Uber is currently looking for a large amount of office space in New York City, in advance of next month’s Initial Public Offering.
By: Craig Mendleton
Multiple sources inside Uber told Crain’s that they are searching for 250,000 to 300,000 square feet of office space. Uber Executives told Crain’s that they have looked at space near Bryant Park in Midtown Manhattan — and at 3 World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan — as possible locations.
Uber has retained CBRE to help with the search.
In February, Uber leased 50,000 square feet of office space 1400 Broadway for $50,000. The 50,000 square foot office at Terminal Stores, located at Hudson Yards — which is scheduled to undergo a vast renovation.
Uber’s main New York home is in Queens — where it’s had 20,000 square feet of office space in the Falachi Building since entering into a lease in 2014.
In comparison, Lyft has 11,000 square feet of space in New York — which houses its sales, marketing, and engineering departments. Lyft leased that space last year. A Lyft spokesperson at the time told The New York Post that employees will be working on research of driverless cars.
“The diversity of New York’s neighborhoods and urban layout makes it an ideal place for engineers to understand and strengthen Lyft’s technology nationwide,” the Lyft spokesperson told The Post in a statement. “If you can understand and build transportation in NYC, you can do it anywhere.”
One month before opening its Manhattan office, Lyft raised $1 billion dollars in funding.
A recent selloff and worries about a looming recession have scared off investors as well as Dara Khosrowshahi, Uber’s CEO.
Experts said earlier this year that Uber was overvalued at $120 billion — and is actually worth around $70 billion.
In a filing sent to the SEC earlier this month ahead of its Initial Public Offering (IPO), Uber declared that it had 91 million users, as of the end of 2018.
Uber said in the filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that it expects expenses to “increase significantly in the foreseeable future,” adding that it “may not achieve profitability.”
The New York Post reported earlier this month that Uber plans to sell about $10 billion in shares at its IPO. In the private fundraising market, Uber was valued at $76 billion dollars, however, executives are seeking a valuation of anywhere between $90 billion and $100 billion.
Uber had revenue last year of $11.3 billion dollars, and gross bookings were $50 billion, according to The Post. The Post added that Uber lost $3.3 billion last year.
Former Vice President Joe Biden, a Democrat from Delaware, is expected to launch his 2020 presidential campaign in a short video on Thursday — with no money from the outset.
By: Harry Cherry
“I don’t think the challenge is underestimated by the Biden team,” Rufus Gifford, President Obama’s 2012 financial director, told The New York Times.
Biden’s top political aides have talked to prominent Democratic donors in recent weeks, and have expressed concern that Mr. Biden may not be able to record fundraising numbers like former Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Tex., and Senator Bernie Sanders, Independent from Vermont, did in the first 24-hours of his presidential campaign. Mr. O’Rourke raised over $6 million dollars in the first 24 hours within his campaign’s launch.
Some political experts fear that the more money from large donors that Mr. Biden collects — the more it will hurt his image of being a fighter for middle-class Americans.
One Democratic finance bundler, Wade Randlett, who lives in San Francisco, told The Times that he thinks the “overwhelming share” of Obama fundraisers will come to support Mr. Biden.
“He was an enormously valuable and loyal vice president of the man who we all shed blood, sweat, and tears to make president of the United States,” Mr. Randlett told The Times.
Other Obama fundraisers have thus far come to the aid of Pete Buttigieg, the Mayor of South Bend Indiana and California Senator Kamala Harris.
“This is going to be tough. This is going to be a heavy lift,” Mr. Gifford told The Times, adding: “The Obama people are not a given, and they’re going to have to work for them just like everyone has to work for them.”
Mr. Sanders as well as Elizabeth Warren, a Senator from Massachusetts who is running to obtain the Democratic nomination, have promised supporters not to use bundlers or accept large contributions from corporate donors.
Katie Petrelius, the Director of Development for the Biden Foundation, has been managing the early financial efforts for Mr. Biden’s impending presidential campaign, according to The Times.
“An awful lot of people have offered to help, and the people who are usually the biggest donors in the Democratic Party and, I might add, some major Republican folks,” Mr. Biden said in February at the University of Delaware.
One Democratic fundraising expert, Denise Bauer, however, told The Times in an email that she plans to raise money for Mr. Biden, saying that she is “quite optimistic” about his prospects.
“From what I understand, they are putting together a first-rate, modern organization,” she told The Times. “This wouldn’t be a rerun of 2008 or 2012, or even 2016.”
Clare Bronfman, the heiress to the Seagram fortune, pled guilty in court yesterday to involvement in a self-help organization that many have said is really a so-called sex cult.
