U.S. and Israel Voice New Optimism About Cease-Fire as Gaza Talks Resume
American and Israeli officials on Thursday expressed renewed optimism over a cease-fire deal in the Gaza Strip, after Hamas revised its position and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel then told President Biden that he was sending a new delegation of negotiators to the stalled talks.
White House officials said they believed new progress in the talks amounted to what one repeatedly called “a breakthrough” in the monthslong negotiations, though they said that it would take some time to work out the many steps involved in implementing the truce. Israeli and other officials involved in the talks agreed that there had been progress but described it in more cautious terms.
The discussions are based on a three-stage framework deal publicized by President Biden in late May and endorsed by the United Nations. If carried out, the agreement would ultimately stipulate an end to the war, a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and for Hamas and its allies to release the remaining 120 living and dead hostages in Gaza for Palestinians held in Israeli jails.
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Why More French Youth Are Voting for the Far Right
In the 1980s, a French punk rock band coined a rallying cry against the country’s far right that retained its punch over decades. The chant, still shouted at protests by the left, is “La jeunesse emmerde le Front National,” which cannot be translated well without curse words, but essentially tells the far right to get lost.
That crude battle cry is emblematic of what had often been conventional wisdom not only in France, but also elsewhere — that young people frequently tilt left in their politics. Now, that notion has been challenged as increasing numbers of young people have joined swaths of the French electorate to support the far-right National Rally, a party once deemed too extreme to govern.
The results from Sunday’s parliamentary vote, the first of a two-part election, showed young people across the political spectrum coming out to cast ballots in much greater numbers than in previous years. A majority of them voted for the left. But one of the biggest jumps was in the estimated numbers of 18-to-24-year-olds who cast ballots for the National Rally, in an election that many say could reshape France.
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