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The prospect of a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas remains on a knife’s edge today, as the two sides have yet to reach consensus on multiple drafts of a potential deal.
Hamas accepted a deal Mondat that seeks to halt the seven-month war with Israel in Gaza. The announcement came after a day-long meeting in Doha, attended by CIA Director William Burns and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, who, alongside Egyptian officials, are leading talks. Israel has pushed back against the three-stage agreement; finalization rests on differing interpretations of language in the second stage, which calls for restoration of “sustained calm” in Gaza (The Hill and The New York Times).
The main sticking point in the indirect negotiations has been the length of a cease-fire. Hamas has demanded a permanent cessation of fighting, which would effectively end the war outright. Israel, preparing for a ground offensive in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, wants a temporary halt in fighting that would allow for the exchange of hostages held in Gaza for Palestinian prisoners.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said Monday that while the new proposal failed to meet the country’s demands, the government will still send a working-level delegation to Cairo in hopes of reaching an acceptable deal during continuing talks. If both sides accept the same conditions, it could lead to the release of up to 33 hostages in Gaza and a pause of more than a month in the fighting (Axios).
“The bill is now firmly in Benjamin Netanyahu’s court,” a diplomatic source told CNN.
State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said Monday that Washington will “withhold judgment” on Hamas’s response to the deal until it has time to fully review it (Al Jazeera).
▪ Euronews: Demonstrators in Tel Aviv on Monday pressured the prime minister to accept a deal that would return hostages.
▪ The New York Times: Here is a timeline of the recent twists and turns in the Gaza peace talks.
As negotiations are taking halting steps forward, Israel seized “operational control” of the Gazan side of the Rafah crossing with Egypt overnight. It’s a strategic landmark that is expected to be at the center of Israel’s long-planned next battleground — the city that has served as shelter for an estimated 1.4 million Palestinians. On Monday, the Israeli military ordered about 100,000 civilians in parts of Rafah to evacuate “immediately” to a humanitarian zone. The Israeli incursion overnight appeared to be short of the full-fledged offensive that Israel has planned, and the Israeli military said it will allow humanitarian aid to enter Gaza later today (The Hill).
In a phone call with Netanyahu Monday, President Biden reiterated his opposition to an invasion of Rafah, even as the Israeli military began to carry out “targeted strikes” on what it called “terror targets in eastern Rafah” (The Washington Post and Axios).
The Hill: Biden is facing a key test this week in delivering a report to Congress on the Israeli military’s conduct in Gaza, which has the potential to cut off U.S. assistance to Israel.
Diplomats and humanitarian agencies have warned that an invasion of Rafah would deepen a famine that has already taken hold in northern Gaza, and put further strain on a decimated health care system (The Guardian and The Washington Post).
“This is inhumane,” United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk warned Monday. “It runs contrary to the basic principles of international humanitarian and human rights laws.”
👉 The World Health Organization’s representative to the Palestinian Territories, Rik Peeperkorn, continues to say the risk of famine has not been averted in Gaza.
3 THINGS TO KNOW TODAY:
▪ Gen Z sinks deeper into debt.
▪ Russian President Vladimir Putin is re-engineering his country into a regressive, militarized society.
▪ The workings of the U.S. financial system conceal some environmental organized crime, which reaps hundreds of billions of dollars yearly.
👏 Pulitzer Prizes 2024: Fine reporting captured journalism’s top prizes Monday. Here’s the list of winners. Don’t overlook the often dangerous, daring work of great still photographers: The Associated Press captured the prize for feature photography with images showing migration from Central America to the United States; Reuters was awarded the breaking news photography prize for “raw and urgent” images documenting the Oct. 7 attack in Israel by Hamas and the first weeks of Israel’s war in Gaza. Take a look. 📸
LEADING THE DAY
© The Associated Press / Evan Nucci | President Biden, pictured last month, blends official and campaign stops in Wisconsin, where he will return Wednesday.
