In the name of White Supremacy, This is What Donald Trump has Done to this Country

From: https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Social_Justice_Studies/Race_and_Ethnic_Relations_in_the_U.S.:_An_Intersectional_Approach/06:_Euro_Americans_and_Whiteness/6.03:_Whiteness-__White_Privilege_White_Supremacy_and_White_Fragility

Instead of Making America Great Again (whatever this bullshit means), Trump has caused Americans to lose faith in their country because the Great White Moron raped the very foundations of the still growing up country.

The White Anglo-Saxon men who still dominate everything in the country have failed to recognize and embrace a changing world and are embarking on destroying the foundations of the country just to stay in control as a demographic tsunami is washing up on its shores. 

Donald Trump is a symptom of that failure. His attempt to reverse the course of history and take the country back to somewhere between the 18th and 19th centuries is as tragic as it is comical.  The problem of white Anglo-Saxon Protestant Americans is THEY CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH that the country is not theirs any more than it is to a 2026 immigrant from Haiti! Y'ALL IMMIGRANTS, MORONS.      

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Americans' pride in US history and democracy drops, and fewer are proud to be American, polls find


FILE - A demonstrator carries an American flag upside-down near the White House during a protest taking place on the day of a military parade commemorating the Army's 250th anniversary, coinciding with President Donald Trump's 79th birthday, June 14, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)(AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

LINLEY SANDERS, SIMRAN PARWANI and AMELIA THOMSON-DEVEAUX
Updated Mon, June 29, 2026

WASHINGTON (AP) — Americans have grown less proud of their country's history or the way its democracy works over the past decade, according to a new AP-NORC poll.

Americans' pride in the U.S. on several key attributes has dropped since 2017 — including the nation's military and its political influence around the globe — according to the survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. This poll was conducted in April, as the United States and Iran fought over the Strait of Hormuz in a prolonged war that started with the U.S. and Israel launching strikes on Iran.

New Gallup polling also finds that only 53% of U.S. adults are "extremely" or "very" proud to be an American, the lowest reading in the trend dating back to 2001.

The findings point to a broad decline in patriotic sentiment over a tumultuous period that included most of President Donald Trump's first term, the COVID-19 pandemic and rising inflation that contributed to a backlash against President Joe Biden. That timeframe also covers Trump's return to the White House, where he's taken more aggressive actions on immigration and issues abroad.

At the same time, most U.S. adults say that being an American is "extremely" or "very" important to their identity, highlighting an enduring connection, even as some become increasingly critical of the country's past or the government's current actions.
American pride declines on the armed forces and democracy

Americans' pride in the way democracy works in the U.S. has declined 14 percentage points, falling from 42% in February 2017 to 28% now.

In addition, Americans' pride in their armed forces has dropped 19 percentage points since 2017, and pride in the U.S.'s history has declined 14 percentage points. In each case, the drop is largely driven by Democrats, with some movement among independents as well.

Karla Galdamez — a 48-year-old Democrat who used to teach U.S. history — believes America has regressed under the Trump administration. While the Californian is not proud of Trump, she is pleased with how far the U.S. has come in 250 years.

"It's a country that really wanted to be different and really wanted to be better," she said. "Despite some of the very ugly history that we have of segregation and slavery ... if you look at the trajectory of the last 250 years, we've done nothing but get better and move toward a more egalitarian nation."

The AP-NORC poll found that Republicans are especially likely to be proud of the nation's armed forces. About 9 in 10 Republicans say the military makes them "extremely" or "very" proud, compared with about 6 in 10 U.S. adults.

Samantha Fulks, a 40-year-old in San Antonio, Texas, says she's proud to be an American and doesn't hide it. The Texas Republican showcases that pride with an American flag in her front yard — as well as Trump flags in the back yard — and she plans to wear red, white and blue on the Fourth of July. Fulks comes from a military family, and while she believes the country's involvement in Iran is unnecessary, she remains a proud supporter of the military.

"I still support our troops no matter what they do," Fulks said.

Being an American matters more for personal identity among Republicans and older adults

Matt Stafford, a 39-year-old in Massachusetts, is proud of being an American, even if the U.S. political system frustrates him.

He has a bald eagle tattooed on his back to represent the United States, its freedoms and "all the things we're supposed to stand for as a country." But despite that national pride, he often finds himself frustrated by politicians on both sides. Stafford — a centrist who identifies as "politically homeless" — wants Democrats and Republicans to come together to look out for their constituents in middle America.

"I love America, but our biggest problem is how we're pushing both sides — like the left and the right — to the extremes," he said.

For many Americans, their partisanship is often intertwined with their national identity. The poll finds that Republicans are much likelier than Democrats or independents to say being an American is "extremely" or "very" important to their personal identity.

Younger people are also much less likely than older people to say being an American is highly important to their personal identity. About three-quarters of Americans ages 60 and older say being an American is highly important to them, compared with only about one-third of U.S. adults under 30.
Race or ethnicity matters more to many Black Americans

The AP-NORC survey found that the vast majority of Black Americans — 73% — say their race or ethnicity is "extremely" or "very" important to how they see themselves, higher than the share that say that about being an American.

Vincent Harris, a 60-year-old in California, says his identity as a Black man rises above other attributes for him because of how Black men are treated in America.

"A lot of people are scared of Black men just because we are Black and we are male. And that's crazy," Harris said. "People don't even take you for who you are as a person; they just look at your race."

About half of Hispanic Americans say their race or ethnicity is highly important to them, compared with 22% of white Americans.

Black and Hispanic adults are also more likely than white adults to say their family's ancestry or country of origin is highly important to their personal identity.

Harris, who identifies as a gay man, says being an American is "a wonderful thing" because of the freedoms that Americans have, despite the obstacles he's had to overcome.

"It's great to be an American — regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or whatever. As long as you have that freedom of choice as an American, that's a great thing," Harris said. "Right now, I wouldn't live in any other country in the world. I'm here. I love it."
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The AP-NORC poll of 2,596 adults was conducted April 16-20 using a sample drawn from NORC's probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 2.6 percentage points.
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Poll: Majority of Americans believe country not adhering to founding ideals


An American flag is held at a rally as more flags wave in the background. Photo: ninjason1 / 

Therese Boudreaux
Updated Sun, June 28, 2026

86% of registered U.S. voters support America's founding principles, but only 31% believe they are being practiced well.

(The Center Square) – American voters overwhelmingly support their country's founding ideals – yet the majority also believe that the U.S. is failing to live up to them, according to new polling.

The Center Square's Voters' Voice Poll revealed that 86% of registered U.S. voters support America's founding principles, among which the poll listed "individual rights such as life, liberty, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to bear arms, equal treatment under the law, and government by the consent of the people."

Only 31% of all voters, however, believed those principles are being practiced well, painting a gloomy picture of voters' moods as the U.S. approaches its 250th anniversary.

The poll was conducted by Noble Predictive Insights from June 1-4, 2026, surveying 2,585 registered U.S. voters. The sample was comprised of 915 Republicans, 1013 Democrats, and 297 True Independents, the latter of whom chose neither major party when asked about their political leanings. The poll's margin of error is +/- 1.93%.

"Voters are not rejecting the founding ideals, but many doubt the country's political system is healthy enough to live up to them," Mike Noble, founder and CEO of Noble Predictive Insights, told The Center Square. "All of them are pretty pessimistic on how well these founding principles are being practiced today."

The poll found significant support for American principles among all political groups, with 89% of Republicans, 85% of Democrats, and 79% of Independents on board.

Gender and geographic divides over the issue were virtually nonexistent, with 87% of males and 85% of females supportive of American ideals, while support across rural, suburban, and urban areas hovered equally around 86%.

Racially, white voters expressed 90% support, Hispanic or Latino voters 83%, Black voters 73%, and voters of other races 79%.

Support across generations never dipped below 70% and progressively increased with age, with nearly 95% of voters ages 65 and older supporting American ideals.

Favorable views of American values also progressively increased alongside education and annual income growth, with support for American values surpassing 90% among the most highly educated and wealthiest respondents.

The "big disconnect," Noble noted, is not over American principles in theory, but "whether they're being practiced well."

Nearly two-thirds of voters surveyed don't believe those ideals are being practiced well in the country today.

Not even the majority of Republican voters, whose party currently holds a government trifecta, believe the country is upholding its founding principles – 44% think so.

"I was actually a little surprised by it," Noble added. "Remember, Republicans are kind of in the driver's seat right now."

Democratic and Independent voters have less than half of Republicans' confidence – only about 20% of each group – while over 70% in each group believe the country is failing to live up to its principles.

Younger voters were also slightly more hopeful than older voters, with roughly 34% of Gen Z and Millennials believing the country practices its ideals, versus less than 30% of all voters over the age of 45.

While the gender gap reappeared – 36% of males remain positive, compared to 26% of females – the racial divide was almost nonexistent, with 31% of white, Hispanic, and Black voters respectively believing principles are being practiced well.

Higher household income and higher education levels translated to slightly higher beliefs that American principles are well-practiced. Urban voters were also more likely (37%) to hold that view than voters in rural (31%) or suburban (28%) areas.

