It's extremely disturbing that the hardcore pro-Israel commentators seem to overwhelmingly lament that there isn't a brutal Sunni minority regime suppressing the Shia majority in Iraq AND a brutal Alawite minority regime suppressing the Sunni majority in Syria.

I just had a very lengthy and productive discussion with @SEPeaceMissions @SteveWitkoff about the state of play regarding Iran.   After this discussion, it is my opinion that signing the MOU will be beneficial to the United States, in as much as the Strait of Hormuz will begin to open, and the hostilities with Iran will stop.   Whether or not the United States can reach an acceptable, verifiable deal with Iran regarding its nuclear program and other issues is yet to be determined, but I see little downside to trying.   The economic stability that comes from opening up the Strait and the cessation of hostilities could create a pathway to peace well beyond the Iranian conflict.   The expansion of the Abraham Accords and normalizing relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel is President Trump’s and my ultimate goal. I think that is best achieved by creating economic stability for the United States, the region and the world, as well as the cessation of hostilities.  The signing of the MOU is an essential step to make that happen and thus it is worthwhile.

NYT: Now that you're approaching a new phase in this conflict in this Iran, can you now say whether you will hold anyone in your administration accountable for the strike on a school that killed more than 100 children? TRUMP: No. It's such a strange question to be asked. It's a long time ago. Mistakes are made. I would ask Pete Hegseth that question.

*sips coffee* Well, at least the Iran deal pretty conclusively demonstrates the Israelis do NOT, in fact, control U.S. foreign policy.

CNN: CNN independently took the sample of water and consulted with the pool store that regularly tests water to help read the results. It showed phosphate levels far higher than what is recommended to keep algae at bay, based on estimates for a pool that holds 6.5 million gallons of water. “If there's already some phosphate fertilizer in the water, that's really opportunistic, especially for the blue green algae that can fix nitrogen. So they are having a field day out here.”

🔻 ترامب : لقد قام الرئيس السوري أحمد #الشراع بتوحيد ذلك البلد بسرعة مذهلة إنه قادر للغاية، وقد كان مفيدًا جدًا بالنسبة لي لقد حمى كل ما طلبته وإذا لم تستطع إسرائيل القيام بهذه المهمة دون قتل الجميع، فسيقوم هو بذلك. ستقوم سوريا بذلك .

BIG: Israel's Defense Minister Katz says the IDF will not withdraw from security zones in Lebanon, Syria, or Gaza despite the US-Iran ceasefire deal. Netanyahu made this clear directly to Trump. Katz says the security zones will be cleared of local residents and all terror infrastructure destroyed, including homes in contact-line villages that served as Hezbollah outposts. He calls holding the zones "among the IDF's greatest achievements" in the war and says Israel "will not withdraw despite all existing pressures and those that will still come." He warned that if Iran attacks Israel over Lebanon, Israel will "strike it with full force."

1/5 An open letter to @TheLancet from an Iranian-Jewish cardiologist. Today, one of the world's most prestigious medical journals published a campaign to suspend the Israeli Medical Association from the World Medical Association — the body founded after WWII to ensure physicians would never again be weaponized by political ideology. I'm a cardiologist. I'm an Iranian Jew who grew up under a regime where medicine was subjugated to the state. What The Lancet just did is a disgrace to my profession. Here's what they published — and what they deliberately left out.

Applebaum: What binds Russia, China, Iran and North Korea is not religion or ideology. China is communist, Russia nationalist, Iran theocratic. What binds them is fear of liberal language: rights, rule of law, separation of powers and independent courts. 1/

A year ago, the world met Habiba al-Askari, a three-year-old toddler in Gaza fighting for her life. @JomanaCNN and @AbeerSalmanCNN's reporting resulted in Habiba's medical evacuation to Amman. CNN returned to Jordan this year to reunite with little Habiba and her family.

If this identity is confirmed, it would be Ukraine's biggest achievement for Syrians ever. General Maksimtsev oversaw the aerial bombardment campaign that began Russia's intervention in #Syria (2015) - a wall of fire that caused countless victims, esp. from Hama to Aleppo. He's believed to have been killed in today's car bomb in Moscow.