POLITICS
In six short months, voters will cast ballots in the presidential contest between Biden and former President Trump presidential contest, a race that will be decided in just a handful of states, according to the latest The Hill/Decision Desk HQ polling average. Issues, outreach, campaign advertising and fundraising will matter in a throwdown between the incumbent and the former president (The Hill).
The Hill’s Amie Parnes reports on blistering, hyperbolic, mocking and bleep-worthy rhetoric used by the presidential contenders and their surrogates. It may play on social media and TV, to donors and to the candidates’ respective supporters, but what about the rest of the electorate?
Some GOP lawmakers who have pledged to work closely with Trump — especially Senate GOP Whip John Thune of South Dakota and John Cornyn of Texas (each vying to succeed Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) as Republican leader in the upper chamber) — are in a tight spot because of the former president’s unwillingness to commit to accepting the results of this year’s election, The Hill’s Alexander Bolton reports. Where Trump goes, Republican candidates and lawmakers are pressed to follow — while the former president’s critics sound alarms.
Trump made a baffling decision to back Utah’s little-known Senate GOP primary candidate Trent Staggs, a move that could help boost Republican Rep. John Curtis in the primary, The Hill’s Al Weaver reports. Curtis is a leader on the conservative House Climate Caucus.
2024 ROUNDUP:
▪ From a courtroom in Manhattan, Trump is reliving his chaotic 2016 campaign.
▪ Trump will headline the Minnesota GOP’s Lincoln Reagan Dinner on May 17 after attending his son Barron’s high school graduation. His campaign gave donors an electoral map presentation suggesting Trump could be competitive in Virginia and Minnesota, two states that have leaned toward Democrats in recent elections.
▪ Trump wants to cut off the political oxygen to independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
▪ Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), 82, will run for reelection in November.
▪ The Hill profile: Patrice Willoughby, vice president of policy and legislative affairs for the NAACP, talks about her 20-year career and an upbringing in a politically active family.
▪ The Conservative Partnership Institute, a nonprofit whose funding skyrocketed after it became a nerve center for Trump’s allies in Washington, has paid at least $3.2 million since the start of 2021 to corporations led by its own leaders or their relatives.
WHERE AND WHEN
The House will meet at 10 a.m.
The Senate will convene at 3 p.m.
The president will receive the President’s Daily Brief at 9 a.m. Biden will head to the Capitol to speak at 11:30 a.m. at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum’s annual Days of Remembrance ceremony. The White House in a statement in advance of the president’s remarks describes Biden’s federal efforts to combat hate of all kinds and antisemitism. He will also meet with Romanian President Klaus Iohannis at 1:30 p.m.
Vice President Harris has no public events.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in Guatemala to lead the U.S. delegation during the third ministerial meeting of the Los Angeles Declaration on Migration and Protection. He will meet with Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo this morning, plus other leaders from the Western Hemisphere.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will deliver remarks at 10 a.m. at the inaugural 2024 Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders Economic Summit at the Treasury Department.
First lady Jill Biden will host an East Room event at 3:30 p.m. to honor all those who served during World War I and to recognize those who made the National World War I Memorial possible.
Second gentleman Doug Emhoff will travel to Atlanta to visit Black-owned small businesses as part of the Biden-Harris campaign at 3:10 p.m.. He will participate in a panel on reproductive rights at 4:30 p.m.
The White House daily press briefing is scheduled at 2 p.m.
ZOOM IN
© The Associated Press / Patrick Semansky | Congress faces a deadline this week to reauthorize the Federal Aviation Administration.
CONGRESS
ON AN ISLAND: Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R-Ga.) lonely effort to boot Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) from power is emblematic of a larger trend that’s followed her throughout her time on Capitol Hill, write The Hill’s Mike Lillis and Mychael Schnell. She might be the face of the MAGA movement in Congress, but she’s alienated a long list of fellow conservatives in getting there. If Greene’s effort to remove Johnson before has highlighted the deep divisions within the GOP, her struggles in finding Republican support for her motion to vacate have revealed that those divisions are inherent within the party’s conservative wing, where even Johnson’s most vocal critics have refused to endorse it.