By: David Dennison
Bronfman, 40, “admitted Friday in a federal court in Brooklyn to harboring an undocumented immigrant for financial gain and committing credit card fraud on behalf of Keith Raniere, the leader of the Nxivm group. Prosecutors say some members of the group were forced to have sex with Raniere and were branded with his initials,” the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) reported.
The high-profile case has had a little something for everyone, including court room histrionics, as the defendant fainted earlier today when the judge “asked if she was being secretly represented by embattled celebrity lawyer Michael Avenatti in a case where she is charged with money laundering and identity theft involving the alleged sex-cult NXIVM,” noted CNBC.
Bronfman will not be forced to go on trial alongside the reputed cult leader in May, since she has accepted a plea deal. The heiress is looking at two-plus years behind bars and having to give up approximately $6 million – pocket change, considering that the Bronfman fortune has been estimated by some at being ine excess of $200 million. She is due for sentencing on July 25.
“Your honor, I was afforded a great gift by my grandfather and father,” Bronfman said as part of her testimony. “With the gift comes immense privilege and, more importantly, tremendous responsibility. It does not come with an ability to break the law.”
As part of the plea deal, Bronfman admitted under oath that she had, indeed, hidden someone who was living in the United States illegally for unpaid “labor and services.” She also admitted to committing credit card fraud while working for Keith Raniere, who led the Nxivm cult based in upstate New York.
Bronfman, the daughter of the late philanthropist and former Seagram chairman Edgar Bronfman Sr., “told the judge she was trying to help people. Nxivm described itself as a “self-help” organization, but according to officials, it was actually a cult that branded members and forced them into having sex with Raniere,” according to The Forward.
Bronfman’s late father, Edgar Bronfman Sr., was “a scion and longtime head of the Seagram’s Company, at one point the largest distiller of alcoholic beverages in the world. Bronfman was president of the World Jewish Congress for many years and was a major supporter of an array of Jewish causes, including the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, where he was a board member, and JTA’s partner site MyJewishLearning, which he founded in 2003,” JTA reported.
An attorney for Platinum Partners told jury members yesterday that investors in the firm – which has now gone of business – were given plenty of notice that there was a chance they would never get back their money.
By Howard M. Riell
Attorney Jose Baez opened his remarks to the jury by saying that the multi-billion-dollar hedge fund firm’s founder, Mark Nordlicht, should be acquitted of the criminal fraud charges he is facing.
“This case is a fraud,” Baez said, summing up the criminal prosecution that began over two years ago with the arrest in December of 2016 of Nordlicht and some of his Platinum executive colleagues. The trial got underway early yesterday afternoon.
Standing trial together with Nordlicht are David Levy, who was Platinum’s co-chief investment officer; Joseph SanFilippo, who was chief financial officer of Platinum’s flagship Value Arbitrage fund; and Daniel Small, who was a Platinum managing director. Each has entered a plea of not guilty.
In court papers, Nordlicht claimed that he believed in good faith that Platinum would resolve its liquidity issues. He also felt the firm’s problems were brought about by media reporting in regard to the government’s investigation before the indictment.
In his opening statement, Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Hein said that Nordlicht and his co-defendants, Platinum’s co-chief investment officer David Levy and its Chief Financial Officer Joseph SanFilippo, cheated their investors out of “millions and millions of dollars” in two separate schemes.
In the first, Hein charged, Platinum Partners “overvalued the often-illiquid assets of its flagship hedge fund, reported false annualized returns topping 17 percent and selectively paid out cash to some investors over others,” reported Vos Iz Neias. “In the second scheme, Nordlicht and Levy defrauded bondholders in Black Elk, an oil exploration company Platinum owned, by diverting money from asset sales to Platinum ahead of Black Elk’s 2015 bankruptcy, Hein said.
Baez “countered by showing jurors numerous examples of documents given to investors warning that the investments were risky, that Platinum’s investments were not necessarily liquid and that redemptions of cash were at Nordlicht’s discretion. “The warnings and the notices to these investors are everywhere,” reports Reuters.
Baez, the news service continued, said Nordlicht and the other defendants “believed they could recover from a liquidity crunch in 2014 and 2015. He said they ultimately failed because of “leaks” to media about the federal investigation of Platinum, and that there could be something “sinister” behind those leaks. That drew a sharp rebuke from U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan after the jury left for a break. Cogan had previously ruled that defense lawyers could not suggest to the jury that the government engaged in misconduct.”
