Graffiti is seen on the windows of DG Bodyworks in Cavendish on Wednesday, May 20, 2026. The Vermont State Police has partially redacted profanity that appears on the window to the right. Photo: Vermont State Police

A Jewish woman’s store in Vermont was vandalized early Wednesday morning with anti-Israel graffiti in an incident that police are investigating as a possible hate crime.

“Free Palestine” and “F–k Israel” were spray-painted on the windows of DG Bodyworks, where Israeli flags were on display.

Vermont State Police said they are investigating the vandalism in the Windsor County town of Cavendish as a possible hate crime and will inform the Attorney General’s Office of the incident. Officers who responded to the crime scene reviewed security footage and saw an individual vandalizing the store with purple spray paint during the early hours of Wednesday morning. Police released a photo of the suspect, a white male who wore a cap and covered his face while spray-painting the messages.

Shop owner Denise Gebroe said that her store was targeted because she is Jewish and that while she was “shaken” to discover the graffiti, “I am OK and will not be broken.”

“This was an act of intimidation directed at me because I am Jewish,” she added, in a statement shared with The Algemeiner by Vermont Friends of Israel. “I made Vermont my home because I love it here, but it does not feel the same as it once did. Incidents like this are happening more than many people realize, and most go unreported. I fear for the future of the Jewish community here, and Jewish friends of mine have already left.”

In a statement given to The Algemeiner, Mark Treinkman, president of Vermont Friends of Israel, also called the vandalism an anti-Jewish hate crime and said such an incident “is the predictable consequence of a political campaign in Vermont that demonizes Israel and pressures local communities to treat Jews and Zionists as equivalent to Nazis.” He referenced an Apartheid Free Community campaign active in Vermont, promoted by the Palestine Solidarity Coalition, that is marketed locally as “grassroots activism.”

“When anti-Zionist activists tell people that Jews with deep spiritual, cultural, and familial ties to Israel are ‘baby killers’ and ‘genocide supporters,’ it sends a dangerous signal that intimidation against them is understandable, deserved, or even justified,” Treinkman noted. “History teaches us where this goes. First come campaigns of dehumanization, slogans, pledges, and public shaming. Now a Jewish woman’s storefront has been vandalized in rural Vermont.”

“Synagogues in Vermont have been sent death threats. Swastikas are found on Vermont school walls,” he added, referring to threatening letters sent to several local synagogues and antisemitism graffiti discovered at an elementary school last year. “Jewish students are bullied. What comes next if this is not confronted?”

Ozgur Ozel, leader of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), speaks to the media at party headquarters after a Turkish court dismissed a case seeking to remove him and annul the party’s 2023 congress, in Ankara, Turkey, Oct. 24, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Efekan Akyuz

A Turkish court effectively ousted the main opposition leader Ozgur Ozel on Thursday, annulling the 2023 party congress that elected him chairman in a ruling that dealt a blow to President Tayyip Erdogan’s challengers and hit financial markets.

The appeals court annulled the congress over irregularities and ruled that former Republican People’s Party (CHP) Chairman Kemal Kilicdaroglu – a divisive figure within the party who lost to Erdogan in an election earlier in 2023 – should replace his successor Ozel.

The case was seen as a test of Turkey‘s shaky balance between democracy and autocracy, and the ruling may throw the opposition into further disarray and possible infighting. It could also boost Erdogan’s chances of extending his more than two-decade rule of the big NATO member country and major emerging market economy.

OPPOSITION HIT BY JUDICIAL CRACKDOWN

The CHP, running roughly even with Erdogan’s ruling AK Party in polls, has separately faced an unprecedented judicial crackdown since 2024 in which hundreds of members and elected officials have been detained as part of corruption charges that the party denies.

Among those imprisoned for more than a year is Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, who is seen as the main rival of Erdogan and remains the CHP’s official candidate for a presidential election set for 2028 but that could come next year.

After the court ruling, Ozel convened party leaders to discuss possible steps and members were called to the CHP headquarters building in Ankara to protest against it.

Ali Mahir Basarir, CHP deputy parliamentary group chair, told Reuters the ruling “is an attempted coup carried out through the judiciary [and] a blow against the will of 86 million people.”

The party rejected the ruling, he said, adding that those who signed off on it were “complicit in this coup attempt and will be held accountable before the courts.”

Turkey‘s main Borsa Istanbul .XU100 dropped 6% in response, triggering a market-wide circuit breaker, while Turkish government bonds slid. Sovereign bonds sold off as much as 1.2 cents, which for many was the biggest fall since late March.

The ruling by the Ankara court overturned a decision last year by a court of first instance that said the case surrounding the CHP’s 2023 congress had no substance.

