Emergency crews in Israel are battling a wildfire that sent smoke drifting over Jerusalem and forced drivers to run from their cars.
About 5,000 acres (20 square kilometres) have been scorched since the blaze started in the hills outside the city on Wednesday.
The ambulance service said at least 12 people had been treated in hospital, mainly for smoke inhalation, but the fire service said “miraculously” no homes had been damaged.
Breaking reports indicate significant disruptions affecting multiple payment processors, banks, and card networks throughout the United States. According to Downdetector, there has been a sharp surge in user-reported outages impacting major financial institutions and services, including Visa, Wells Fargo, First National Bank, Discover, CashApp, and others. These incidents have caused widespread inconvenience, with customers experiencing issues such as failed transactions, inability to access accounts, and delays in payment processing. Visa and Wells Fargo have acknowledged the issues on their official channels, stating they are working to restore services as quickly as possible.
Fire official says fires ‘may be Israel’s largest ever’ * European countries sending aid * Motorists forced to abandon vehicles as fire hits Route 1 highway
Spain and Portugal have been hit by widespread blackouts, with millions plunged into darkness amid scenes of mayhem across major European cities. The power cuts come just days after Spain’s power grid ran entirely on renewable energy, including wind, solar and hyrdro power, for a whole day for the first time on April 16. Spanish officials are urgently investigating the cause of the outages and have said they are looking into the possibility of the blackouts being triggered by a devastating cyber attack. All of Valencia and Barcelona were left without power, Spain’s entire rail network shut down, internet services stopped working and there was chaos on the streets as traffic built up in Madrid and Lisbon.
Madrid’s Mayor has urged people to stay where they are as they deal with the disaster, while the president of the city’s regional government has called for Spain’s prime minister to activate an emergency plan so soldiers can be deployed. Videos online show railway networks in Spanish cities plunged into chaos, with people being evacuated through tunnels as blackouts hit underground stations and halted trains. Parts of France also lost power after the outages in Spain and Portugal, the country’s grid operator confirmed. Further outages have been reported as far as Belgium, according to the latest information. The cause of the outages is not yet clear, with the Spanish government saying it is working to ‘identify the origin’.
Her family issued a statement on Saturday confirming she took her own life at her farm in Western Australia, where she had lived for several years.
New York City and surrounding areas faced an unprecedented air quality crisis, with authorities urging millions of residents to stay indoors due to toxic smoke from wildfires. Reports indicate that hazardous levels of pollutants have blanketed the region, raising serious health concerns and prompting emergency measures.
According to posts found on X, approximately 10 million Americans in the New York City area were advised not to leave their homes due to an air quality emergency caused by toxic chemicals in wildfire smoke.
India has just closed all the flow gates at four separate dams along the Indus River that feed fresh water into Pakistan. Yesterday, in response to a terrorist attack in Kashmir which killed 26 India (Hindu) Tourists, India blamed Pakistan and took aggressive actions against Pakistan.
Among the actions taken by India was “suspension” of the Indus River Water Treaty, which has been in-place since 1960.
The Indus River flows from the Himalaya Mountains southwestward through northern India. It then crosses into Pakistan and flows due south through all of Pakistan, emptying into the Arabian Sea. The River provides Pakistan with fresh water for its people. Pakistan said today that if India halts the flow of water from the Indus River, Pakistan will treat that as an “act of War” and respond with force.
Higher mortgage rates and concern over the broader economy are making for a weak start to the all-important spring housing market.
Sales of previously owned homes in March fell 5.9% from February to 4.02 million units on a seasonally adjusted annualized basis, according to the National Association of Realtors. That’s the slowest March sales pace since 2009.
Sales were 2.4% lower than in March 2024 and slumped across all regions month to month. They fell hardest in the West, the priciest region of the country, down more than 9%. The West, however, was the only region to see a year-over-year gain, due to strong activity in the Rocky Mountain states, where job growth is strong.
Adults under 21 years old can now obtain concealed carry permits in the Hawkeye State. On Friday, Republican Governor Kim Reynolds signed House File 924 into law. The legislation lowers the minimum age to legally carry a concealed firearm. It also lowers the age at which it becomes illegal to sell a used gun to another person. Both are now set at 18. “I joined the Marines when I was 18, I graduated from boot camp when I was 18. I was carrying firearms in the military, ready to defend my country when I was 18, along with hundreds of thousands of other young men and women,” Republican Representative Steven Holt, who sponsored the bill, told The Des Moines Register. “So the idea that an 18-year-old, a 19-year-old, a 20-year-old, doesn’t have a right to own a firearm in protection of their families—which is really what the Second Amendment is about, right?”
It has been revealed that Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a deported El Salvadoran man (aka, ‘Maryland Father’) at the center of an intense political debate, was suspected by a Tennessee state trooper of human trafficking in 2022 after he was pulled over for driving erratically in a black 2001 Chevrolet Suburban – owned by another individual, full of people. During the interview, subject pretended to speak less English than he was capable of and attempted to put encountering officer off-track by responding to questions with questions,” reads the summary. “When asked what relationship he had with the registered owner of the vehicle, subject replied the owner of the vehicle is his boss, and that his work is in construction.” “There was no luggage in the vehicle, leading the encountering officer to suspect this was a human trafficking incident,” according to DHS records. the SUV was owned by a man who was himself deported after pleading guilty to smuggling illegal aliens in 2020. Abrego Garcia told the state trooper that the SUV was owned by his boss. DHS documents, meanwhile, identified the owner of the vehicle as Jose Ramon Hernandez Reyes – whose 2001 Suburban was flagged separately by Homeland Security Investigations Baltimore field office as belonging to a target the suspected of human trafficking or smuggling, the documents reveal.
“Vehicle is used by HSI Baltimore target in human smuggling/trafficking operation. Vehicle makes trips to southern border to pick up non-citizens,” reads the record, adding that the Baltimore HSI case agent should be notified if the vehicle is encountered. Jose Ramon Hernandez Reyes, who Abrego Garcia claimed he was working for, had been previously convicted of smuggling illegal aliens into the United States. In 2020, Hernandez Reyes, himself an illegal alien, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 18 months in prison for smuggling fellow illegal aliens in the United States after he was stopped by law enforcement in Mississippi in a car with passengers from Mexico, El Salvador and Honduras. Homeland Security records indicate Hernandez Reyes’ “deport order” was reinstated in March 2021, as his 18-month sentence was nearing its end. –