Rep. Omar sits on the House Foreign Relations Committee spewing anti-Semitism because the Democrats believe that Islamic terrorism is justified. Anti-Semitism, in Omar’s case, is the symptom of an Islamist hostility that does not limit itself to Israel, but encloses America and much of the free world. Photo Credit: Shutterstock
Last night, Bernie Sanders, the Democrats’ leading candidate for President called the recent, democratically elected government of Israel “racist”, and said if elected, he would be more sympathetic to Palestinian concerns. In response to this latest signal that the Democratic party is moving away from being a pro-Israel party, RJC Executive Director Matt Brooks released the following statement:
Democrats are at it again. They don’t like the results of a free and democratic election; therefore, they call the victors racist and, by extension, call their supporters racist. It’s an absurd and offensive claim. When the Democratic party’s presidential frontrunner, Bernie Sanders, calls the Israeli government racist, he ignores that the nearly 2 million Arab Israeli citizens enjoy the same exact rights that every other Israeli citizen does: freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and the right to vote in free and democratic elections.
However, Bernie Sanders and the Democratic leadership don’t care about these facts. They care about appealing to the apparent, new voting base that has been energized by Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Linda Sarsour. These Left-wing radicals preach intersectionality as a way to rally disparate groups, even if that means attacking a close ally that happens to be the only country in the Middle East that protects the rights of women, the LGBTQ community, and religious minorities. Bernie Sanders and his Democratic Party are calling Israel racist in hopes that the American people will buy their lies. The RJC won’t let this happen. We won’t let Israel become a punching bag for Democrats to score points with their radical base.
The Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America and Rabbinical Council of America express deep condolences to the families of those who lost their lives in the horrific murders on Sunday at three Christian churches and other locations in Sri Lanka and pray for the speedy recovery of those injured in the terror attack.
We stand with our brothers and sisters throughout the world against senseless hatred and bigotry, and the despicable violence they breed. We condemn, in the strongest terms, the horrific murder of innocent people, and the added abhorrence of violence in houses of prayer. We commit to continue to work toward a future in which people of all faiths may respect each other and live together in safety and peace.
The World Jewish Congress on Wednesday voiced deep condemnation after a group of supporters of the Italian Serie A football club SS Lazio were caught on video performing fascist salutes and hanging banners glorifying Benito Mussolini ahead of the team’s Wednesday match in Milan. The scene unfolded the day before Liberation Day celebrations, which mark the end of the country’s fascist dictatorship.
Responding to the incident, World Jewish Congress CEO Robert Singer stated, “It is incomprehensible that in the 21st century there are still those who seek to glorify a fascist regime that was responsible for spreading hate across the continent during the darkest days of World War II and supported the Nazis in their perpetration of the Holocaust and other crimes against humanity.”
“Football is known to millions around the world as the ‘beautiful game’ not only because of the skill of its players, but for its unique ability to bring people together over their shared love of sport and club. It is time for players, club officials, and governing bodies to make clear that there is no room for such behavior by supporters both inside and outside of stadiums. We call on the leadership of SS Lazio and Serie A to respond accordingly and to ensure that these fans are punished to the fullest extent,” Singer said.
Today, U.S. Reps. Grace Meng (D-NY) and Brian Mast (R-FL) sent a bipartisan letter with 73 other Members of Congress to Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan urging him to expand the Global Entry program to Israel.
The Global Entry program allows expedited entry to the United States for pre-approved, low-risk travelers upon their arrival in the U.S. Current participants of the program include: Australia, Canada, Mexico, South Korea, the Netherlands, Panama, Germany, Singapore, the United Kingdom, Colombia, Switzerland, Argentina, and India.
Since 2012, Israel has participated in a limited pilot program for Global Entry. Israel’s full participation in the program would not only strengthen the deep U.S.-Israel national security ties that exist but would also grow the U.S. economy and increase people-to-people exchanges.
“Israel is America’s strongest ally and friend in the Middle East and it’s time that Israel is finally permitted to fully participate in our Global Entry program,” said Meng. “By adding Israel, America continues to affirm its unbreakable support for U.S.-Israel relations and strengthens the people-to-people connections for years to come. I want to thank Rep. Mast for co-leading this letter with me and I look forward to hearing back from Acting Secretary McAleenan.”
“The United States’ relationship with Israel is critically important to both countries and global security,” said Mast. “A long list of our allies already benefit from full participation in Global Entry and there’s no doubt that Israel should be added to strengthen security at our border and theirs, as well as increase opportunity for cultural and economic exchange.”
A copy of the Meng-Mast correspondence, and the signatories, can be viewed here. The text of the letter is below.
