Good Thursday evening. In this edition: Netanyahu and Abbas give dueling speeches at the U.N.; and Trump hosts Xi for state dinner amid TV pool uncertainty.
Plus, Iran war powers, FDA nominee and Schumer vs. Trump.
United Nations
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas accused Israel of genocide and ethnic cleansing while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fiercely defended his country's military actions and lashed out at his critics as the two leaders delivered sharply contrasting addresses to the United Nations General Assembly.
The speeches came as the war in Gaza, the fragile peace plan and the fallout from the Iran war loomed over the annual gathering of world leaders in New York City.
President Abbas, addressing leaders in a prerecorded video after the Trump administration refused to grant him a visa for the second year in a row, said the Palestinian people were facing "one of the most dangerous times" in their history.
"In the Gaza Strip, our people are being subjected at the hands of the Israeli occupation forces to killing, destruction, starvation, and attempts at displacement as well as a genocidal war that has created an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe," he said.
The Palestinian leader also warned that Israeli settlement expansion was accelerating in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, accusing Israel of pursuing a "malicious colonial scheme" aimed at making life more difficult for Palestinians and forcing them from their homeland.
"The West Bank is being fragmented, and Jerusalem is being isolated and Judaized," he said. "Settler terrorism is escalating under the protection of the occupying forces while the crimes of land theft, home demolition, checkpoints and raids continue under a system of laws, measures and practices all built of racial discrimination, ethnic cleansing and state terrorism."
President Abbas said he welcomed President Trump's peace plan for Gaza but lamented that nearly a year after its announcement, key provisions had not been implemented.
"We call for accelerating the implementation of the second phase rather than wasting any more time," he said, arguing that the transition period must ultimately lead to the reunification of Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, under the authority of the State of Palestine.
"The transitional period must not be allowed to become a permanent or open-ended situation without any clear timebound political horizon."
Hours later, a flood of delegates walked out of the General Assembly Hall at the United Nations as Prime Minister Netanyahu took the podium.
"Before I begin, just a quick announcement," he said. "If there are any other moral cowards who haven't yet left this hall, please do so now. Thank you very much."
The Israeli leader rejected accusations that his country had committed genocide in Gaza, calling the allegation the "greatest lie of the century," and turned his attention to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D), whom he accused of antisemitism and of helping make Jewish New Yorkers feel unsafe.
"You falsely, repeatedly accuse Israel of genocide," Prime Minister Netanyahu said. "Mr. Mamdani, you tried to stop me from coming here. You tried to silence me. Well, you can't silence me, you can't silence the truth. And here's the simple truth, Israel didn't commit genocide. Israel prevented genocide."
Prime Minister Netanyahu also forcefully defended his decision to strike Iran's nuclear facilities, saying the operation was necessary for Israel's survival.
"Devastating Iran's nuclear facilities was hard. It was very hard to do," he said. "But, for me, it was one of the easiest decisions I've ever had to make as prime minister. Because if we hadn't done it, we'd all be dead."
He thanked President Trump for joining Israel in the war against Iran, calling the president Israel's greatest partner in its "battle against the barbarians."
"He understood that if left unchallenged, the fanatic ayatollahs who chant 'death to America, death to Israel' would eventually carry out their mad fantasies," Prime Minister Netanyahu said. "So, Israel and America acted together not only to protect ourselves, but to save civilization."
The Israeli leader also accused the delegates who walked out and protesters demonstrating against him in New York of hypocrisy, calling them "phony human rights protesters" and asking why they had not similarly protested the Iranian government's treatment of its own people.
"Where were you when the Iranian tyrants butchered and maimed tens of thousands of unarmed Iranian civilians?" he asked. "Did you protest outside the Iranian mission to the U.N.? Did you speak out for that matter, for Christians persecuted in Iran and throughout the Middle East? No, no, you didn't, because you're phony human rights protesters."
Prime Minister Netanyahu also predicted that Iranians would ultimately topple their government, saying it was "only a matter of time."
"The power of the people will overcome the people in power," he said. "One day, and it may not be far away, the Iranian people will be free. Their murderous regime will be toppled by its lies, by its corruption, by its cruelty. This evil regime will fall. And we will all celebrate that day."
President Trump met with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the White House for about three hours at the start of a high-profile state visit that will be capped with a state dinner this evening.
The White House visit, the first for President Xi in more than a decade, kicked off with an elaborate welcome ceremony involving hundreds of military personnel and a flyover by a B-2 stealth bomber and four F-22 fighter jets.
The official arrival ceremony this morning was not covered by the major television networks after the White House continued to block access to some CNN, MS NOW and Politico reporters despite an overnight court ruling requiring the administration to restore their credentials.
Later in the day, the reporters' credentials were returned, though it's still not clear why they were initially blocked from entering the White House grounds.
