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Why Hamas is protesting in Gaza — and why it will continue

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Large protests rocked the border between Gaza and Israel for the second consecutive Friday this past week.

A March 31 rally resulted in the deaths of at least 20 Palestinians, with hundreds injured, as Israeli forces used live ammunition and tear gas to push back protesters. On Friday, nine more people were fatally shot, including a journalist.

While much of the international attention has focused on the actions of the Israel Defense Forces, from inside Gaza, a different set of issues has taken priority. Hamas organized the protests, centered on the right of return for Gazan refugees and their descendants. This represents a new strategic initiative for Hamas, which has been attempting to fuel popular protest since 2015, but until recently had largely failed to generate much interest outside its own constituency.

Hamas is a socio-political and militant movement founded in 1987 to confront the Israeli occupation, periodically exchanging attacks with Israeli forces, and it is considered a terrorist organization by both Israel and the United States. It has been in control of Gaza since 2007.

The Friday protests were part of a season of weekly rallies organized by Hamas under the slogan the “Great March of Return.” Protests are scheduled to continue until May 15, a day traditionally commemorated by Palestinians for their displacement in 1948 and by Israel to celebrate its independence. Significantly, this is also the date the United States plans to officially move its embassy to Jerusalem.

How did Hamas manage to organize broad support for its protests, and why did it choose this form of collective action? Can Hamas sustain protests in the face of severe Israeli reprisals and international indifference? Its ability to do so will depend not only upon the Israeli and American response, but also upon whether its internal organizational structure provides sufficient support to ongoing mobilization and adherence to nonviolent action

What sparked the Gaza protests?

President Trump’s decision to move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem generated widespread anger among Palestinians, many of whom were already disillusioned with the Oslo peace process. Gaza in particular has suffered for years from seemingly endless economic blockade, political isolation and cyclical violence. The Trump administration’s talk of “the deal of the century” did nothing to ease uncertainty among Palestinians, who have been largely left out of the discussions and have been unsettled by leaked details of the deal.

The economic toll of years of blockade enforced by Israel and Egypt because of Hamas’s militant actions have put the Gazan population on edge, and popular discontent with Hamas’s authoritarian rule has been growing for years.

Rapidly shifting regional politics and ongoing political battles with the rival Palestinian Authority have also left Hamas with few sources of external support.

Hamas has frequently sought to generate protest focused on lifting the siege on Gaza, with little real success, but with this protest movement, Hamas has skillfully rechanneled popular grievances toward the Israeli occupation.

Can Hamas sustain nonviolent protest?

Protest demands coordination, discipline and broad participation, which in turn requires a strong level of organization. Last week’s rallies showed that Hamas was able to act as the organizational backbone of an entire season of protest. Yet the question remains as to whether Hamas can continue to function in a cohesive and organized manner in the face of potentially severe repression.

Israel’s forceful response to the recent rallies and the seemingly indiscriminate killings led to international outrage, generating unusual levels of critical attention to Israel and galvanizing greater Palestinian enthusiasm for confrontation. Further Israeli escalation against protesters will likely have similar effects, strengthening support and fueling conflict.

What if Israel targeted Hamas’s leadership in Gaza? My research in Gaza suggests that the distinctive organizational structure of Hamas would probably allow it absorb such a response and to sustain protest. Two organizational and mobilizational forms in particular distinguish Hamas from other Palestinian factions and allow it to thrive in conditions of extreme adversity. Inspired by the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt, Hamas organizes itself in small groups referred to as “families.” These are its cadre incubators, where the education and training of its budding members take place.

These activities feed into channels of upward mobility within the movement. To rise through Hamas’s hierarchy, candidates go through exams and evaluations to prove their mobilizing qualifications and loyalty to the movement over stages. This means that the death or arrest of a high-ranking member does not necessarily create a leadership vacuum that throws the organization into disarray. The removal of a leader simply activates a process at the horizontal level that rapidly elevates a proven member to the suddenly vacant position.

On one hand, Hamas depends on local activism to form potential leaders and maintain the integrity of its structure. But on the other, this resilience is precisely what allows Hamas to continue to play a consequential role in sustaining popular mobilization. Hamas’s muqawama is a type of resistance that is formed from unarmed protests, virtually empowered with and by the civilian population. According to my findings, muqawma — as opposed to militancy — is the strategy that best corresponds to Hamas’s internal organizational structure.

Looking ahead to May 15

Each week of protest leading up to May 15 holds out the prospect for the escalation of violence. Will Hamas be able to sustain a nonviolent campaign despite the primacy of militants in its leadership? Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s leader in Gaza who has organized and led the popular protests, hails from the military wing. Israel has justified the killing of protesters in part by identifying several participants as members of its armed wing.