—————————————————
The Honorable Kevin McAleenan
Acting Secretary of Homeland Security
Washington, D.C. 20528
Dear Acting Secretary McAleenan:
We write to you in support of Israel’s participation in U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) Global Entry program. Over a year ago, all 100 of our colleagues in the United States Senate wrote to you urging the expansion of Global Entry to Israel – an unwavering ally. We write to you today, to ensure that the benefits that Global Entry promises to U.S. tourism, to our country’s national security, and to the U.S.-Israel relationship are realized.
According to the U.S. Travel Association, visits from Israel to the United States have averaged 418,000 people per year for the past three years. Israeli travelers account for $1.2 billion in spending annually, with an average $4,000 in personal spending per trip.
CBP’s Global Entry Program allows expedited entry upon arrival to the United States for pre-approved, low-risk travelers. By removing known, low-risk travelers from the regular screening process, CBP is able to focus resources on potentially riskier unknown travelers.
Since 2012, Israel has been participating in a limited pilot program of Global Entry. Israel’s full participation in this program would grow the U.S. economy, strengthen national security at each of our borders, and increase opportunities for people-to-people exchange, which bolsters our already unique bilateral relationship.
Israel would join a group of allies who benefit from participation in Global Entry, including Australia, Canada, Mexico, South Korea, the Netherlands, Panama, Germany, Singapore, the United Kingdom, Colombia, Switzerland, Argentina, and India.
We urge you expediently open the full benefits of Global Entry to Israel, and to provide an update to Congress on the status of the current negotiations.
With Passover season upon us, April 19, 2019, marked the Annual Bread Burning/Biur Chometz which was organized by the Staten Island Council of Jewish Organizations Security Committee. This annual holiday event was coordinated by COJO-SI together with the NYPD, FDNY, DSNY, Shomrim, Hatzolah and Chaverim. The COJO-SI Security Committee oversaw the burning of the chometz, and garbage removal.
COJO-SI gives special thanks the NYPD, FDNY and DSNY for assisting as they always do. Special thanks are given to Chief Kenneth Corey, commanding officer of Patrol Borough Staten Island, Inspector Matthew Harrington, commanding officer of Precinct 121, Chief Richard Howe, FDNY Staten Island Borough Chief, and Chief Stephen Montanino, DSNY Staten Island Borough Chief.
Mendy Mirocznik, president of COJO gives a special thanks to Security Committee and to its Chairs Scott Maurer (COJO CEO & Executive Vice President) and Ari Weiss ( Executive Coordinator of the Staten Island Shomrim) for their efforts in coordinating with the NYPD, FDNY, DSNY and our community. As always Scott and Ari and the Shomrim Members did an outstanding exemplary job.
As the central coordinating agency for the Island’s Jewish Community, COJO-SI wishes all a Happy Holiday season, a Zisse Pesach and a wonderful spring.
Antisemitism, Identity Politics, and American Identity: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives
The American Jewish Historical will host Eric Ward, long time civil rights strategist and the Executive Director at Western States Center. In 1990, for a special program on Antisemitism and Identity Politics in the US. Ward documented his first white nationalist Rally, and since then has been working to expose and respond to bigoted violence across the country through empowering community organization. Ward emphasizes that in order to understand the threat posed by the rapidly growing white nationalist movement in the United States today, we must first come to terms with the centrality of antisemitism to white nationalist ideology.
Joining Eric Ward in conversation is Tony Michels, a professor of American Jewish History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Christina Greer, Associate Professor of Political Science at Fordham University. Together these panelists will pull on the threads that connect past and present, and help us begin the process of unraveling the prevalence antisemitism, and bigotry more broadly, in America.
Tuesday, May 7, 2019, 7:00 pm
Part of the Jack Coleman and Lawrence Kanter, MD Lecture Series
Co-sponsored with the the Center for Jewish History
$15 general ● $10 students/AJHS/CJH members/seniors ● $18 at the door
On Friday April 19, the FDNY received a 911 call for a reported fire at Beth Gabriel on 108th Street in Forest Hills.
This One Alarm Call went out to respond to the 911 call.
When the Fire Chief was asked why the FDNY showed up to the synagogue on the eve of Passover the Queens Gazette was told that someone called 911 reporting smoke and flames were coming from the congregation’s property.
The Queens Gazette reporters were at the scene reporting on the Chumitz burning when fire truck sirens were heard coming closers othe to the property until a fire truck stopped across the street.