Only 17% of voters who voted for 2024 Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris held a hopeful view, compared to 47% of those who voted for President Donald Trump.

Noble believes the principles versus practice disconnect is "a symptom of the hyper polarization that's happened" with nearly all political issues – many of which are directly tied to America's founding principles.

"If you were to take freedom of speech, for example, there's some questions on that, or equal treatment under the law, or government by consent to the people, or right to bear arms," Noble noted. "The parties both agree on those in principle, but then when you talk about details, like automatic weapons … are they really staying true to that, or are they getting down into these partisan trenches?"

Republicans and Democrats at the congressional level have frequently clashed over how to protect American ideals and accused the other party of violating them.

Republican lawmakers have accused the former Democrat-led administration of violating Americans' free speech rights by pressuring social media companies to censor politically incorrect speech during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Democratic lawmakers, meanwhile, have condemned what they describe as federal law enforcement's sometimes deadly responses to public protests against the current administration, arguing that the attempted federal crackdowns on allegedly violent protests suppressed protestors' free speech rights.

Similarly, both parties oppose unequal treatment, but disagree on what that looks like. Republican lawmakers, for example, believe DEI policies in federal workplaces violate the principle of equal treatment, while many Democrats believe such policies are equitable.

By contrast, many Republicans see no problem with federal law enforcement arresting illegal immigrants without judicial warrants, while Democratic lawmakers view the practice as contrary to the equal treatment principle.

"These two parties are going after each other, and they've kind of forgotten it's not about the two parties – what about the country and America's founding principles as a whole?" Noble said.

"I think it's just more of a symptom of getting too far into this partisan trench. What about these higher-level ideas? It's not just the red versus blue team – which is kind of what we're sitting at right now."

It Took the Fool-in-Chief to Unravel Decades of Judeo-Christian Love. "Monster" AIPAC Slayed?

For the first time in their history, Israelis feel seriously depressed. They've aways counted on the dumb Americans they've been brainwashing - to AIPAC's credit - for decades with biblical garbage that is a fusion between the Jewish Torah's goat manure with the Christian Old Testament's sheep dung. 

Stories and myths of persecution and redemption, of promised land, of frog rains, splitting oceans, virgin conception and birth, rising from the dead, of NRA's Charlton Heston as liberator Moses, of the barbaric colonization by Hebrew nomads of ancient Canaanite Palestine with ethnic cleansing and genocide just as their pretend-descendants are doing today to Arab Palestine, of Jewish actors serving as heroes of American Independence.... All of it a distortion of the deceptive Judeo-Christian "loving relationship" that is in fact two millennia of western antisemitism and Jew-hatred. All of it, thanks to AIPAC (America-Israel Political Action Committee) that buys and sells US representatives and senators and bends them into submission to the Zionist colonizers of Palestine and their subscription to the ongoing genocide and ethnic cleansing of Palestine.

It took an even dumber fool like Donald Trump to unravel all that crap. Since he came onto the political stage, American Jews and Israelis have adulated Trump as the savior of colonial Israel. Now, worried about money and gasoline prices, the white supremacist and of course cryptic antisemite Donald Dumb is falling out of love with the rabid criminals running the Zionist colony in Palestine. In reality, it doesn't matter why Donald Dumb is being the fool that he is. What matters is that he, as a Republican, has gone farther than any Democrat in screwing Israel. Let's see if AIPAC can repair this damage by buying Donald Dumb back into the warmth of Judeo-Christian love!

But I have a better idea for the Fool-in-Chief: Why doesn't he "rescue" the Fascist racist white supremacist Zionists by giving them - all 5 million of them - asylum and favored treatment in the US, just as he did with their alter egos, the Fascist neo-Nazi white supremacist Afrikaners of South Africa? Maybe he is just waiting for Israel's Zionists to become a minority victim in a liberated Palestine before he does that, because that is what happened after Nelson Mandela liberated South Africa from the white supremacist colonial juggernaut: The neo-Nazi Afrikaners became a minority and Donald Dumb has offered to rescue them from Black African persecution with express green cards to the US.

The two situations -Palestine and South Africa - are nearly identical. By giving asylum to the 3 million Israeli Jews (excluding the half a million Jews with black and brown skin from Ethiopia or Iran or North Africa because their skin color clashes with Trump's "beautiful white skin",  and minus the 2 million Palestinians who reluctantly were made "Israelis citizens"), he could win the Nobel Prize for radically solving the Palestine question, while significantly increasing the white Anglo-Saxon-Protestant-Jewish-love-fest population to the detriment of all the darkies from slavery times and immigrants from shithole countries. He could thus really save white America. 

What about Israelis' reaction to Trump's turnabout on Iran?

Some of the commentary below was obtained from an AI search:

After hailing him as a savior of Israel for allowing Israel to carry out its genocidal war on Gaza and for turning his gaze away from the Zionists' terrorism in the Palestinian territories, many Israelis feel betrayed and angry by President Donald Trump's peace deal with Iran. They see it as a capitulation that endangers their national security while saving his ass in the looming midterms and otherwise prioritizing American interests like reopening the Strait of Hormuz and reducing gasoline prices at the pump in the US. Israeli public sentiment describes the agreement as a "big mistake" that leaves Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile programs intact and releases frozen assets to Tehran without resolving the supposed Iranian nuclear threat to Israel as well as the threat from Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Political and public criticism focuses on the perception that Israel was sidelined in negotiations and forced into a fragile ceasefire it did not want.

Israeli-Zionist settlers and officials express shock that Trump, previously seen as Israel's strongest ally, signed a deal they believe empowers their "genocidal archenemies."

Critics also argue the deal fails to address Iran's nuclear capabilities or its support for proxies, with one citizen calling it the "worst agreement that could ever be done" for Israel's safety.

Despite the agreement that prohibits Israel from continuing its daily assaults on Lebanon, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz has defied Trump and ordered his occupation forces not to withdraw from Lebanon and to continue to act independently and against US demands.

Blame by the radical ultra-religious terrorist right-wing Zionist leadership (the Jewish cognate of the Afghan Taliban, the Saudi Wahhabis, or the Iranian Ayatollahs) against Trump does not spare prime minister Ben-Yamin Netanyahu who, they say, misread Trump's idiocy and was derelict in milking America's dumbness to the last drop. Opponents accuse Netanyahu of misjudging Trump's appetite for war and failing to secure Israel's interests. 

While some pundits note that the U.S. naturally acts in its own interest regarding energy markets, Israeli politicians like Yair Golan describe Netanyahu as "weak, ill, isolated and lacking influence" for allowing a deal that allegedly makes Israel weaker. To add insult to injury, the US Vice-moron J.D. Vance has dismissed the Israeli reaction as a "freakout," urging Israel to face regional realities rather than blame Washington. I wonder what he meant by "regional realities" because at some point those "regional realities" will have to find a permanent solution to the Zionist rape of Palestine, otherwise the Muslims and Arabs who have walked against nature with the US, and who have been scared shitless by the US-Israeli-brandished Iranian scarecrow, may suddenly discover that the US will dump them just as easily as it dumped the Israelis.

Fearful Moron-in-Chief Lifts Sanctions on Iran and Generously Hands it Billions of Dollars

Trump's U-Turn on Iran Sanctions Would Unravel Decades of Curbs

An Iranian Navy officer stands behind a portrait of late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during a nightly pro-government rally to mark the IRIS Dena, a Moudge-class frigate in the Southern Fleet of the Islamic Republic of Iran Navy, in northern Tehran, on June 25, 2026. The Dena frigate was reported to have been targeted and sunk by the United States Navy in the waters of the Indian Ocean, with the incident occurring near the coast of Sri Lanka. (Photo by Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Getty Images) · Bloomberg · NurPhoto via Getty Images

Daniel Flatley, Magdalena Del Valle, Jennifer A. Dlouhy and Jeff Mason
Sun, June 28, 2026

(Bloomberg) -- The Trump administration's effort to unwind decades of sanctions as part of a deal to end the war with Iran has created a head-spinning situation for governments, banks and other companies as they contemplate a shifting patchwork of new permissions and old restrictions.

Following the revolution in 1979, Iran became one of the most sanctioned nations on Earth over its nuclear program and support for regional militias. But the White House is now orchestrating a stunning reversal as part of a broader deal to open the Strait of Hormuz, lower global energy prices and end its unpopular war.

It's hardly been a linear process. On Friday, President Donald Trump accused Iran of violating a fragile ceasefire and US Central Command launched fresh strikes on Iranian targets. There's also continuing disagreements that could unravel the deal.

Still, the pace and scale of the effort has stunned longtime sanctions observers. The US has already authorized the sale of Iranian oil and fuels and pledged to unlock billions in frozen funds.

The 14-point memorandum of understanding signed by Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on June 17 includes the removal of all US sanctions on Iran on "an agreed upon schedule." It also directs the Treasury Department to issue waivers for existing sanctions for 60 days as technical negotiations unfold.

The disorienting change will be tricky to implement in a way that appeals to risk-averse US financial institutions and other firms, according to former Treasury officials, sanctions attorneys and industry sources monitoring the process.