Given the strong presence of Hamas’s military wing in Gaza, will the “success” of the wave of protest develop into a kind of internal referendum on Hamas’s choices of popular muqawama at the expense of its militancy?

For now, at least, turning its armed wing into nonviolent protesters serves Hamas’s strategy. Hamas is redirecting part of its human capital to serve its political objectives and find a way out of its Gaza straitjacket, while gaining a popular stance as defenders of the Palestinian national interest. It is aware that its major rivals — Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) — are vulnerable to popular muqawama. It believes Israel’s repressive measures will serve only to bolster Hamas’s internal popularity and will invite international support for Palestinians. The PA seems to agree because it has rushed to gain legitimacy from the protests, announcing mourning days for the dead.

Israel and the PA will work to prevent further protests, while Hamas aims to expand them to the West Bank. There is a key precedent; the First Intifada originated in Gaza but expanded to the West Bank in 1987. If muqawama indeed takes on larger proportions, Israel will push hard to militarize it. What remains to be seen with Hamas’s turn toward popular muqawama, however, is whether Hamas will be able and willing to sustain nonviolent protest as tensions and conflicts mount.

Imad Alsoos is a research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology. His research focuses on a comparative study of Hamas and an-Nahda’s forms of internal and external mobilization.

Blaze on 50th floor of Trump Tower in New York kills 1

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NEW YORK — A raging fire that tore through a 50th-floor apartment at Trump Tower killed a man inside and sent flames and thick, black smoke pouring from windows of the president’s namesake skyscraper.

New York Fire Commissioner Daniel Nigro said the cause of Saturday’s blaze is not yet known but the apartment was “virtually entirely on fire” when firefighters arrived after 5:30 p.m.

“It was a very difficult fire, as you can imagine,” Nigro told reporters outside the building in midtown Manhattan. “The apartment is quite large.”

Todd Brassner, 67, who was in the apartment, was taken to a hospital and died a short time later, the New York Police Department said. Property records obtained by The Associated Press indicate Brassner was an art dealer who had purchased his unit in 1996.

Officials said four firefighters also suffered minor injuries. An investigation is ongoing.

Shortly after news of the fire broke, President Donald Trump, who was in Washington, tweeted: “Fire at Trump Tower is out. Very confined (well built building). Firemen (and women) did a great job. THANK YOU!”

Asked if that assessment was accurate, Nigro said, “It’s a well-built building. The upper floors, the residence floors, are not sprinklered.”

Fire sprinklers were not required in New York City high-rises when Trump Tower was completed in 1983. Subsequent updates to the building code required commercial skyscrapers to install the sprinklers retroactively, but owners of older residential high-rises are not required to install sprinklers unless the building undergoes major renovations.

Some fire-safety advocates pushed for a requirement that older apartment buildings be retrofitted with sprinklers when New York City passed a law requiring them in new residential highrises in 1999, but officials in the administration of then-mayor Rudy Giuliani said that would be too expensive.

Nigro noted that no member of the Trump family was in the 664-foot tower Saturday.

Trump’s family has an apartment on the top floors of the 58-story building, but he has spent little time in New York since taking office. The headquarters of the Trump Organization is on the 26th floor.

Nigro said firefighters and Secret Service members checked on the condition of Trump’s apartment. About 200 firefighters and emergency medical service workers responded to the fire, he said.

Some residents said they didn’t get any notification from building management to evacuate.

Lalitha Masson, a 76-year-old resident, called it “a very, very terrifying experience.”

Masson told The New York Times that she did not receive any announcement about leaving, and that when she called the front desk no one answered.

“When I saw the television, I thought we were finished,” said Masson, who lives on the 36th floor with her husband, Narinder, who is 79 and has Parkinson’s disease.

She said she started praying because she felt it was the end.

“I called my oldest son and said goodbye to him because the way it looked everything was falling out of the window, and it reminded me of 9/11,” Masson said.

Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Trump threatens "Animal Assad," Putin over alleged chemical attack in Syria

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WASHINGTON — President Trump responded Sunday to reports of a suspected chemical attack in the Syrian city of Douma, blaming Syrian President Bashar Assad and his international allies for the apparent attack that left dozens dead and hundreds injured. In some of his most critical comments directed at Russian President Vladimir Putin to date, Mr. Trump threatened that there’s a “big price … to pay” for those backing the Assad regime.

