McMahon separately said she was satisfied with what was found in the review and released the money, adding she did not think there would be future freezes.
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Israel to Resume Airdrop Aid to Gaza on Saturday, Military Says
Palestinians carry aid supplies which they received from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed/File Photo
Israel will resume airdrop aid to Gaza on Saturday night, the Israeli military said, a few days after more than 100 aid agencies warned that mass starvation was spreading across the enclave.
“The airdrops will include seven pallets of aid containing flour, sugar, and canned food to be provided by international organizations,” the military added in a statement.
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Trump Says Hamas ‘Didn’t Want to Make a Deal,’ Now Likely to Get ‘Hunted Down’
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., July 8, 2025. Photo: Kevin Lamarque via Reuters Connect.
i24 News – US President Donald Trump on Friday said the Palestinian jihadists of Hamas did not want to make a deal on a ceasefire and hostage release in Gaza.
“Now we’re down to the final hostages, and they know what happens after you get the final hostages. And basically because of that, they really didn’t want to make a deal,” Trump said.
The comments followed statements by Middle East peace envoy Steve Witkoff and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the effect that Israel was now considering “alternative” options to achieve its goals of bringing its hostages home from Gaza and ending the terror rule of Hamas in the coastal enclave.
Trump added he believed Hamas leaders would now be “hunted down.”
On Thursday, Witkoff said the Trump administration had decided to bring its negotiating team home for consultations following Hamas’s latest proposal. Witkoff said overnight that Hamas was to blame for the impasse, with Netanyahu concurring.
Trump also dismissed the significance of French President Emmanuel Macron’s announcement that Paris would become the first major Western power to recognize an independent Palestinian state.
Macron’s comments, “didn’t carry any weight,” the US leader said.
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