"You want to be 100% sure that you're within compliance," said Adam Smith, a former senior adviser to the director of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, which oversees US sanctions. "One-off transactions that close within the 60 days could work but there may be challenges finding banks and other intermediaries willing to process transactions."

Amid the uncertainty, some Iran hawks are pushing the administration to shift from cash payments for Iranian oil sales to one requiring funds be placed in an escrow account where US officials can ensure it doesn't go to proxy groups such as Hezbollah or Hamas, according to people familiar with the matter.

Trump has suggested publicly Iran's money may go into escrow accounts controlled by the US, or that Tehran can only spend it on US farm goods — ideas that were not in the MOU and which Iran has mocked and rejected.

The idea of using the frozen funds to purchase US agricultural goods was first discussed about a month ago during an Oval Office meeting with Trump, Vice President JD Vance and other advisers on Iran, according to a person familiar with the matter.

It was seen as a way to insulate the White House from the criticism Republicans leveled at the Obama administration for delivering Iran "pallets of cash," the person said, adding they believed Iran had little choice but to accept such a mechanism.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Wednesday Iran will invoice its oil sales in US dollars. The comments marked a departure from Washington's longstanding goal of locking Tehran out of the US financial system.

To make that work, the US would need to enlist some of the biggest US or US-linked banks, which have been hesitant to handle any transactions that risk violating sanctions, according to a former Treasury official.

The first step came Monday when Treasury issued General License X, which allowed oil sales to be conducted in "US dollar-denominated funds."

In addition to the license, companies are likely to request clear guidance from Treasury — such as comfort letters or fact sheets that are regularly issued for thorny cases — in order to reassure compliance departments it's okay to participate in these sorts of transactions, according to a person with knowledge of the assurances the oil industry is planning to seek.

Firms are looking for the kind of guidance issued for Venezuela after the US captured then-president Nicolas Maduro in January, the person said.

"Financial institutions are typically more risk adverse than are their clients when we see sanctions programs unwind," said Michael Huneke, a trade and national security lawyer at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP. "I would expect them to be very cautious here as well."

Rushing in and risking a possible violation is not an appealing gamble. BNP Paribas paid a nearly $1 billion settlement to the US in 2014 for allegedly violating sanctions on Iran and Sudan. Other banks also paid steep fines.

Successive US administrations, along with Congress, have levied hundreds of sanctions on Iran over the years, creating layers of restrictions designed to be difficult to remove in one fell swoop.

A 2015 law called the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act mandates that Congress review and approve any nuclear agreement reached with Iran. It was passed following the signing of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which was implemented during the administration of then-President Barack Obama — an agreement Trump repeatedly assailed before pulling out of it in 2018.

Some hawkish US lawmakers believe the administration may circumvent the law by saying the Iran MOU is not a nuclear agreement, even though it deals squarely with the issue, according to a person familiar with the matter.

If that happens, they are likely to place additional pressure on banks and companies doing business with Iran, reminding them of their obligations under US law, the person said, requesting anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

The person pointed to a 2012 law called the Iran Threat Reduction and Syria Human Rights Act that requires companies that list on US stock exchanges to report certain Iran-related activities to the Securities and Exchange Commission, potentially exposing themselves to future congressional scrutiny should the deal fall apart.

"General License X is unprecedented in the relief it offers Iran," said Chris Kennedy, economic statecraft lead at Bloomberg Economics. However, relying on waivers rather than new legislation means that "over the longer term, the Trump administration will face an uphill battle delivering on its promise to permanently remove sanctions on Iran."

Iran Says $12 Billion to Be Unfrozen Ahead of Rubio’s Gulf Tour
Eltaf Najafizada and Omar Tamo
Tue, June 23, 2026

(Bloomberg) -- Iran said $12 billion of its frozen funds were set to be released as part of ongoing talks with the US, with the two sides broadly signaling progress in negotiations to formally end their war.

Plenty of tensions remain, including over Israel's war against Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the US is yet to confirm how much Tehran will get in unfrozen funds.

Iran will get two installments of $6 billion each, the country's semi-official Mehr news agency reported, citing Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi.

The unfreezing of funds — as well as the US waiving sanctions on Iranian oil exports and pledging to help set up a $300 billion rehabilitation fund for Iran — has provoked criticism of President Donald Trump. Iran hawks fear the Islamic Republic will use the money to rebuild its armed forces and continue its support of militant groups such as Hezbollah.

JD Vance, Trump's vice president and the lead negotiator for the US, on Monday said Iran would buy American soy, wheat and corn with the funds it receives.

Meanwhile, Secretary of State Marco Rubio is expected to land in the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday, as the US seeks to reassure regional allies the agreement it signed last week with Iran is good for their security and economies.

Rubio will also travel to Kuwait and Bahrain this week.

The Strait of Hormuz will be among the topics of discussion for Rubio. Traffic through the vital waterway is increasing, pointing to growing confidence among shipowners and traders about sending vessels through as tensions ease.

In talks in Switzerland since Sunday, the US and Iran have agreed to set up technical working groups to deal with issues such as unwinding sanctions on the Islamic Republic and curbing its enrichment of uranium. Vance and Iran's lead negotiator, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, left Switzerland on Monday, though lower-level delegates are continuing discussions this week.

The sides continue to give differing details of what exactly has been agreed and what is being negotiated. The White House needs to appease Iran hawks, while Iran is presenting the deal to its people as a capitulation by Washington. The Islamic Republic's military and infrastructure were battered by US and Israeli bombing from late February, but its closure of the Strait of Hormuz caused energy prices to soar and hurt Trump's standing among Americans and allied countries.

Oil prices nudged lower on Tuesday, with Brent down 0.6% to below $78 a barrel. It's down from a high of around $125 in late April but still above pre-war levels, reflecting that it will take months for oil and liquefied natural gas flows through Hormuz to return to normal.

Ghalibaf said on his return from the talks that the Strait of Hormuz would never return to its pre-war state and Iran would administer the waterway in accordance with international law, the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency reported.

Vance said negotiators had "set up the mechanism" to ensure the strait remains open. When speaking earlier to reporters, he did not answer directly when asked if the US wanted Israel to withdraw troops from southern Lebanon.

Israel's ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, told Bloomberg TV that "unfortunately, it's not the case" when asked if the Lebanese military can confront the Hezbollah militia on its own. "We are capable of fighting Hezbollah, but we are not eager to stay in Lebanon," Danon added.

Biden: Trump is an Incompetent, Corrupt and Vain Loser

Biden calls Trump ‘a loser’, portraying him as incompetent, corrupt and vain
Ramon Antonio Vargas
Sun, June 28, 2026


Former President Joe Biden and former first lady Jill Biden attend the dedication ceremony for the opening of the Barack Obama Presidential Center, on 18 June in Chicago, Illinois. Photograph: Taylor Hill/Getty Images

Joe Biden called Donald Trump "a loser" in a pugnacious speech on Saturday that invoked his presidential successor's attempted makeover of Washington DC to portray him as incompetent, corrupt and vain.

He delivered those remarks while giving the keynote address at a gala in Hanover, Maryland, hosted by the state's Democratic party, which is hoping to help wrest control of Congress away from Trump and his Republican allies during November's midterm elections.

Biden's 10-minute discourse touched on Trump's demolition of the White House's East Wing to make space for a ballroom, the court-ordered removal of his name after he added it to the facade of the John Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, his plans for a triumphal arch, and the algae bloom that undermined his $14.7m renovation of the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool.

But "it's not just his vanity projects" in the nation's capital city that are a disgrace, Biden contended at the Live! Casino & Hotel Maryland. He also invoked how the administration has been seeking to compensate those convicted of – and then presidentially pardoned for – roles in the violent attack at the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 after Trump's first Oval Office term ended in defeat to Biden.

"Whoa!" Biden said while reciting all of that. "What a loser."

The reflecting pool project in particular – for which the federal government awarded a $1.7m no-bid, filtration system contract to a Trump donor who is a neighbor of the president's Mar-a-Lago club in Florida – "reflects something even worse than the narcissism and incompetence at the core of this administration," Biden continued.

"It's the corruption – the corruption, the brazen, blatant corruption," Biden said. "Corruption on a scale never seen before in American history in any administration."

Biden also criticized Trump's relationship with Vladimir Putin after the Russian leader's forces invaded Ukraine in 2022. And Biden accused Trump of "deliberate distortion and destruction" of the NATO military alliance, widely seen as strained by the war that the US and Israel started in Iran in late February.

"He's diminished our standing in the world more than any president in history has," Biden, 83, said of Trump, 80.

Biden's comments on Saturday came exactly two years after a disastrous televised debate with Trump – a relentless critic of his – that preceded his decision to drop out of running for re-election in the November 2024 presidential race.

Trump subsequently won a second White House term by defeating Biden's endorsed candidate, Vice-President Kamala Harris.

It also came at a time when his family was conspicuously becoming more visible on the political scene in the wake of his departure from office.

For instance, former first lady Jill Biden published her memoir View from the East Wing on 2 June. She appeared at an event promoting the book that day and – among other things – said her husband's cancer diagnosis, announced in May 2025, "really puts life into perspective".