A woman walks next to a banner with a picture of Iran’s new Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei in Tehran, Iran, May 8, 2026. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS

Iran‘s Supreme Leader has issued a directive that the country’s near-weapons-grade uranium should not be sent abroad, two senior Iranian sources said, hardening Tehran’s stance on one of the main US demands at peace talks.

Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei’s order could further frustrate US President Donald Trump and complicate talks on ending the US-Israeli war on Iran.

Trump vowed on Thursday that the United States will not allow Iran to have its stockpile of highly enriched uranium.

“We will get it. We don’t need it; we don’t want it. We’ll probably destroy it after we get it, but we’re not going to let them have it,” Trump told reporters at the White House.

Israeli officials have told Reuters that Trump has assured Israel that Iran‘s stockpile of highly enriched uranium, needed to make an atomic weapon, will be sent out of Iran and that any peace deal must include a clause on this.

Israel, the United States, and other Western states have long accused Iran of seeking nuclear weapons, including pointing to its move to enrich uranium to 60%, far higher than needed for civilian uses and closer to the 90% needed for a weapon. Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he will not consider the war over until enriched uranium is removed from Iran, Tehran ends its support for proxy militias, and its ballistic missile capabilities are eliminated.

“The Supreme Leader’s directive, and the consensus within the establishment, is that the stockpile of enriched uranium should not leave the country,” said one of the two Iranian sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

Iran‘s top officials, the sources said, believe that sending the material abroad would leave the country more vulnerable to future attacks by the United States and Israel. Khamenei has the last say on the most important state matters.

When asked for comment for this story, White House spokeswoman Olivia Wales said: “President Trump has been clear about the United States’ red lines and will only make a deal that puts the American people first.”

Iran‘s foreign ministry did not respond to request for comment.

DEEP SUSPICION AMONG TOP IRANIAN OFFICIALS

A shaky ceasefire is in place in the war that began with US-Israeli strikes on Iran on Feb. 28, after which Iran fired at Gulf states hosting US military bases and fighting broke out between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon.

But there has been no big breakthrough in peace efforts, with a US blockade of Iranian ports and Tehran’s grip on the Strait of Hormuz, a vital global oil supply route, complicating negotiations mediated by Pakistan.

The two senior Iranian sources said there was deep suspicion in Iran that the pause in hostilities was a tactical deception by Washington to create a sense of security before it renews airstrikes.

Iran‘s top peace negotiator, Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, said on Wednesday that “obvious and hidden moves by the enemy” showed the Americans were preparing new attacks.

Trump said on Wednesday the US was ready to proceed with further attacks on Tehran if Iran did not agree to a peace deal, but suggested Washington could wait a few days to “get the right answers.”

The two sides have started to narrow some gaps, the sources said, but deeper splits remain over Tehran’s nuclear program — including ‌the fate of its enriched uranium stockpiles and Tehran’s demand for recognition of its right to enrichment.

IRAN HARDENS STANCE ON ENRICHED URANIUM STOCKPILE

Iranian officials have repeatedly said Tehran’s priority is to secure a permanent end to the war and credible guarantees that the US and Israel will not launch further attacks.

Only after such assurances are in place, they said, would Iran be prepared to engage in detailed negotiations over its nuclear program.

Israel is widely believed to have an atomic arsenal but has never confirmed or denied it has nuclear weapons, maintaining a so-called policy of ambiguity on the issue for decades.

Before the war, Iran signaled willingness to ship out half of its stockpile of uranium which has been enriched to 60%, a level far higher than what is needed for civilian uses.

But sources said that position changed after repeated threats from Trump to strike Iran.

Israeli officials have told Reuters it is still unclear whether Trump will decide to attack and whether he would give Israel a green light to resume operations. Tehran has vowed a crushing response if attacked.

However, the source said there were “feasible formulas” to resolve the matter.

“There are solutions like diluting the stockpile under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency,” one of the Iranian sources said.

The IAEA estimates that Iran ​had 440.9 kg of ⁠uranium enriched to 60% when Israel and the US attacked Iranian nuclear facilities in June 2025. How much of that has survived is unclear.

IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said in March that what remained of that stock was “mainly” stored in a tunnel complex in Iran‘s Isfahan nuclear facility, and that his agency believed slightly more than 200 kg ⁠of it was ​there. The IAEA also believes some is at the sprawling nuclear complex at Natanz, where Iran had two ​enrichment plants.

Iran says some highly enriched uranium is needed for medical purposes and for ​a research reactor in Tehran which runs on relatively small amounts of uranium enriched to around 20%.