When the rabbi displayed the congregation’s permit for the event, the FDNY firefighters picked up their hoses and turned off the water flowing from the fire hydrant across from where the congregation is located.
It is with much sadness that I report that long time (70 years)Long Beach resident and sports reporter, ROBERT JOSEPH ELKIN (Kohen) passed away on Wednesday April 3, 2019 at the age of 76, just one day before the Mets home opener, an event he tried not to miss during his 40 years sports writing career.
Robert graduated Long Beach High School. He was the score keeper in high school because he was forced to give up playing baseball when he was hit in the eye with a batted ball around the age of 12.. The accident caused Robert to lose most of his eyesight in one eye.Robert covered sports for the New York Journal American , The Brooklyn Eagle, Caribbean Life, a Courier Life Publication and the Queens Times.
Robert covered high school, college and professional track and field,baseball, basketball and football. Robert did most of his writing about The New York Mets as sports writer and Sports Editor for the Queens Times, Jim Lisa, Publisher.
Robert was often seen on the sidelines of high school track and field events throughout the New York Metropolitan area, but mostly at sporting events in the borough of Queens. Longtime sports writer Lloyd Carroll said he would miss “Little Bobby,” as he called him, while he covers Mets and Jets home games. Mr. Carroll is well known for is sports writing in the Queens Chronicle as well as his sports and entertainment writing in Good Times Magazine, a New York publication..
Robert remained a resident of long Beach until his last breath. When he could no longer take care of himself he moved to the Long Beach Assisted Living, where he spent most of his last days of his life. He was very fond of Avi Heineman, Long Beach Assisted Living Administrator.
Robert said shortly before his death that he began his professional sports writing career the year that Jay Horwitz started his with the New York Mets, 40 years ago. His memory as a lifelong sports writer and Mets fan should not go unnoticed. He credited Jim Lisa, publisher of the Queens Times for sticking with him during his difficult years as wells as his productive writing years.
Robert credited his life’s work writing about the New York Mets to Jay Horwitz and Ethan Wilson, who were very helpful to Mr. Elkin.
We know that Robert will be missed in the New York Mets and New York Jets Press Boxes.
Robert Elkin was an only child and had the benefit of two loving parents who treated him like a prince.
Robert was laid to rest on Sunday April 7, 2019 at King Solomon Cemetery in Clifton, New Jersey during a graveside service attended by friends and family.
Robert’s father, Daniel Elkin was a Kohen, a member of the holiest Tribe of Israel. Kohen were considered the Priests in biblical times and still honored at Sabbath and other religious services of the Jewish faith.
State Senator John Liu spoke last Sunday at a breakfast at Hillcrest Jewish Center.
Senator Liu unseated Tony Avella to represent Northeast Queens in the New York State Senate.
Senator John Liu with Hillcrest Jewish Center Rabbi Kogan Manes Senator Liu said ,” I have spent many days and evenings attending community and local meetings here at Hillcrest Jewish Center”
Senator John Lou previously have a New York City councilman from Flushing and then ran and successfully won the controller spot representing all of New York City as its financial leader.
State Senator John LIU who formerly serve in the New York City Council and as New York City Comptroller now represents Northeastern Queens in the New York State Senate
Send Luis a stand out student athlete at Bronx high school of science he performed in track and field.
Senator Liu was asked why so many Democrats have taken socialist views. The Senator replied, “I am not a Socialist. I am a Democrat.”
“Iran’s leaders plunder the nation’s resources to enrich themselves and to spread mayhem across the Middle East and far beyond,” declared President Trump in a statement to the media on Monday. To this end, the president outlined his strategy for cutting off Iran’s oil exports completely, thus denying the rogue regime its principal source of revenue. As such, the Trump administration announced that they would not renew waivers next month to five countries that continue to import oil from Iran. The official name of the waivers is known as Significant Reduction Exceptions (SREs) and the precise deadline is May 2.
China, who is one of Iran’s largest oil customers, said that the Trump announcement was evidence of US “unilateral sanctions and long-arm jurisdiction.” China, which relies on imports for about half of its oil, could present the toughest diplomatic challenge for the US in trying to enforce its sanctions, as was reported in a Times of Israel report. Photo Credit: Shutterstock
The five nations in question are China, India, Japan, South Korea and Turkey. Voicing their strident opposition to this move, China, who is one of Iran’s largest oil customers, said that the Trump announcement was evidence of US “unilateral sanctions and long-arm jurisdiction.” China, which relies on imports for about half of its oil, could present the toughest diplomatic challenge for the US in trying to enforce its sanctions, as was reported in a Times of Israel report.