Biden's son Hunter, meanwhile, has gained himself fans through self-deprecating social media posts covering topics such as politics, mental health and addiction recovery – something that was perhaps unexpected when his father, in the waning days of his presidency, issued him a pardon for convictions on federal gun and tax charges.

Prior to Saturday's gala, Biden had struck a more conventional tone in a statement attributed to him in anticipation of his address. "I've always believed democracy isn't a spectator sport," Biden's statement said, before praising political organizers for "knocking on doors, making phone calls and putting in the time nobody sees but everyone benefits from".

Lebanon is Reaching an Irreversible Point of Inflexion

[For a better understanding of the complex chess board game in Lebanon, read the text of the Trilateral Framework agreement between the US, Lebanon and Israel: https://lebanoniznogood.blogspot.com/2026/06/what-does-lebanon-israel-framework.html]

The two Shiite Muslim parties in Lebanon, Iran-backed Hezbollah and the Amal Movement, are mobilizing their troops against the Lebanese government (represented by Maronite Christian President Joseph Aoun and Sunni Muslim Prime Minister Nawaf Salam) for its signing of the Trilateral Framework agreement with the US and Israel.

One wonders how far this mobilization is willing to go. Will it be just statements of condemnation and denunciation? Or will it go as far as turning its weapons against the State and its legitimate Lebanese Army?

Hezbollah and Amal Movement mouthpieces are foaming at the mouth, attacking Aoun and Salam as traitors who have agreed to sell Lebanon to the US and Israel. Any move by anyone to extricate Lebanon from the six-decades-old spiral of violence is treated as a traitor, when all other Arab countries - including US-friendly Syria where large swaths of its territory are still occupied by Israel - have decided to no longer officially display hostility to the Jewish colony in Palestine.

Of all 21-some Arab countries, only the smallest and weakest of them is tasked with "liberating Palestine", precisely because Lebanon is home to the only free Christian community in all these Arab countries. Being Christian in the minds of Fascist Islamists and Muslims - both Iran's Shiite clients, and Saudi Arabia's Sunni clients who are America's lackeys - is the next worse thing than being Jewish. Therefore, Lebanon is an expendable and disposable commodity in the chess game of creating a new Middle East that is unfolding in the region.

I have always said in reply to those who defend Hezbollah's "resistance" rape of the Lebanese State that Hezbollah will NEVER voluntarily depose its weapons and become a strictly political entity as long as the Islamic Republic of Iran is still standing. Back in the early 1990s, there were Jewish American leftwingers like Rachelle Marshall (writing for the Washington Report of Middle Eastern Affairs) defending Hezbollah's "resistance" against the Israeli occupation of south Lebanon and declaring unabashedly that Hezbollah will depose its weapons once Israel withdraws from the southern strip along the border. Israel withdrew in 2000, but Hezbollah did not give up its weapons. Rather, it continued to give Israel every pretext it needed to continue bombing and tormenting Lebanon.

Hezbollah dragged the country into a war with Israel in 1996 (Operation Grapes of Wrath), then again in the July 2006 34-day war. In 2008, Hezbollah deployed its "Black Shirts" militia in the streets of the country and threatened to take over the government. Between 2011 and 2024, Hezbollah put aside its "Palestine liberation" bullshit to fight in Syria in defense of the Assad regime. More recently, Hezbollah dragged Lebanon into another war with Israel in support of Hamas in Gaza following the October 7, 2023 attacks. And now, Hezbollah dragged the country into yet another war with Israel in support of the ongoing Iran-Israel-US confrontation.

Every time Hezbollah waded into a war with Israel, it ended up losing more territory than it claimed to be liberating, and I still believe that Hezbollah will NEVER surrender its weapons and cease its "resistance" pretext. Which is why the joint Israeli-Lebanese-American "tripartite framework agreement" is a waste of time because Hezbollah is not a party to the negotiations. In fact, Hezbollah refuses ANY negotiation with Israel because it believes that merely talking to the Israelis is tantamount to a recognition of the Zionist state.

At this very moment, tensions are rising sharply inside Lebanon, at least on the airwaves and in official statements. Having signed the Framework Agreement, the Lebanese government must now implement clauses pertaining to it, notably deploying Lebanese Army units to areas from which its regular troops have been denied access by non-state terrorist organizations, including the Palestinian PLO (1969-1982) and Hezbollah (1982-present time). 

Moreover, the absence of regular government troops will soon be compounded by the departure of the UN's Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) that has been in the area since 1978 without ever really solving any of the problems for which it was deployed in the first place. UNIFIL is slated to begin its orderly and safe withdrawal from Lebanon in December 2026, with the mission expected to fully disband and exit the country by 2027. The UN Security Council adopted Resolution 2790 on August 28, 2025, extending the UNIFIL’s mandate for the final time until December 31, 2026, when it is granted an additional one-year drawdown period (through December 2027), during which the force will transfer security responsibilities in southern Lebanon to the Lebanese Army.

Which brings us to what we and others have been saying: The Lebanese are being pressured to launch their own "civil" war to disarm Hezbollah, which the Lebanese government of Aoun and Salam are reluctant to do for a number of reasons, including a poorly equipped Lebanese army (the US and Israel historically arguing against it in a self-fulfilling prophecy for fear of weapons falling into Hezbollah's hands) and a fear of a repeat of the 1975 War in which the Lebanese fought against Yasser Arafat's PLO attempted takeover of the country as a substitute for Palestine.

Back in 1975, it was the Sunni Muslims of Lebanon who led the insurrection against their own state in defense of the Palestinian guerillas (also Sunni Muslims), a war that led to the fracture of the Lebanese Army into sectarian units. Now with a Sunni Arab World less hostile to Israel, it is the turn of the Iranian-backed Shiite Muslims, namely Hezbollah, to lead the insurrection against the State. And again, any attempt by the Lebanese Army to confront Hezbollah will inevitably lead to another fracture of the Army: All Hezbollah has to do is call on the Shiite Muslim soldiers to abandon their units and join its ranks. Loyalty and identity in Lebanon are more to one's sect than to one's country.

As long as Iran is able to withstand the American-Israeli assault, Hezbollah will not flinch in Lebanon. So, per traditional American backstabbing foreign policy, the Americans, who are in a terrible bind at what to do, are beginning to think, again, of handing over the Lebanon headache to Syria.

If official Lebanon is reluctant to "clean up" Hezbollah, and

if Israel is terrified of yet another land invasion of Lebanon, and

if Hezbollah is backed into an existential corner, its supply routes have been severely diminished with the mutation of Syria from a pro-Iran to an anti-Iran regime,

one avenue would be to subcontract the task to the Syrians next door. In 1975, the Syrian troops of the Shiite-leaning Assad regime were dispatched into Lebanon to quell the Sunni Muslim Palestinians. Now the Syrian regime is Sunni, and Hezbollah is Shiite: A perfect recipe for the Americans to send in the Syrian troops of Al-Sharaa who have no lost love for Hezbollah that fought against them during the Syrian civil war (2011-2024).

Donald Dumb's chaotic mind spilled the beans - he must hear his advisors discuss these issues in his presence, and he brainlessly latches on to what he hears and later disgorges it in his posts. He suggested a week ago that it might be a good idea to subcontract the Lebanon stalemate to Syria, which means another US-sponsored Syrian invasion and occupation of Lebanon which would, in theory, finish off Hezbollah in what could turn out to be a horrific and more bloody war than that of 1975.

As an example of the tenor of Hezbollah's discourse in reaction to the signing of the Framework Agreement, Hezbollah MP Mohammad Raad said, "The joint US-Lebanon-Israel statement represents a surrender of the Lebanese State to American domination and its collusion with the Zionist enemy against its own people who are attached to their land."

The chameleon Shiite dinosaur Nabih Berri, leader of Hezbollah's twin sister, the Amal Movement, and who has been speaker of the Lebanese parliament for some 40 years (because of Lebanon's fake "consensual" democracy) has not yet criticized the signing of the Lebanon-Israel-US Agreement; Any criticism by him would represent a major vertical split within the Lebanese government because he represents the Shiite community in the State's hierarchy. His response will determine the course of events.

US Democrat Party Leaders are Jaundiced Cowards

[Read the ABC report at the end of this post]

Under the GOP-MAGA umbrella there are scores of heavily armed radical right-wing, racist, white supremacist, survivalist, extremist and terrorist groups that are never ostracized or rejected by the "mainstream" republican establishment. Donald Dumb even called them "decent people". I am talking about gangs like the KKK, Proud Boys, the Patriot Movement, Michigan Militia, the NRA, Oath Keepers, Three Percenters, Boogaloo Bois, Patriot Prayer, Aryan Nations, the Atomwaffen Division, etc.... whose neo-Nazi members proudly march down the streets of American cities, weapons pointed at people, without being bothered by police and the government and are not even criticized by the Republican establishment.

No one in the Republican party renounces or denounces these sociopathic terrorists (Timothy McVeigh bombed the federal building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995, killing 167 Americans) nor does the leadership of the Republican party tell these groups to leave the GOP and create their own party. 