Syrian opposition activists and rescuers said Sunday that a poison gas attack on the rebel-held town of Douma near the capital of Damascus killed at least 40 people. The alleged attack has been denied by the Syrian and Russian governments. Russia is Syria’s closest ally and has a major military presence in the country.

Reports of the latest attack which appeared to target civilians and young children could not be independently verified. 

Mr. Trump called out Putin along with the leadership in Iran for backing Assad, who he referred to as “Animal Assad.” Mr. Trump ordered missile strikes on a Syrian airbase in response to another chemical attack in 2017.

First responders said they found families suffocated in their homes and shelters, with foam on their mouths. The opposition-linked Syrian Civil Defense were able to document 42 fatalities but were impeded from searching further by strong odors that gave their rescuers difficulties breathing, said Siraj Mahmoud, a spokesman for the group, which is known as the White Helmets. 

“Open area immediately for medical help and verification. Another humanitarian disaster for no reason whatsoever. SICK!” the president urged. 

Mr. Trump later blamed his predecessor President Barack Obama for not taking action against the Assad regime earlier in the civil war.

It’s unclear what the administration’s next steps are with regard to responding to the attack. In response to a similar chemical attack in April of last year, Mr. Trump ordered a missile strike on a Syrian military target in Shayrat, about 50 miles due south of the village that was hit in a gas attack. 

With regards to a counter response, Homeland Security Adviser Tom Bossert told ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday, “I wouldn’t take anything off the table.”

“The State Department put out a statement last night and the president’s senior national security cabinet has been talking with him and each other all throughout the evening and this morning,” Bossert added.

Meanwhile, Sen. Lindsey Graham told ABC in response to Mr. Trump’s tweets on Sunday that this was a “defining moment” for the president.  

“He has challenged Assad in the past not to use chemical weapons,” said Graham. He added, “if it becomes a tweet without meaning then he’s hurt himself in North Korea, if he doesn’t follow through and live up to that tweet, he’s going to look weak in the eyes of and Russia and Iran.”

Graham urged Mr. Trump to “show a resolve that Obama never did to get this right.”

Stock Market Plummets After Trump Explores $100 Billion in New Chinese Tariffs

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(NEW YORK ) — Another increase in trade tensions has stocks falling sharply Friday as the U.S. considers an even larger set of tariffs on imports from China and the two countries exchange pointed statements. Technology companies and banks are taking some of the worst losses.

Stocks have changed direction again and again this week as investors tried to get a sense of whether a trade dispute between the two nations will escalate, an outcome that could have major consequences for the global economy. The market didn’t get any help from a March jobs report that was weaker than expected.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell dropped 581 points, or 2.4 percent, to 23,916 as of 2:15 p.m. Eastern time. Earlier it fell as much as 620 points.

The SP 500, which many index funds track, lost 53 points, or 2 percent, to 2,608. The Nasdaq composite slid 135 points, or 1.9 percent, to 6,940. The Russell 2000 index of smaller-company stocks dipped 29 points, or 1.9 percent, to 1,513.

The Dow average, which contains numerous multinational companies including industrial powerhouses Boeing and Caterpillar, has swung dramatically this week, with about 1,300 points separating its highest and lowest marks. It fell as much as 758 points Monday, then recovered all of those losses, and late Thursday it was up as much as 519 points for the week. It’s down 0.7 percent for the week.

The administration spent the past few days reassuring investors that it’s not rushing into a trade war, and China’s government has done the same. But late Thursday, President Donald Trump ordered the U.S. Trade Representative to consider placing tariffs on $100 billion in duties on Chinese imports. China said it would “counterattack with great strength” if he that happens.

Stocks dipped further after Trump criticized the World Trade Organization on Twitter Friday morning.

At the start of the week, the U.S. announced plans to put tariffs on $50 billion in goods imported from China, and the Chinese government responded with measures of equal size. Stocks plunged on Monday, but they rallied over the next few days as officials from both countries said they were open to talks and that the tariffs might never go into effect.

With administration officials sounding conciliatory one day and more hostile the next and the president always quick to fire off another tweet, investors simply don’t know what the U.S. wants to achieve, said Katie Nixon, chief investment officer for Northern Trust Wealth Management.

“The process itself seems to be quite chaotic,” she said. “We’re not quite sure what the long term strategy is.”

Still, she said businesses support the idea of making changes in America’s trade relationship with China. But even though investors are optimistic about the state of the global economy and company profits continue to grow, Nixon said the administration is creating the thing investors hate the most: uncertainty.

Technology companies make a lot of their sales in Asia and they have struggled as Wall Street worries about a slowdown in global economic growth. Optimism about the world economy has helped many tech companies make huge gains in the last year.

