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Israeli and Hezbollah strikes test limits of ceasefire

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The latest exchange of fire between Israel and Hezbollah is testing the limits of last week’s already fragile ceasefire deal.
Hours after Hezbollah fired two mortar shells at an Israeli military outpost on Monday, Israel carried out its largest series of air strikes since the truce came into effect.
Nine people were killed in two villages in southern Lebanon.
“Yesterday was the most dangerous moment for the cessation of hostilities,” said one seasoned observer in Lebanon.
The Israeli military said it targeted Hezbollah fighters, rocket launchers and infrastructure. However, in a statement it added, that: “The State of Israel remains obligated to the fulfilment of the conditions of the ceasefire agreement in Lebanon.”
Both sides have accused each other of violating the truce brokered by the US and France in recent days.
Under its terms, Israel is prohibited from conducting offensive military operations in Lebanon while Lebanon must prevent armed groups, including Hezbollah, from launching attacks on Israel.
The Israeli army did not report any casualties from the mortar attack on its position in the sensitive Shebaa Farms area – along the border of Lebanon and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
However, soon afterwards, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed a “strong” response.
There were also fiery comments from the Defence Minister, Israel Katz: “If the ceasefire collapses, there will no longer be an exemption for the state of Lebanon,” he said on Tuesday.
“We will enforce the agreement with maximum response and zero tolerance; If until now we have separated Lebanon and Hezbollah – it will not be anymore”.

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International

Azerbaijan Airlines says plane crashed after ‘external interference’ as questions mount over possible Russian involvement

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Azerbaijan Airlines says the jet that crashed in Kazakhstan on Christmas Day experienced “physical and technical external interference,” according to an early investigation, as questions swirled about Russia’s possible involvement in the disaster.

At least 38 of the 67 people on board the plane were killed in the crash, Kazakh authorities confirmed, including two pilots and a flight attendant. People from Azerbaijan, Russia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan were among those on board, according to preliminary data from Kazakhstan’s transport ministry.

One passenger told Reuters in an interview on Friday that he didn’t think he would survive after he heard a loud bang and the plane started to “behave unnaturally.”

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FTX executives shave serious time off their sentences

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Ryan Salame and Caroline Ellison, FTX executives convicted for their roles in the notorious crypto fraud led by their former boss Sam Bankman-Fried, have both shaved time off their lengthy prison sentences.

Salame, a former top executive of FTX, the now-bankrupt cryptocurrency trading platform, pleaded guilty to criminal fraud charges in September 2023, and was sentenced in May to 7 1/2 years in federal prison. He began his sentence in October. But the Federal Bureau of Prisons currently lists his release date as March 1, 2031, more than a year earlier than his initial release date in April 2032. Business Insider first reported Salame’s new release date.

Ellison, Bankman-Fried’s former girlfriend and the former CEO of FTX’s hedge fund arm, Alameda Research, was sentenced to 2 years in prison after she pleaded guilty to seven federal counts of fraud and conspiracy and was a key witness against Bankman-Fried. Her current release date is listed as July 20, 2025, three months earlier than her initial release date.

Bankman-Fried, who was sentenced to 25 years in prison, does not have a release date listed on the prisons website.

The Bureau of Prisons didn’t immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment. However, in several past statements about early release dates, the bureau has told CNN that it does not comment on the conditions of any individual inmate, but inmates can earn good conduct time that is calculated into their projected release date.

Qualified inmates are currently eligible for up to 54 days of GCT time for each year of the sentence imposed by the court. Inmates have other ways of earning time credits while incarcerated, including participation in various prison programs.

FTX was a high-profile crypto startup that allowed people to buy and sell digital assets. It had its name emblazoned on an arena in Miami and on every Major League Baseball umpire’s jersey. The exchange had several celebrity endorsers and was widely believed to be a gold-standard for safety and security.

But FTX collapsed in November 2022 when customers pulled their funds as rumors spread about FTX’s unusually close ties to its founder’s crypto hedge fund, Alameda

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‘It’s a scary time’: US universities urge international students to return to campus before Trump inauguration

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Fear and uncertainty are spreading across many US college campuses ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s January 20 inauguration, with some schools advising international students to return early from winter break amid promises of another travel ban like the one that stranded students abroad at the start of Trump’s last term.

In a country where more than 1.1 million international students enrolled in US colleges and universities during the 2023-24 academic year, the former president has pledged more hardline immigration policies upon his return to the White House, including an expansion of his previous travel ban on people from predominantly Muslim countries and the revocation of student visas of “radical anti-American and antisemitic foreigners.”

International students generally have nonimmigrant visas that allow them to study in the US but don’t provide a legal pathway to stay in the country.

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