For some reason, the Republican party has created for itself an aura of entitlement by monopolizing the notion of "patriotism", a fake one to be sure, but one that is wrapped by the flag and other superficial slogans and imagery that belong to nationalism rather than patriotism. In contrast, the Democrat party always seems to be apologetic and insecure, as if willingly fitting the GOP's description of the Democrats as being "less-Americans" simply because it embraces immigrants and people of different races, creeds and backgrounds, whereas the Republicans are largely a white Anglo-Saxon protestant party.

For those who don't know the difference: Patriotism is love of one's country, pure and simple. Nationalism is hatred of other countries and peoples which, by default, suggests love of one's country. A patriot is someone who loves his country without hating other peoples and countries. A nationalist is someone who must hate others to prove he loves his country. 

REPUBLICANS AND THEIR MAGA AND WHITE CHRISTIAN SUPREMACIST AFFILIATES ARE NOT PATRIOTS. THEY ARE NATIONALISTS WHO CONFLATE HATE FOR OTHERS WITH LOVE FOR COUNTRY.

In contrast, the Democrats do play into the GOP's dirty game of having to constantly defend their patriotism. The fact that Democrats include in their ranks Catholics, Blacks, immigrants and disaffected minorities of all brands has constituted the central accusation by Republicans that the Democrats are not "pure" Americans. What the Democrats fail to do is assert their patriotism with more fervor; they always seem to be on the defensive because their patriotism is not coupled with hatred of others. But they are naive in assuming that a timid, apologetic, and centrist posture is their key to fighting the Republicans. AND THAT IS because they are trapped by the Republicans into a defensive posture.

Just as Republicans and the GOP embrace hard-right radical extremists - they still defend their own barbarians for attacking Congress in the insurrection of January 6, 2021 - the Democrat party must embrace more hard-left groups. What's good for the Republican goose must be good for the Democrat gander!

Around the world, people who do not understand the internal dynamics of US politics always see the Republicans as the "real" Americans. This is perhaps because the Republicans are interventionists and warmongers who launch useless and deadly wars - which they never win, but that is less important for ignorant outsiders who see Republicans as "stronger" than Democrats - By waging wars ands beating their chest like apes and other primates, Republicans are more visible to the rest of the world.

And now, faithful to their assumed weakness and succumbing more to the GOP-inflicted guilt of being "less Americans", traditional establishment Democrats, like James Carville below, are playing their GOP-assigned role as weak centrists by demanding that progressive candidates who label themselves as Socialist Democrats and who are winning one victory after another from within the party, leave the party and start their own. By telling the progressive Democrats they do not belong to the party and that they should leave the party and start their own, Carville is falling into the GOP trap. He is accepting of a GOP that embraces right wing radicalism, but is rejecting a Democrat party that embraces everyone, even hard-left constituents. Carville has apparently not learned anything from the past decade of a Trump-dominated GOP.

And that is why the American people who denounce Trump's Republican party by and large find the Democrats not up to par, not a sufficient counterpart.

Mr. Carville: Use the progressive members of your party to rally the troops and signal to the GOP that the Democrats are as entitled Americans as the GOP claims to be. You need to fight dirty just like the GOP always does, especially after it was hijacked by Donald Dumb.

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James Carville says Mamdani-backed candidates should form separate party


Alicia Sitz
Thu, June 25, 2026

(NewsNation) — Democratic socialist candidates made major gains in elections across the country Tuesday night.

Three candidates gaining the most attention are Democratic socialists Claire Valdez and Darializa Avila Chevalier, and progressive Democrat Brad Lander. All of them were backed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani in what was considered a major test of his political influence and the strength of the city's progressive movement overall.

"We are showing there is a new path for politics in our city and in our country," Mamdani said. "We are showing that last June, a year ago tomorrow, was not an anomaly. It was not the end. It was the beginning."

However, some in the Democratic Party believe success of the left could bring the party down.

Democratic strategist James Carville thinks some critics of Tuesday's results are being overly dramatic, calling their reactions "90% hysterical." But he told NewsNation's Elizabeth Vargas on Wednesday that he doesn't understand or appreciate these candidates' efforts to use the Democratic Party to advance their socialist ideals.

"All of these people hate Democrats," Carville told Vargas. "Why do you want to run as a Democrat? Start your own movement. If it's such a powerful, sweeping movement that's got momentum everywhere, then go ahead and be at the head of it. Don't use the Democratic Party to advance it."

Carville specifically called out Chevalier, saying Democrats shouldn't seat her if she wins in November. He said her views were against anything Democrats support.

"We believe in pluralism. She doesn't even believe in interracial dating," Carville said.

Carville referred to social media posts Chevalier published from 2018 to 2022. The posts included attacks on Democratic leaders, questioned the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic and criticized interracial relationships.

Carville also called out the socialist movement's anti-Israel sentiment, saying it's not what the Democratic Party is about.

"You can be hugely anti the policies of the government of Israel. …But when you say, 'I don't think Israel should exist,' then I don't have room for you," Carville said. "When you start to write, 'They don't have to exist,' or you run against the concept of Jewish people, then you've got no place at my table."

While Carville said they are entitled to their opinions and that free speech protects them, having them seated in the Democratic caucus is not appropriate based on the party's values.

"We just don't want to be in the same political party with them."

NewsNation's Steph Whiteside and Jessica Kartalija contributed to this article.

======================================================

Can Democrat veterans running for Congress reclaim the patriotism narrative from the GOP?


OREN OPPENHEIM and GABY VINICK
Fri, June 26, 2026

Some of the military veterans running for Congress as Democrats in the 2026 midterms see themselves as part of the party's push to showcase itself as patriotic amid polling showing Democrats broadly feeling less proud of the country than Republicans.

An Ipsos poll conducted earlier this year found 63% of Republicans saying that the phrase "I feel proud to be an American" described them extremely well, compared to just 14% of Democrats. The same poll found 65% of Republicans saying the phrase "there's no place I'd rather live than the U.S." described them extremely well, compared to 19% of Democrats.

Houssein Hersi/AFP via Getty Images - PHOTO: Captain Nancy Lacore delivers a speech during a handover ceremony at the Camp Lemonier navy base in Djibouti, July 20, 2017.

One caveat: the discrepancy between Democrats and Republicans in the poll could be explained in part by Democratic opposition to the White House and its policies.

But those military veteran Democrats are campaigning in part on saying that patriotism isn't partisan, or that critiquing the government can itself come from having pride in the country and wanting it to improve.

"I think that's kind of silly to think that patriotism belongs to one particular party," said Nancy Lacore, a retired vice admiral and former Chief of Navy Reserve running for Congress in South Carolina after having been removed from her position by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in 2025.

"In my mind, patriotism isn't about, like, 'Oh, I got the biggest flag' or 'I'm cheering the loudest at events.' To me, patriotism is grounded in service, that you love your country enough to try to make it better, serve your country, strengthen it, uphold the Constitution."
'The most patriotic duty you have is to question'

In Florida's 13th Congressional District, Leela Gray, a retired Army brigadier general, is one of the Democrats running for the chance to flip a seat held by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna. Gray told ABC News, "I served in uniform for 30 years. I had no idea if people were an independent or a Republican or a Democrat. It didn't matter. What mattered was, could you trust the person next to you?"

U.S. Army - PHOTO: Brig. Gen. Leela Gray waits to be introduced as the guest speaker for the Sisters in Arms general session at Shaw Air Force Base, S.C., July 6, 2018.

Over in Kansas, two former service members are among the Democrats competing in a crowded field to unseat incumbent Sen. Roger Marshall.

State Sen. Patrick Schmidt is a former naval intelligence officer based in Topeka who still serves in the Army Reserve. He told ABC News he rejects the premise that Democrats need to "reclaim" patriotism: "We're all trying to figure out how do we communicate with more people, how do we meet more people, but I think I reject the idea that we've lost the plot."

John Hanna/AP - PHOTO: Kansas Democratic congressional candidate Patrick Schmidt answers questions during an interview with The Associated Press, Oct. 31, 2022, at his campaign headquarters in Topeka, Kansas.

Another Democrat in the race, Noah Taylor of El Dorado, is a former Army infantryman and counterintelligence analyst who co-founded the nonpartisan political advocacy group Leading Kansas.

"We stopped talking about the things that make America great, and being a patriot doesn't mean that you can't criticize this country. In fact, the most patriotic duty you have is to question, to make things better," Taylor said in an interview.

Noah Taylor/X - PHOTO: Noah Taylor, candidate for Congress in Kansas in a video posted to his X account.'I love this country'

In New Jersey's toss-up 7th District, Rebecca Bennett won the Democratic nomination in early June to take on GOP Rep. Tom Kean. Bennett is a former Navy helicopter pilot and served for over a decade and also worked as a test pilot and served in the Air National Guard.

She said she does not shy away from any themes of patriotism: "I am a patriot. I love this country. It's why I joined the military. It's why I'm doing this now. And I explicitly say that in my stump [speech] every time when I'm talking to people."

