Israel’s Netanyahu sends Mossad director to Gaza ceasefire talks in Qatar in sign of progress
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is sending the director of the Mossad foreign intelligence agency to ceasefire negotiations in Qatar, his office said Saturday, in a sign of progress in talks on the war in Gaza. It was not immediately clear when David Barnea would...
Firefighters race to contain Los Angeles wildfires with menacing winds forecast to return
LOS ANGELES — Firefighters raced Saturday to cut off spreading wildfires before potentially strong winds return that could push the flames toward the world famous J. Paul Getty Museum and the University of California, Los Angeles, while new evacuation warnings left more homeowners on edge. A fierce battle against the...
Black boxes from South Korea plane crash failed to record final 4 minutes, officials say
SEOUL, South Korea — The black boxes of a Boeing jetliner that crashed in South Korea last month stopped recording about four minutes before the accident, South Korean officials said Saturday, possibly complicating investigations into the cause of the disaster that killed 179 people. After analyzing the devices, the U.S....
Ukraine says it captured 2 North Korean soldiers fighting for Russia
KYIV, Ukraine — Ukraine’s forces have captured two North Korean soldiers fighting alongside Russian forces in Russia’s Kursk border region, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Saturday, the first such claim by Kyiv since North Korea sent thousands of troops to shore up Moscow’s war effort on the other side of the...
Trump is planning 100 executive orders starting Day 1 on border, deportations and other priorities
WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump is preparing more than 100 executive orders starting Day One of the new White House, in what amounts to a shock-and-awe campaign on border security, deportations and a rush of other policy priorities. Trump told Republican senators about the onslaught ahead during a private meeting...
Biden is still considering pardons for people who have been criticized or threatened by Trump
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden on Friday said he was still considering whether to give pardons to people who have been criticized or threatened by President-elect Donald Trump. Speaking to reporters at the White House, Biden said he and his aides were playing close attention to rhetoric from Trump and...
Powerful winter storm dumps heavy snow, causing flight delays, slick roads and school closings
ATLANTA — A powerful winter storm that dumped heavy snow and glazed roads with ice across much of Texas and Oklahoma lumbered eastward into Southern U.S. states Friday, making for dicey travel and a rare snow day for many students. Arkansas and North Carolina mobilized their National Guards for tasks...
Federal probe of 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre says ‘no avenue’ for criminal case in connection to attack
OKLAHOMA CITY — The first-ever U.S. Justice Department review of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre concluded Friday that while federal prosecution may have been possible a century ago there is no longer an avenue to bring a criminal case more than 100 years after one of the worst racial attacks...
Families in shock begin to visit their charred homes in Los Angeles area
LOS ANGELES — Many watched their homes burn on television in a state of shock. Now four days since the flames erupted in and around Los Angeles, many residents have returned to their still smoldering neighborhoods even as the threat of new fires persisted and the nation’s second- largest city...
Trump nominates Pennsylvania RNC member Christine Toretti as ambassador to Sweden
A longtime Republican National Committee member from Pennsylvania who was twice unsuccessfully nominated for an ambassadorship during the first Trump administration will get a third go for the job. President-elect Donald Trump is nominating Christine Toretti, a RNC member from Indiana County, to be the next ambassador to Sweden. Trump...
FBI must be independent and above the partisan fray, outgoing director says in farewell address
WASHINGTON — The FBI must remain independent, above the partisan fray and “committed to upholding the rule of law,” outgoing Director Christopher Wray said in a farewell address just days before his expected retirement at the conclusion of the Biden administration following more than seven years on the job. “No...
Panama Canal administrator pushes back against Trump’s assertions of Chinese meddling
PANAMA CITY — The administrator of the Panama Canal said Friday that the vital waterway will remain in Panamanian hands and open to commerce from all countries, rejecting claims by President-elect Donald Trump that the United States should take it over. In an interview with The Associated Press, Ricaurte Vásquez...