CNN reported that Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu firmly rejected the Trump administration decision on Monday, saying via Twitter that “the US decision to end sanctions waivers on Iran oil imports will not serve regional peace and stability yet will harm Iranian people. Turkey rejects unilateral sanctions and impositions on how to conduct relations with neighbors.”
Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu firmly rejected the Trump administration decision on Monday, saying via Twitter that “the US decision to end sanctions waivers on Iran oil imports will not serve regional peace and stability yet will harm Iranian people. Turkey rejects unilateral sanctions and impositions on how to conduct relations with neighbors.” Photo Credit: Shutterstock
He went further during a press conference in Ankara, saying that “pushing buying oil from countries besides Iran goes too far. Turkey is against those steps and impositions,” according to the state-run Anadolu news agency.
It was also reported by CNN that a senior Iraqi official said Monday that Trump’s decision to end waivers for the purchase of Iranian oil exports, and pressure Iraq to end its purchase of Iranian power is a “serious problem.”
“Iraq needs good relations with Iran. The US has one policy focus, which is to bring Iran down and are looking through this prism. The situation is precarious. The Americans need a nuanced policy. This drive by the White House risks disrupting Iraq. If they really want a policy towards Iran, they should look at strengthening Iraq. But given that much of our assets are in the Federal Reserve the Americans can make life very difficult for us.”
According to the Trump statement issued by his press secretary Sarah Sanders, the United States, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, three of the world’s great energy producers, are working to ensure global oil markets remain well supplied. The statement went on to say that the United States and its partners will take immediate action to ensure that supplies are made available to replace all Iranian oil removed from the market. The White House added that forecasters expect global oil supply will keep pace with demand in 2019.
Emphasizing that the decision against the renewal of waivers on the purchase of Iranian oil was to show the world that the administration is determined to expand and enforce its maximum pressure campaign against the Iranian regime, the White House statement said that this action was taken to hold Iran accountable for the full range of its malign activities.
“The United States will continue to apply maximum pressure on the Iranian regime until its leaders change their destructive behavior, “ said the White House statement.
Soon after President Trump took office, he fulfilled his campaign pledge to withdrew the United States from the “horrible Iran nuclear deal” and thusly imposed the most stringent sanctions ever placed on the Islamic Republic of Iran. Moreover, the Trump administration declared that all sanctions that were originally lifted under the Obama era Iran deal were reimposed last year. These sanctions targeted critical sectors of Iran’s economy, including energy, shipping, and its financial institutions.
The Trump administration recently designated Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, putting the private sector on notice not to conduct business with them. Photo Credit: Wikipedia
In addition, the Trump administration recently designated Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, putting the private sector on notice not to conduct business with them. As a result of the administration’s actions, Iran’s currency has lost more than two-thirds of its value on the black market. Foreign direct investment and business activity in Iran have fallen off as the private sector is keenly cognizant of the multifarious risks involved when conducting business with Iran.
As a result, the White House reported that more than 100 companies who had previously engaged in business dealings with Iran have ceased and desisted from conducting business there.
The White House also noted that the decision to apply this kind of economic pressure on rogue nation was sending a clear and unambiguous message to the authoritarian regime that its destabilizing activities and global terrorist campaign have serious consequences.
The well-crafted statement also made it known that the malevolent Iranian regime has long used oil revenues to support its destabilizing activities and fund terrorist proxies throughout the world. It is internationally known that Iran is the leading state sponsor of terrorism, with a chief objective of working towards financing and supporting terrorist organizations including al-Qa’ida, Hizballah, Hamas, the Taliban, and others of that ilk.
The Trump administration also called out Iran in terms of their purported promises to scale down and eventually eliminate their entire nuclear program. The statement noted that fact that Iran’s oil revenues have helped to finance their nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs that threaten the region and the United States.
Without mentioning specific names, the White House statement said that leaders of the Iranian regime have committed horrific human rights violations while using oil revenues to line their own pockets instead of giving support to their own people. It continued by declaring unequivocally that Iran continues to undermine the stability of the region, including through hostility toward Israel and threatening freedom of navigation in the critical Persian Gulf.
Speaking of Israel, the recently re-elected prime minister of the Jewish state, Benjamin Netanyahu lauded the Trump administration’s Monday announcement that it will no longer grant exemptions from sanctions to Iran’s oil customers, according to a TOI report.
“The decision of President Trump and the American administration is of great importance for increasing the pressure on the Iranian terror regime,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement. “We stand by the determination of the United States against Iranian aggression and this is the right way to stop it.”