Ryan Murphy/AP - PHOTO: Rebecca Bennett, Democratic candidate for New Jersey's 7th Congressional District, speaks during a primary election night watch party after winning the Democratic nomination, June 2, 2026, in Bridgewater, N.J.

Democratic veterans running for Congress also point to their military bona fides when discussing the Iran war and how it's driven up prices.

Matt Maasdam, a retired Navy SEAL and onetime military aide to former President Barack Obama who is running in a swing district in Michigan, told ABC News, "As somebody who watched Baghdad and Kabul roads get fixed while I was overseas, I want to see Michigan's roads get fixed. If we don't have money to spend on health care and education in America, why are we spending billions of dollars dropping bombs on the other side of the world?"

Matt Maasdam For Congress via AP - PHOTO: This undated image provided by Matt Maasdam For Congress, shows Matt Maasdam, a Democrat running for Michigan's 7th Congressional District.

Maasdam is a candidate in Michigan's 7th District Democratic primary in which the winner will take on incumbent GOP Rep. Tom Barrett. Barrett, himself a former Army helicopter pilot, has voted in Congress to rein in President Donald Trump's powers to conduct the Iran war.

Jason Cabel Roe, a spokesperson for Barrett's campaign, told ABC News, "Tom Barrett wasn't elected to Congress because of his service in the Army, he was elected because he has deep ties to the 7th District, and faces the same struggles as thousands of other families living in the district."
Will it work?

Running a large set of veteran candidates is something of a reprisal of a strategy that worked before for the Democratic Party, like in the 2018 midterms when former Navy helicopter pilot Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey and former CIA case officer Abigail Spanberger in Virginia flipped GOP-held seats. Both went on to be elected governor in their respective states.

The strategy isn't foolproof by any means, even in intra-party Democratic primaries. For instance, in Texas' 9th Congressional District, former astronaut and Air Force fighter pilot Terry Virts lost in the Democratic primary in March. In Kentucky, former Marine Corps fighter pilot Amy McGrath -- who was the party's nominee for a Senate seat in 2020 -- lost in the state's Democratic Senate primary in May.

Are Democrats intentionally prioritizing or recruiting veterans this cycle because of the gulf between the parties on patriotism?

Sawyer Hackett, a Democratic political strategist, told ABC News, "As much as I would love to credit the Democratic Party leaders for recruiting a slate of fantastic veteran candidates, I think, honestly, most of it is organic," because, he argued, veterans are more attuned to actions taken by Trump as commander-in-chief.

Hackett acknowledged that the party is also recruiting veterans, but thinks that veterans already active with the party are encouraging others.

But why do Democrats feel veterans can be successful candidates?

Emily Cherniack, CEO of the Democratic-aligned New Politics, argued that along with high prices, "people are really pissed that Trump has not solved the problems he promised to solve, and so they're really looking for a new generation of leadership."

New Politics recruits candidates with military backgrounds and has endorsed Bennett and Maasdam.

And Matt Corridoni, a Democratic strategist who advises Democratic groups The Bench and VoteVets, which are boosting some candidates including Maasdam and Lacore, argued, "Because they are veterans and they have the experience of putting service over self, people trust them on a wide range of issues. ... especially right now, though, with Iran, they can speak with an extra level of credibility."

What does the Lebanon-Israel "Framework Agreement" Say?

The Iranian militia in Lebanon, Hezbollah, is seething with anger at the signing yesterday June 26, 2026, of a "framework agreement" between Lebanon and Israel toward the pacification of their borders that have been the stage for what seems like a perpetual war for the past six decades.

Will this agreement succeed? Or will it suffer the same fate as the May 1983 Accord that followed the 1982 Israeli invasion to get rid of Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)? Back then, after nearly a year of difficult negotiations, the May 1983 Accord was never signed or ratified and no one really knows why, although there are a number of explanations and speculations. 

Most of the latter seem to point to three salient possibilities: 

1- When faced with his obligation to sign the agreement that his own government negotiated, the Lebanese President at the time, Amin Gemayel, became reluctant to be the second (after Egypt in 1979) Arab country to sign peace with Israel. From very close and well informed sources, Lebanon Iznogood has learned that Gemayel justified his refusal to sign the May 1983 Accord by saying he "didn't want to close 20 [Arab] doors to open one [Israeli] door". In other words, he feared a massive boycott of Lebanon by the Arab countries.

2- Amin's brother, Bashir, had been assassinated by the Syrian occupation army in September 1982 just weeks after his election to the presidency, and after indicating he would seek a peace treaty with Israel. Amin might have feared for his life if he signed the Accord, and balked at the idea. Anwar Sadat of Egypt signed peace with Israel in 1979 and was also assassinated in 1981. In sum, Amin might have feared for his life. He refused to sign at the last minute even though Parliament had ratified the agreement.

3- Some suggest, perhaps in defense of President Gemayel, that it was the US that instructed Gemayel not to sign because, as has been the case throughout the past six decades of Lebanon's torment in the Israeli-Arab conflict, the US always gave priority to its relations with the Arab world (and its sword of Damocles oil embargo threat over the West) over Lebanon. Indeed, the US sponsored the Syrian dictatorship's takeover of Lebanon between 1974 and 2005, when it finally relented and demanded that Syria end its occupation of Lebanon in the aftermath of 9-11 and the invasion of Iraq. 

Up until then, the US considered Syria like an avatar of the Arab world at large, and in order to appease the Arabs and Muslims, the US always favored Syria's interests in Lebanon, sacrificing the small country's welfare in the process. It may well be that the US back in 1983 also concurred that peace between Lebanon and Israel was too "early" and that the May 1983 Accord would be a slap in the face of the Arab world, especially that the US was not addressing the question of Palestine appropriately.

The failure of ratifying and implementing the May 1983 Accord resulted in the fall of Amin Gemayel's government, the reinvigoration of Syria's dominion over Lebanon, the gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces, the inability of Parliament to elect a successor for Amin Gemayel in 1988, and the completion of Syria's takeover of Lebanon through the 1989-1990 Taig Agreement - all of which were sponsored by the US and Saudi Arabia. 

Right now, President Joseph Aoun is faced with the same dilemma, except that there has been a tectonic shift in the Arab world's relations with Israel. Most Arab countries have essentially abandoned and betrayed Palestine and are on their way to "normalizing" with Israel, and whereas Israelis used to say that liberal, democratic and Christian-led Lebanon would be the first Arab country to sign peace with Israel, Lebanon might well be the last to do so now.

But also right now, Hezbollah and Iran see the wind in their sails as they consider that not losing to the US and Israel means that they won. Hezbollah is not a signatory to the Framework Agreement and has not participated in the negotiations, which does not augur well for its successful implementation. The virulence of Hezbollah's reaction over the past 24 hours since the signing of the agreement is unprecedented, accusing the government of President Aoun and PM Salam of treason and submission to the US-Israeli expansionist plan in the south of the country. 

Lebanon Iznogood predicts difficult moments ahead in Lebanon, including potential assassinations, riots, clashes with the Lebanese Army, and an insurrection bordering on civil war by Hezbollah against the Lebanese government, leading perhaps even to a takeover of the state. This way Iran will acquire a new territory and a substitute beachhead on the Mediterranean (which it lost with the fall of the Assad regime in Syria), and will no longer be operating via its proxy Hezbollah but would be directly in charge of operations in Lebanon right along the Israeli border.

Of note and particular concern is that if the agreement fails and Hezbollah's ascendancy grows in Lebanon, the presumed "temporary" presence of Israel in the south of the country might become a permanent one, leading to the eventual Israeli annexation of that part of Lebanese territory (south of the Litani River) just as Israel has done with the Syrian Golan Heights.

Here are the details of the "Framework Agreement" signed yesterday June 26, 2026, by Lebanon and Israel in Washington DC: 

The trilateral (US, Lebanon, Israel) agreement consists of 14-points. The agreement aims to end the state of war, ensure sovereignty and security for both nations, and establish peaceful neighborly relations.

The core mechanism of the deal is a reciprocal, sequenced process: the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) will restore effective sovereign authority over all Lebanese territory pending the verified disarmament of non-state armed groups (specifically Hezbollah) and dismantlement of their infrastructure. In exchange, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) will progressively redeploy out of Lebanese territory.

Key provisions include:

Pilot Zones: Two initial areas (one south and one north of the Litani River) will serve as pilot zones for phased IDF withdrawal and LAF deployment, with future zones to be agreed upon by mutual consent.

Sovereignty and Disarmament: Lebanon commits to rebuilding its monopoly on the use of force and ensuring no non-state groups have military capabilities anywhere in the country, requesting support from international and Arab partners.

Security Arrangements: Israel declares it has no territorial ambitions in Lebanon and that its military actions were solely in response to threats from non-state actors; termination of this threat will eliminate the need for future IDF presence.

Reconstruction and Aid: The United States will mobilize international partners for substantial reconstruction and humanitarian assistance, with future U.S. aid conditioned on verified milestones.

Next Steps: The parties will establish working groups to draft a comprehensive peace and security agreement and a Security Annex detailing verification mechanisms, while maintaining a military coordination group with U.S. support.

