USA

08 Dec 2022; MEMO: A week in which the Biden administration has been rebuked for having "no red lines on Israel", the US is applying pressure on the UN not to update its database of the list of companies operating in illegal Jewish-only Israeli settlements.

08 Dec 2022; MEMO: CIA is warning NATO member, Turkiye, against a new military operation in Syria, after strikes in the country late last month endangered US troops, Reuters reports.

According to the report, CIA Director, Bill Burns, spoke by phone with his Turkish counterpart, conveying his "strong opposition" to a new Turkish military operation in Syria, according to a Pentagon readout on the call.

08 Dec 2022; MEMO: The UN General Assembly has called on Israel to take "immediate steps" to surrender its nuclear weapons and implement UN resolutions fully on the establishment of a nuclear weapon-free zone in the Middle East.

The General Assembly vote was carried 149-6 yesterday. Israel, Canada, Micronesia, Palau, the US and Liberia opposed the resolution, while another 26 countries abstained, including India and many European states.

WASHINGTON, Dec 7 (Reuters) - Republicans on Wednesday blamed their loss in Georgia's U.S. Senate runoff election on several factors directly tied to former President Donald Trump, beginning with the scandal-plagued celebrity he chose as their candidate.

Herschel Walker, a former University of Georgia football star with no political experience, failed to unseat Democratic incumbent Senator Raphael Warnock after being plagued by questions about his fitness for office. Warnock's win gave Democrats a 51-49 majority in the 100-member chamber.

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) — A tart retort by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to a U.S. offer of help and a call by former U.S. President Donald Trump for the “termination” of parts of the Constitution top a Yale Law School librarian’s list of the most notable quotations of 2022.

In February, only days after Russia invaded Ukraine, the U.S. offered to transport Zelenskyy to safety. That appeared not to sit well with him. “I need ammunition, not a ride,” he shot back, a senior American intelligence official with direct knowledge of the conversation told The Associated Press.

NEW YORK (AP) — Hundreds of journalists and other employees at The New York Times began a 24-hour walkout Thursday in what would be the first strike of its kind at the newspaper in more than 40 years.

Newsroom employees and other members of The NewsGuild of New York say they are fed up with bargaining that has dragged on since their last contract expired in March 2021. The union announced last week that more than 1,100 employees would stage a 24-hour work stoppage starting at 12:01 a.m. Thursday unless the two sides reach a contract deal.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Fresh off his party’s better-than-anticipated performance in the midterm elections, President Joe Biden is facing consistent but critical assessments of his leadership and the national economy.

A new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds 43% of U.S. adults say they approve of the way Biden is handling his job as president, while 55% disapprove. That’s similar to October, just weeks before the Nov. 8 elections that most Americans considered pivotal for the country’s future.

08 Dec 2022; MEMO: The White House yesterday responded to Chinese President Xi Jinping's visit to Saudi Arabia by warning that Beijing's attempt to spread influence worldwide is "not conducive" to international order.

Asked about Xi's visit, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters that Saudi Arabia remains a crucial US ally, but he issued a warning over China.

Dec 7 (Reuters) - Lawyers for former U.S. President Donald Trump searched Trump Tower and one of his golf courses after a judge instructed them to attest to complying with a subpoena to turn over all classified materials, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday.

Trump's legal team hired an outside firm to carry out the search of his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey in recent weeks, and, more recently Trump Tower in New York, the report said, citing people familiar with the matter.

WASHINGTON, Dec 6 (Reuters) - U.S. lawmakers late on Tuesday declined to add an extension to an annual defense bill of a looming deadline that would impose a new safety standard for modern cockpit alerts for two new versions of Boeing's (BA.N) best-selling 737 MAX aircraft.

The U.S. planemaker has been lobbying for months to convince lawmakers to waive the deadline that affects its MAX 7 and MAX 10 airplanes and was imposed by Congress in 2020 after two fatal 737 MAX crashes killed 346 people in Indonesia and Ethiopia.