Netanyahu was a main voice against the 2015 nuclear deal that opened up Iran’s export market, and has praised Trump’s moves to reverse the pact.
Following the U.S. designation of the IRGC as a terrorist entity on April 8, some have assessed that Iran is likely to intensify proxy attacks on Israel from Syria and Gaza in response, according to an article on the JNS.org web site.
In the Gaza Strip, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), the second-largest armed faction in Gaza and Iran’s direct proxy, has grown an arsenal of rockets that now surpasses that of Hamas, the largest terrorist faction in the Strip.
The JNS report indicated that PIJ has been rebuilding its firepower since the 2014 conflict it and Hamas fought with Israel. Today. PIJ and Hamas have a combined rocket arsenal of more than 20,000 projectiles, some of which have a sufficient range of reaching targets north of Tel Aviv, as demonstrated by a March rocket strike on an Israeli home that injured seven civilians.
PIJ’s fighting force of 10,000 armed operatives, combined with Hamas’s 30,000 armed-wing members, mean that Gaza has developed a terrorist army. Together, these Iranian-funded factions threaten to indiscriminately fire rockets at Israeli civilian neighborhoods.
The report went on to say that the administration granted eight oil sanctions waivers when it re-imposed sanctions on Iran after Trump pulled the US out of the 2015 nuclear deal. They were granted in part to give those countries — Japan, South Korea, Turkey, China, India, Greece, Italy, Taiwan — more time to find alternate energy sources but also to prevent a shock to global oil markets from the sudden removal of Iranian crude.
Since November, three of the eight countries — Italy, Greece and Taiwan — have stopped importing oil from Iran. The other five, however, have not, and have lobbied for their waivers to be extended.
Speaking Monday at a press conference, as was reported by CNN, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said “the goal remains simple: to deprive the outlaw regime of the funds it had used to destabilize the Middle East for four decades and incentivize Iran to behave like a normal country.”
Noting that oil is “the regime’s No. 1 source of cash,” Pompeo said that prior to the implementation of US sanctions, Iran was generating “as much as $50 billion annually,” from oil exports, but that the department estimates the sanctions have “denied the regime well north of $10 billion.”
“How long we remain there — at zero — depends solely on the Islamic Republic (of) Iran’s senior leaders,” he added.
“We have made our demands very clear to the ayatollah and his cronies: end your pursuit of nuclear weapons, stop testing and proliferating ballistic missiles, stop sponsoring and committing terrorism, halt the arbitrary detention of US citizens. Our pressure is aimed at ending these and others and it will continue to accelerate until Iran is willing to address them at the negotiating table,” Pompeo said.
CNN reported that after the announcement from the US, Saudi Arabia’s Oil Minister Khalid al-Falih said the country will coordinate with other oil producers “to ensure the availability of enough oil supplies for consumers and to ensure global oil markets are not knocked off balance.”
The US will also aid the dearth in supply, Pompeo said. The US produced 1.6 million more barrels of oil in 2018 than in 2017, and is on track to increase production in 2019 as well.
But given the ongoing crises in both Venezuela and Libya, which are two major oil supplying countries, there are fears that the US decision will make the oil market more unstable.
The World Jewish Congress (WJC) on Sunday slammed a Polish town after video circulated of residents beating, hanging, and burning an offensive effigy of a "stereotypical Jew" in a revival of an old Easter tradition.in a revival of an old Easter tradition. Photo Credit: Sputnik International
The huge effigy was said to represent the Jewish biblical character of Judas Iscariot
The World Jewish Congress (WJC) on Sunday slammed a Polish town after video circulated of residents beating, hanging, and burning an offensive effigy of a “stereotypical Jew” in a revival of an old Easter tradition.in a revival of an old Easter tradition.
WJC chief executive Robert Singer issued a statement expressing “disgust and outrage at this latest blatantly antisemitic manifestation.”
“Jews are deeply disturbed by this ghastly revival of medieval antisemitism that led to unimaginable violence and suffering,” he said.
He added that, “One can only wonder how John Paul II who taught Catholics in his native Poland and all over the world that antisemitism is a sin against God and man would have reacted to this flagrant rejection of his teachings. We can only hope that the Church and other institutions will do their best to overcome these frighful prejudices which are a blot on Poland’s good name.”
As Christian Poles prepared to mark the crucifixion of Jesus the weekend of Easter and Jews marked the Passover festival symbolizing their Exodus from bondage in Egypt, media reports showed photos and video of residents of the town of Pruchnik using sticks to beat an effigy of Judas on Good Friday.