Note that Hezbollah is not a signatory to this agreement, and its reaction to the deal remains a critical factor in its implementation.

The specific disarmament verification mechanisms are not fully detailed in the public text of the June 26, 2026 framework agreement itself; instead, the agreement mandates that these mechanisms will be defined in a forthcoming Security Annex.

However, the framework and associated statements outline the following key components of the verification process:

1. The Security Annex

The primary mechanism for verification is a Security Annex to be developed immediately by working groups with full United States support. This annex will complement the framework by detailing:

Specific security arrangements.

Precise verification mechanisms to confirm the disarmament of non-state armed groups (specifically Hezbollah) and the dismantlement of their infrastructure.

The steps required to advance the reciprocal process of Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) deployment and Israel Defense Forces (IDF) redeployment.

2. Pilot Zones as Verification Mechanisms

The agreement establishes a phased verification process using pilot zones:

Initial Zones: Two specific areas (one south and one north of the Litani River) have been agreed upon as initial pilot zones.

Process: In these zones, the LAF will gradually assume security responsibility. The verification of disarmament in these specific zones is the trigger for:

Phased IDF redeployment from those specific areas.

The start of internationally supported reconstruction.

The safe return of Lebanese civilians.

Expansion: Future pilot zones will be agreed upon by mutual consent only after successful verification in previous zones.

 
3. U.S. Verification and Oversight

The United States plays a central role in the verification architecture:

Direct Verification: The U.S. explicitly intends to "work closely with both countries to verify and support this process."

Military Coordination Group: A trilateral Military Coordination Group (including the U.S., Israel, and Lebanon) will be established to ensure overall implementation and likely oversee day-to-day verification activities.

Conditionality: Future U.S. assistance and reconstruction aid are strictly conditioned on verifiable milestones, full transparency, and demonstrated results monitored by the U.S.

4. Performance-Based Metrics

The verification is tied to a performance-based program for the LAF. The U.S. and international partners will monitor:

The complete and verified disarmament of all non-state armed groups.

The dismantlement of associated infrastructure (e.g., tunnels, weapons depots).

The LAF's ability to exercise exclusive sovereign authority and a monopoly on the use of force in the cleared areas.

The Framework Agreement does not establish a fixed calendar timeline for the Israeli withdrawal. Instead, it mandates a conditional, performance-based schedule tied strictly to security benchmarks.

Withdrawal Mechanism: "Move-for-Move"

The withdrawal follows a reciprocal, sequenced process rather than a set date. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) will only "progressively redeploy" as the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) demonstrates the capacity to maintain security.

No Fixed Timetable: Israeli Ambassador Yechiel Leiter explicitly stated that the deal is not based on a fixed timetable but on "measurable progress" by the Lebanese army in disarming Hezbollah and dismantling its infrastructure.

Condition Precedent: Full Israeli withdrawal is contingent upon the verified disarmament of non-state armed groups and the removal of the threat to Israel. Until these conditions are met, Israel retains the right to maintain its security zone in southern Lebanon.

Phased Implementation via Pilot Zones

The timeline is structured around the successful handover of specific geographic areas:

Initial Pilot Zones: The process begins with two designated "pilot zones" (one north and one south of the Litani River).

Verification Phase: In these zones, the LAF must assume full security responsibility while international monitors verify the absence of Hezbollah weapons and infrastructure.

Expansion: Only upon confirmation of successful disarmament in the initial zones will additional areas be opened for handover. As Ambassador Leiter noted, "Additional 'pilot' handovers... will take place as benchmarks are met."

Immediate Next Steps

Military Coordination: A U.S.-facilitated Military Coordination Group for Lebanon (MCG4L) has been established to oversee the implementation and verify benchmarks.

Reconstruction Link: International reconstruction efforts and significant aid are also conditioned on these security milestones, meaning financial support flows in parallel with verified LAF deployment.

JD Vance Says Nixon's Corruption Pales in Comparison to Trump's

Having elevated official corruption and crime to new "standards", Donald Dumb and JD Dunce admit that Richard Nixon's corruption is insignificant per their standards, but that thanks to them, Nixon's corruption is witnessing a "renaissance".

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Vance, an admirer of Richard Nixon, says Watergate would be a 'a 12-hour news story' today



Updated Thu, June 25, 2026

WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President JD Vance on Thursday said the Watergate scandal that brought down President Richard Nixon would have been a blip in today's news cycle, and he drew parallels between Nixon and President Donald Trump — arguing that both were targeted by "deep state" forces.

Vance described his admiration for Nixon during a conversation at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library in Yorba Linda, California. Widely expected to be a presidential contender in 2028, Vance spoke at the library while promoting his new book, "Communion."

After talking about the book and his faith journey, Vance shifted to Nixon, saying the legacy of the 37th president is "enjoying a bit of a renaissance."

"If Watergate happened tomorrow, it would be like a 12-hour news story. The idea that it would have taken down a presidency is crazy," Vance said.

He went on: "If you look at the story of how the deep state took down Richard Nixon, it's not all that different from what the same groups of people, the same institutions tried to do to Donald Trump in the first Trump administration."

Vance then noted his own similarities with Nixon.

"Young senator, vice president, writes some bestselling books, is hated by the media," he said. "It kind of sounds like JD Vance. I've always liked Richard Nixon."

Nixon was in his second term when he resigned over the Watergate scandal in 1974.

US Memorandum of Misunderstanding with Iran Hits a New Low

[Updated: US strikes Iran in retaliation for the Iranian attack which replies with its own attack on Bahrain. See AP reports below]

 

Iran knows that if the war remains in the news and gasoline prices remain high, it can tilt the outcome of the midterm elections in the US against Donald Dumb and his MAGA-GOP party. 

Does Iran have a right to impose transit fees across the Strait of Hormuz and shoot at vessels crossing it?

Does Israel have the right to continue bombing Lebanon despite Trump's shoddy Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Iran?

Netanyahu knows that he is safe as long as a war, any war, is ongoing. 

Per AI:
An Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) is a maritime area defined by the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) that extends up to 200 nautical miles (370 Km) from a coastal state’s baseline. Within this zone, the coastal state holds sovereign rights to explore, exploit, conserve, and manage all natural resources, both living (e.g., fish) and non-living (e.g., oil, gas), as well as jurisdiction over marine scientific research and environmental protection. But other states retain the freedom of navigation, overflight, and the laying of submarine cables and pipelines, provided these activities do not interfere with the coastal state’s resource rights.

Unlike the EEZ, a country's Territorial Waters extend only 12 nautical miles (22 Km) in which it has full sovereignty.

Since the closest distance between Iranian land territory and United Arab Emirates (UAE) land territory is 24 nautical miles (44 kilometers), which occurs across the Strait of Hormuz, a critical narrow stretch of water separating the two nations, it is clear that Iran has no legal or legitimate right to impose fees on transiting ships across the Strait, since its territorial waters do not encompass the remaining 22 Km of international/UAE territorial waters.

Be that as it may, Iran has managed to interfere with shipping across the Strait, which has caused oil prices to skyrocket, and in turn caused Donald Dumb to retreat from his war against Iran because he feared that high gasoline prices at the pump in the US would hurt the Republican Party's chances at the midterm elections in November.

After signing the American surrender document, the so-called "memorandum of understanding", Iran continues to invoke the right to control shipping across the Strait of Hormuz. And to poke the dumb criminal felon in the eye, it just attacked a vessel in the area, as if Iran is playing into the elections. If Iran manages to keep oil prices high by disturbing oil shipping, it could indeed increase the chances of Trump and his party losing Congress.

According to CNN, Iran struck a vessel in the Strait of Hormuz on Thursday, demonstrating its continued ability to restrict the critical waterway, despite the agreement reached last week with the United States. A US official told CNN the vessel was attacked by an Iranian drone, challenging the Trump administration's claim that the strait is free and open once more.

The attack, the first since the US and Iran agreed signed the MoU last week, prompted a jump in global oil prices and came as Secretary of State Marco Rubio tried to sell the agreement to skeptical Gulf nations. 

This week, ship movements in the Strait of Hormuz hit their highest point since the war began in late February, with MarineTraffic data showing 70 crossings on Wednesday. Most of those vessels using a route that followed the coast of Oman, the maritime monitoring group said. Traffic dipped again on Thursday, however.

Iran sees control of the waterway as a key point of leverage in negotiations. On Thursday, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp warned that safe passage would only be given to ships via routes declared to Iran.

After the attack, the Persian Gulf Strait Authority – an agency Tehran recently established to manage the strait – said safe transit would not be guaranteed. "The consequences of traveling on unauthorized routes will be the responsibility of the owner, operator, and commander of the vessel," the agency said on X.

The current agreement between Washington and Tehran includes a commitment to reopen the waterway without tolls for 60 days, and has already seen the US lift its blockade of Iranian ports. But the 14-point memorandum also grants Iran a formal role in overseeing commercial traffic through the Strait of Hormuz alongside Oman.

Tehran began to enforce tolls on vessels wishing to transit the strait during the conflict, something the Trump administration has vowed not to allow under a long-term peace deal.