Biden to deliver prime-time farewell to nation on Wednesday from Oval Office
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden will deliver a farewell address to the nation Wednesday from the Oval Office, five days before President-elect Donald Trump is sworn in. The president’s remarks at 8 p.m. Eastern are set to be his last significant opportunity to speak to Americans and the world before...
Take the TribLive weekly news quiz: Jan. 10
The following is a regular feature from TribLive: A weekly news quiz:...
Meta becomes latest company to eliminate DEI programs
DEI programs are ending at major companies — with the latest changes happening at Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram. Meta announced the rollback of its major diversity-oriented programs in a memo Friday, citing the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision outlawing affirmative action in college admissions, Axios reported....
An earthquake registering 3.7 magnitude hits west of San Francisco in the Pacific Ocean
SAN FRANCISCO — An earthquake registering a magnitude of 3.7 shook part of the San Francisco Bay Area and people reported feeling a quick jolt. There were no immediate reports of injuries or major property damage. The United States Geological Survey said the earthquake was detected at 7:02 a.m. Friday...
Biden lets 800,000 Venezuelans and Salvadorans stay 18 months as Trump readies immigration crackdown
MIAMI — About 600,000 Venezuelans and more than 200,000 Salvadorans already living in the U.S. can legally remain another 18 months, the Department of Homeland Security said Friday, barely a week before President-elect Donald Trump takes office with promises of hardline immigration policies. The decisions mark the Biden administration’s latest...
Los Angeles landmarks from film and TV damaged by wildfires
The high school where Brian De Palma brought Stephen King’s “Carrie” to life, Will Rogers’ ranch house and a motel owned by William Randolph Hearst are among some of the famous structures that have been damaged or destroyed by the California wildfires. Los Angeles is a town full of landmarks,...
Greenland’s leader says his people don’t want to be Americans as Trump covets territory
COPENHAGEN, Denmark — The prime minister of Greenland said Friday that the people of his mineral-rich Arctic territory do not want to be Americans, but he said he understood the U.S. interest in the island given its strategic location and he is open to greater cooperation with the United States....
Family of former Leicester owner files $2.6 billion fatal accident claim after helicopter crash
MANCHESTER, England — The family of former Leicester soccer club owner Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha has filed the largest fatal accident claim in English history after the Thai billionaire died in a helicopter crash in 2018, representatives said Friday. The High Court claim brought against helicopter manufacturer Leonardo S.p.A. was valued at...
Who is Joseph Aoun, a low-profile army chief who is now Lebanon’s president?
BEIRUT — Lebanon’s new president and former army commander Joseph Aoun has maintained a low profile. Those who know him say he is no-nonsense, kind and averse to affiliating himself with any party or even expressing a political opinion — a rarity for someone in Lebanon’s fractured, transactional political system....
Plane crash-lands and bursts into flames in Kenya, killing 3 on the ground
NAIROBI, Kenya — A light aircraft crash-landed Friday in Kenya ‘s coastal Malindi County, killing three people on the ground, a local police official said. The three fatalities included a motorcycle taxi driver who was killed when the plane burst into flames on impact in the town of Kwachocha along...
Canada’s Liberal Party to decide on March 9 who will succeed Trudeau as prime minister
TORONTO — Canada’s governing Liberal Party will announce the country’s next prime minister on March 9 after a leadership vote that follows the resignation of Justin Trudeau this week, party leaders said late Thursday. Trudeau remains prime minister until a new leader is chosen. The front runners for the Liberal...
Earth records hottest year ever in 2024 and the jump was so big it breached key threshold
Earth recorded its hottest year ever in 2024, with such a big jump that the planet temporarily passed a major climate threshold, several weather monitoring agencies announced Friday. Last year’s global average temperature easily passed 2023’s record heat and kept pushing even higher. It surpassed the long-term warming limit of...
U.S. added a strong 256,000 jobs in December as unemployment rate dipped to 4.1%
U.S. hiring picked up unexpectedly in December as employers added a strong 256,000 jobs, another sign of the economy’s resilience in the face of high interest rates. The Labor Department reported Friday that job growth was up last month from 212,000 in November. For all of 2024, the economy added...