The effigy, which had sidelocks and a large nose, was then beheaded, set on fire and tossed into a river, according to the reports.
The Easter ritual known as “Judgment over Judas” dates back to the 18th century and continued to be regularly performed until the Second World War.
The tradition had been largely abandoned, with only a couple of villages continuing it. Even Pruchnik had appeared to stop in recent years, according to the Polish news portal oko.press.
But anti-semitic concerns have recently resurfaced in Poland, where most of the country’s Jewish population was wiped out in the Second World War.
The Easter ritual known as “Judgment over Judas” dates back to the 18th century and continued to be regularly performed until the Second World War.
The tradition had been largely abandoned, with only a couple of villages continuing it. Even Pruchnik had appeared to stop in recent years, according to the Polish news portal oko.press.
Last year, Warsaw passed a law that originally established fines or a maximum three-year jail term for anyone who refers to Nazi German death camps as Polish or accuses Poland of complicity in the Third Reich’s crimes.
The law sparked a diplomatic storm with Israel, which led Poland to amend it and suspend its enforcement once the countries were able to settle their differences.
But ahead of this month’s elections in Israel, Minister of Foreign Affairs Yisrael Katz reignited tensions when he made inflammatory remarks that “there were many Poles who contributed with the Nazis,” and that “the Poles suckle anti-Semitism from their mother’s breasts,” quoting former Israeli premier Yitzhak Shamir, who was well-known for the kind of radical anti-Polish sentiment not uncommon among Holocaust survivors.
On Monday, the WJC issued a press release in response to the statement by Bishop Rafał Markowski deploring the symbolic lynching of a Jewish effigy in the town of Pruchnik. WJC CEO Robert Singer said that he was “heartened that the Church had taken an unequivocal stand” with respect to this antisemitic incident.
“Jews all over the world look to the Church to continue the struggle against antisemitism pioneered by Pope John Paul II who had called the Jews the older brothers of Christians,” Singer added. “The Church is in a unique position to overcome age-old prejudice and stereotypes. We can only hope that one day a spirit of brotherhood and mutual respect will replace intolerance and hatred in Pruchnik—and that young people will be taught about the horrifying fate of that community’s Jewish inhabitants during the German occupation.”
“I am leaving office, but I want to firmly underline that I am not leaving politics,” the incumbent president said after exit polls gave Volodymyr Zelensky a decisive lead.
In the Ukrainian elections, it has been reported that incumbent President Petro Poroshenko is accepting defeat for the country’s highest office.
The AP has reported that an exit poll from Ukraine’s presidential election is giving Jewish comedian Volodymyr Zelensky – who plays a high school teacher ranting about government corruption who is elected president on a TV series – a commanding lead over Poroshenko.
Results from the exit poll released Sunday after voting stations closed showed Zelensky receiving 73.2% of the nationwide vote; Poroshenko got 25.3%, according to the AP report.
The poll, conducted by the Kiev International Institute of Sociology and the Razumkov Center public opinion organization, was based on more than 13,000 responses to face-to-face questions at 300 polling places as of 6 p.m., two hours before the polls closed, as was reported by the AP.
The poll claims a margin of error of three percentage points.
Shortly after the poll results were published, Poroshenko said he was willing to help his rival transition into the presidency.
“I am leaving office, but I want to firmly underline that I am not leaving politics,” Poroshenko said.
The comedian is a political neophyte and has no background or experience in affairs of state and has offered few detailed policies.
Reuters reported that Poroshenko tried to rally Ukrainians around the flag by casting himself as a bulwark against Russian aggression and a champion of Ukrainian identity.
Zelenskiy was born in 1978 to Jewish parents and seems set to become Ukraine’s first Jewish president. Ukraine’s Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman is also Jewish, as was reported by Reuters.
Declaring victory at his campaign headquarters to emotional supporters, Zelenskiy promised he would not let the Ukrainian people down.
“I’m not yet officially the president, but as a citizen of Ukraine, I can say to all countries in the post-Soviet Union look at us. Anything is possible!”
European Council President Donald Tusk congratulated Zelenskiy, as did French President Emmanuel Macron and British foreign minister Jeremy Hunt, as was reported by Reuters.
Zelenskiy, whose victory fits a pattern of anti-establishment figures unseating incumbents in Europe and further afield, has promised to end the war in the eastern Donbass region and to root out corruption amid widespread dismay over rising prices and sliding living standards.
But he has been coy about exactly how he plans to achieve all that and investors want reassurances that he will accelerate reforms needed to attract foreign investment and keep the country in an International Monetary Fund program.