Judge Timothy Kelly, who was appointed during President Trump's first term, granted a temporary restraining order sought by the news outlets as part of a joint lawsuit they filed, restoring their press passes for at least two weeks while further litigation plays out.
The judge said the outlets were likely to succeed in showing that the White House violated the journalists' due process rights by revoking their credentials without adequate notice.
He also questioned the administration's national security justification for the ban, pointing to President Trump's own public statements that he was targeting the outlets over their reporting.
As of publication, the television network pool does not plan to cover the state dinner, and President Trump lashed out at the networks in an afternoon social media post.
"CNN and MSDNC, to show you how fake they are, today refused to cover one of the Biggest and Most Beautiful Events to take place in many years, the arrival at the White House of the Highly Respected President of China, Xi Jinping, and his beautiful wife, Madam Peng," he wrote.
"The event was magnificent — Actually made for Television but, because they're Fake News, and because they knew how good it would be, they didn't want credit to be given to 'TRUMP,' they refused to be there. That's why they have such poor Ratings. Tonight's State Dinner at the White House, for President Xi, will be spectacular! The Media will be in attendance."
The three-course dinner will be held in the East Room of the White House and feature yellow squash velouté, sesame-crusted sea bass with braised baby bok choy and a dessert featuring vanilla crémeux and White House honey ice cream.
Guests are expected to include Apple's Tim Cook, Tesla's Elon Musk, Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Google's Sundar Pichai, Nvidia's Jensen Huang and OpenAI's Sam Altman, among others.
Christopher Macchio, who performed earlier this month at the GOP midterm convention in Dallas, will headline the evening's musical lineup, along with performances from the U.S. Army and Marine Corps.
C-SPAN, a pool subscriber, will not be showing the state dinner unless the TV networks resume their pool coverage.
Photo above from the Associated Press.
In other news…
The Senateblocked a House-passed war powers resolution seeking to halt President Trump's war against Iran. The resolution failed 49–50, with four Republicans — Sens. Susan Collins (ME), Lisa Murkowski (AK), Rand Paul (KY) and Thom Tillis (NC) — voting in favor and Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) voting against. Sen. Angela Alsobrooks (D-MD) missed the vote, which needed only a simple majority for passage. The House cleared the measure last week in a 220–204 vote, with seven Republicans joining Democrats in favor. Senators also voted 74–25 to advance the college sports bill, invoking cloture on the underlying legislation that would set national standards for name, image and likeness (NIL). The move tees up a final vote Monday. Next week, the Senate will also vote on an AI data center power bill and to confirm Keith Sonderling as Labor secretary. Other votes are possible before senators leave town until after the midterms, including on a House-passed congressional stock trading ban with a voter ID provision.
Dr. Heidi Overton, President Trump's nominee to lead the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), affirmed the safety of vaccines during her confirmation hearing and pledged to follow the law if challenged by the president. The physician and top White House health policy aide said the combined measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine was "not lethal" and "safe and effective," contradicting President Trump, who claimed last month that it could be "potentially quite lethal." "It is our best tool right now in the public health response to the measles outbreak," she told Senate Health Committee Chair Bill Cassidy (R-LA). Sen. Cassidy also pressed Dr. Overton on what she would do if President Trump asked her to take an action that ran counter to her commitments on vaccine safety and efficacy. "I would give him my best advice, and I would follow the statutory requirements for the role of the FDA commissioner," she said. Dr. Overton also pledged to focus on "restoring the primacy of American innovation" in the biomedical industry if confirmed.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) accused President Trump of engaging in corruption with the fossil fuel industry as he unveiled a new report from his "anti-corruption" working group. "Trump is without question the most corrupt president in all of American history," he said. The report alleges that the president asked oil and gas executives at a 2024 Mar-a-Lago fundraiser to raise $1 billion in campaign donations in his bid to retake the White House. The report alleges that in exchange, President Trump doled out benefits to the industry, including shuttering clean energy projects, installing fossil fuel executives in his administration and cutting regulations meant to curb pollution. "Rather than serving Americans, he has used the highest office to pad his own bank account while sticking working families with the bill," Sen. Schumer said. "Nowhere are the costs of Trump's corruption to the American people clearer than in Big Oil's capture of the White House, and they do it overtly. They have no shame. They're all bragging and proud about it."
For your radar…
Maggie Haberman of the New York Times discusses the reporting from her latest book, "Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump," at the Texas Tribune Festival on Friday. Watch LIVE on C-SPAN at 10am ET.
Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Joni Ernst (R-IA) as well as Rep. Ashley Hinson (R-IA), who's running to succeed Sen. Ernst, speak at a Reagan dinner in West Des Moines on Friday. Watch LIVE on C-SPAN at 6pm ET.
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