Greene on Monday met with Johnson for two hours and said the two will continue their discussions this morning amid her threats to force a vote to depose him, though she did not elaborate on what she and the Speaker discussed.
“I’ve said this repeatedly, that I understand the frustration, I share it. I would really like to advance much more of our conservative policy on a daily basis here,” Johnson said after the meeting. “But the reality is we are working with the smallest majority in U.S. history, with a one-vote margin. It makes it very difficult to, using my football metaphor as I often do, to throw touchdown passes on every single play.”
The continued talks between Johnson and his loudest congressional critic suggest that the two could possibly strike a deal to avert a vote on his grip on the gavel — where Democrats have pledged to save him from an ouster (NBC News).
LAWMAKERS ARE RACING to pass a reauthorization for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) this week, and decisions about possible amendments — including a major nuclear energy package — are going down to the wire. Senators will pick up last week’s negotiations on amendment proposals today in the hopes of giving the House time to hold its own vote before the FAA’s Friday authorization deadline (E&E News).
The Hill: Senators are trying to add bills that are aimed at boosting kids’ online safety into the FAA reauthorization bills. The two bills aim at increasing safety of minors online through data privacy updates and rules to limit potentially harmful features.
ELSEWHERE
© The Associated Press / Steven Hirsch | Former President Trump returned Monday as a defendant at his criminal trial in Manhattan.
TRUMP WORLD
Jurors in Trump’s New York criminal trial Monday viewed key documents in the alleged “hush money” case and heard testimony from Trump business associates called to the stand by prosecutors to explain how an alleged plan unfolded to make hush payments disguised as corporate expenses.
The former president is accused of falsifying business records to cover up a $130,000 payment to adult film celebrity Stormy Daniels to block publication of her account of a sexual encounter, which he denies. If convicted, he could face prison time or probation.
Deborah Tarasoff, who works in the Trump Organization’s accounts payable department, confirmed Trump typically signed documents using a black marker, rather than a pen, and appeared to have signed payments made to former “fixer” Michael Cohen, alleged to be the middleman for payments to Daniels through her lawyer. Trump calls Cohen a liar.
Prosecutors said they need about two additional weeks to complete presentation of their case, as of Day 12. Daniels and Cohen are expected to take the witness stand.
Trump’s day began with the threat of jail. Justice Juan Merchan on Monday ruled that the former president again violated a March 26 court order prohibiting him from public criticisms of witnesses, jurors and the court staff. “Going forward, this court will have to consider a jail sanction,” Merchan said (CNN). “Mr. Trump, it’s important you understand, the last thing I want to do is put you in jail. You are the former president of the United States and possibly the next president as well.”
The former president reacted outside the courtroom Monday, blaming the judge for what he sees as an unfair gag order, despite the court’s decision that he has repeatedly violated its instructions. He had been fined $1,000 each for nine violations, a punishment Merchan said Monday proved ineffective.
OPINION
■ America needs to get ready now for post-election chaos in November, by Austin Sarat, opinion contributor, The Hill.
■ After the war, what kind of future awaits Israelis and Palestinians? by David Ignatius, columnist, The Washington Post.
THE CLOSER
© The Associated Press / Evan Agostini, Invision | Harris Reed and Demi Moore at the Met Gala on Monday.
And finally … The first Monday in May brought with it the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s annual Met Gala in New York City, where fashion and Hollywood’s brightest paraded up the museum’s iconic steps in outfits to the theme of “Garden of Time,” an apparent reference to a 1962 short story by the British writer J.G. Ballard in which aristocrats living in a walled estate are menaced by the advance of a violent rabble.
It also nods to the subject of the Costume Institute’s spring exhibition, “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion.” The event, which raises millions of dollars for the museum’s self-funding fashion wing, has become known for its audacious red carpet, with a highly exclusive guest list handpicked by longtime Vogue editor Anna Wintour.
Here is a gallery of some of the most eye-catching looks from Monday night.
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