"The reality of it is that no country on Earth has a right to charge for the use of international waterways, and that will never be an acceptable condition of any deal," Rubio said at a meeting with foreign ministers of Gulf Arab states in Bahrain on Thursday. A joint statement later said the ministers "rejected any tolls, fees, or attempts to assert control over the Strait."

Tehran, which disputes the waterway being international waters, has previously raised the prospect of charging a kind of service fee, rather than toll, alongside Oman in the future.

The memorandum is meant to halt fighting, open the Strait of Hormuz and offer economic relief to Iran in exchange for a pledge never to develop nuclear weapons - just a pledge that can easily be broken. (The US under Trump broke its own pledges and signature by wantonly withdrawing from the JCPOA, the 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran, the US and Europe).

But the MoU leaves the critical details, like Tehran's nuclear program and its stocks of enriched uranium, to be hashed out over 60 days of high-stakes negotiations.

The process has been riddled with stumbling blocks – including persistent fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, which threatened to derail US-Iran talks last week. Rubio has tried to separate the Israel-Lebanon talks from the US-Iran negotiations, even as Iran has repeatedly insisted that the issues are entwined. The agreement itself declared an end of fighting on all fronts, including Lebanon. But just as Iran has struck a vessel in the Strait of Hormuz, the US client Israel launched airstrikes on targets near Nabatieh in southern Lebanon. It therefore seems that Iran is trying to counteract Israel's continued attacks on Lebanon by its own attacks in Hormuz.

Iran has so far succeeded in driving a wedge between Israel and the US. As long as Israel's campaign in Lebanon continues, Iran says it will not cease interdicting oil shipping in the Gulf. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio is skipping Israel on his ongoing Middle East visit, which some describe as a snub of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

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US strikes Iran in response to a drone attack on a ship that Trump says violated ceasefire

COLLIN BINKLEY and JON GAMBRELL
Updated Fri, June 26, 2026

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. struck Iran on Friday in response to a drone attack a day earlier on a cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz. It's the most significant test yet to an interim understanding reached a week ago by the two countries to begin working to end their months-long war and reopen the pivotal waterway.

U.S. President Donald Trump said the drone attack violated the ceasefire. The strikes came shortly after Trump told reporters, "You'll find out," whether the U.S. would respond.

U.S. Central Command said the military struck missile and drone locations and coastal radar sites in Iran.

"I don't like the fact that they took a shot yesterday, actually four of them," Trump said at the White House shortly before the U.S. struck back. When asked why there would be strikes when Trump has insisted talks with Tehran are going well, Trump said of Iran: "They're a little bit different."

He then abruptly cut off questions and reporters were ushered out of his office.

Ebrahim Azizi, who heads the Iranian parliament's national security commission, responded to Trump on social media earlier Friday, saying, "the Strait of Hormuz is governed by Iran, so: Respect the rules" and to "not mistake control for escalation."

"This is not a violation of the ceasefire; it is ceasefire management," Azizi wrote.

Friday evening, Vice President JD Vance said on social media that Iran should "pick up the phone" if there are disagreements about the ceasefire agreement.

"But violence will be met with violence," Vance said.

Strikes conclude an hour later

The U.S. strikes on Iran concluded about an hour after U.S. Central Command announced the military action on social media, a U.S. official with knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing military operation.

The British military said on Thursday that a container ship was hit by a projectile off the coast of Oman, coming hours after Iran threatened vessels to stop using the route. The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center said no injuries were reported.

The development came during a fragile time for the U.S. and Iran as they work to negotiate a permanent end to the war. Iran has increasingly challenged the region and the U.S. over its control of the Strait of Hormuz, even with the current interim deal it reached with the U.S. last week.

The attack on the cargo ship happened while a United Nations maritime agency was beginning an operation to move stranded ships out of the strait this week, using an alternative route, hugging the shores of Oman rather than sailing through the central part of the strait.

The International Maritime Organization halted the evacuations after the attack and said on Friday they won't resume until there are guarantees that the other ships won't be attacked.

About 115 ships were able to move out of the strait in recent days, leaving about 500 still in the area, said Arsenio Dominguez, the agency's secretary-general.

The opening of the alternative passage through the strait was expected to relieve pressure on the world economy and remove Iran's main source of leverage in ongoing peace talks with the U.S.

The U.S. and Iran are still negotiating terms of the deal, including issues such as getting ships through the key strait and addressing the future of Iran's stockpile of highly enriched uranium. Under the interim deal, the two sides have 60 days to work out the details.
Cargo ship attack poses a test for shipping

Shipping analysts said the drone strike cast a shadow over what had been a growing stream of trapped vessels finally leaving the Gulf and an increasing flow of tankers carrying crude oil.

"A week of widening commercial confidence in the Strait of Hormuz has hit its first significant test," said marine data company Windward on X. It said that while the strait remains operationally open with 43 transits recorded after the incident, "the pace of normalization has slowed."

On Wednesday before Thursday's drone strike, 78 vessels transited the strait, the highest since the war began, although below the prewar averages of 130 or more per day.

At least two tankers reversed course while attempting to transit the strait on the U.N.-backed route near Oman after Iran insisted vessels use only the Teheran-approved routes, according to marine data and analytic firm Lloyd's List Intelligence.

More than two dozen ships were still transiting the strait's southern route after the attack, Lloyd's said Friday.

Lebanon and Israel make a step toward peace

Ambassadors from Israel and Lebanon announced an agreement Friday described as a step toward peace following months of conflict between Israeli troops and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

Nada Hamadeh, Lebanon's ambassador to the U.S., called the framework a move toward "enabling our people to go back to their land and allowing all Lebanese to live in peace, security, and prosperity."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the plan was a "great achievement" for Israel.

"The most important thing, first and foremost, is that Israel will remain in the security zone in southern Lebanon," he said, adding that they will stay until Hezbollah is disarmed and no longer poses a threat to Israel.
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Gambrell reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Associated Press writers Ben Finley, Michelle L. Price and Josh Boak in Washington, David McHugh in Frankfurt, Germany, and John Seewer in Toledo, Ohio, contributed to this report.

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DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran launched a drone assault targeting Bahrain while a ship in the Strait of Hormuz separately came under attack Saturday, likely Tehran's response to overnight airstrikes by the United States.

The attacks across the Persian Gulf show the danger of the Iran war again spinning out of control, even after Iran and the U.S. reached an interim deal to try and agree on a final accord to end the conflict.

The U.S. had launched its airstrikes in response to an Iranian drone attack on a ship trying to get out of the strait on Thursday, continuing a string of attacks that have shaken the uneasy ceasefire in the war.

Meanwhile, a multinational maritime body overseen by the U.S. Navy said Saturday that it would expand a route near Oman in the strait to allow for both inbound and outbound traffic — likely setting up a new flashpoint with Tehran.
Bahrain condemns Iran's drone attack

That Iran targeted Bahrain likely was not coincidental. The kingdom has been one of the strongest critics of Iran and is home to the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet. It just hosted U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio for a meeting of the Gulf Cooperation Council's foreign ministers, which ended with a call for an end to Iran's attacks and the strait to be completely open.

A statement from Bahrain's Foreign Ministry said a "number of Iranian drones" targeted the country. It called the attack "a flagrant threat to the security of citizens and residents."

Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard earlier on Saturday issued a statement carried by the state-run IRNA news agency saying it had targeted several locations "of the U.S. terrorist army in the region."

It did not name what areas were targeted.

The U.S. military's Central Command said the military struck Iranian missile and drone locations and coastal radar sites in the overnight strikes.

U.S. Vice President JD Vance, who has led the American negotiations with Iran, said on social media Friday night that Iran should "pick up the phone" if there are disagreements about the ceasefire agreement.

"But violence will be met with violence," Vance said.

The U.S. and Iran are still negotiating terms of the deal, including issues such as getting ships through the key strait and addressing the future of Iran's stockpile of highly enriched uranium. Under the interim deal, the two sides have 60 days to work out the details.
Ship comes under attack as strait route expands

Meanwhile, the British military's United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center said that a tanker was attacked Saturday in the strait, saying the crew was safe and no environmental damage was reported. No one immediately claimed the strike, but suspicion immediately fell on Iran.

Just after the report of the ship attack, the Joint Maritime Information Center, overseen by the U.S. Navy, said the route near Oman's shores is expanding to allow for both inbound and outbound traffic.

Iran has insisted ships must obey its orders and is warning it will start charging fees for transit through the strait, through which a fifth of all oil and natural gas once passed. However, ships have been increasingly trying to get out of the Gulf in recent days, to Iran's ire.

Ebrahim Azizi, who heads the Iranian parliament's national security commission, wrote Friday that "the Strait of Hormuz is governed by Iran, so: Respect the rules."

The U.S. and Gulf Arab states have rejected Iran's demands. The strait is considered around the world as an international waterway, despite being the territorial waters of Iran and Oman.

In its announcement, the Joint Maritime Information Center warned that the threat in the region to ships was "substantial."

"Mariners are advised of the existence of mines and should expect a naval presence as clearance operations continue," it said.