Apple skidded $3.46, or 2 percent, to $169.34 and Cisco Systems declined 98 cents, or 2.4 percent, to $40.84. PayPal dipped $2.63, or 3.4 percent, to $74.32.

Industrial companies might face the worst pain from tariffs, as they could find themselves dealing with higher costs for components imported into the U.S. while the duties on their goods in China harm their sales.

Caterpillar, a construction equipment maker, shed $584, or 3.9 percent, to $142.29 while farm equipment company Deere sank $5.56, or 3.7 percent, to $145.79. Aerospace giant Boeing dipped $12.20, or 3.6 percent, to $324.20.

Health care companies also declined. Johnson Johnson sank $2.99, or 2.3 percent, to $127.72 and health insurer UnitedHealth dropped $59, or 2.6 percent, to $223.18.

Employers added 103,000 jobs in March, which is weaker than the last few months. The Labor Department also said fewer jobs were added in January and February that it initially estimated. The unemployment rate remained low and the job market looks fundamentally healthy, but it’s possible some employers are struggling to find workers.

Benchmark U.S. crude dropped $1.17, or 1.8 percent, to $62.37 a barrel in New York while Brent crude, used to price international oils, lost 92 cents, or 1.3 percent, to $67.41 per barrel in London. Oil prices have also been volatile this week, as investors wonder if an increase in trade tensions will reduce demand for oil by slowing down the global economy.

Bond prices rose, sending yields lower. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 2.78 percent from 2.83 percent. The lower yields mean banks can’t make as much money from lending, and that send bank stocks lower. JPMorgan Chase fell $3.23, or 2.9 percent, to $108.65 and BBT lost $1.89, or 3.6 percent, to $51.

Gold rose $7.60 to $1,336.10 an ounce. Silver edged up 1 cent to $16.36 an ounce. Copper fell 2 cents to $3.06 a pound.

The dollar fell to 106.86 yen from 107.12 yen. The euro rose to $1.2287 from $1.2256.

Germany’s DAX was down 0.5 percent while France’s CAC-40 fell 0.3 percent lower. The FTSE 100 in Britain lost 0.2 percent.

Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 index dipped 0.4 percent while South Korea’s Kospi slipped 0.3 percent but Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 1.1 percent after trading resumed following a holiday as investors caught up with the previous day’s global gains.

Feds seize Backpage.com in enforcement action

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Federal law enforcement authorities are in the process of seizing Backpage.com and its affiliated websites.

The websites are being seized as part of an enforcement action by the FBI, U.S. Postal Inspection Service and the Internal Revenue Service, according to a notice that appeared Friday afternoon on Backpage.com.

The notice didn’t characterize or provide any details on the nature of the enforcement action.

Rep. Blake Farenthold, the Texas Republican accused of sexual harassment in a suit that led to an $84,000 taxpayer settlement to a former aide, resigned Friday after insisting for months that he would serve out his current term in Congress.

Farenthold’s decision was announced shortly before it became official, on the final day of the two-week congressional spring break.

“While I planned on serving out the remainder of my term in Congress, I know in my heart it’s time for me to move along and look for new ways to serve,” the Corpus Christi representative wrote.

Once again, President Trump has talked about rapists in Mexico, and left consternation and confusion in his wake.

At a Thursday afternoon event in Sulphur Springs, W.Va., Trump called for tighter control of the nation’s southern border and reminded his audience that when he announced his presidential candidacy in 2015 he had called Mexican immigrants “rapists.”

“Everybody said, ‘Oh, he was so tough,’ and I used the word ‘rape,’” Trump recounted. “And yesterday, it came out where, this journey coming up, women are raped at levels that nobody has ever seen before. They don’t want to mention that.”

The White House said Friday that it would move on with a plan to use 2,000 to 4,000 National Guard troops to patrol the Southwestern border, whether or not California chooses to go along.

“We’re going to continue to work with California and we’re hopeful that they’ll do the right thing,” Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters.

California is the only state among the four along the border that is run by a Democratic governor, Jerry Brown. Sanders said the plan — which has only been outlined loosely — could still take shape with Guard troops from the other three states.

President Trump reached back to some of his most visceral campaign rhetoric against illegal immigration on Thursday as his administration released new figures showing a surge in March in the number of people caught crossing the border unlawfully.

As Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt finds himself consumed by scandal and speculation grows that his days in the Cabinet are numbered, President Trump signaled he plans to keep Pruitt around.

It has been a tough week for Pruitt. The EPA chief is under fire for accepting housing from the wife of a top energy lobbyist at far below market rates, giving immense pay raises to a pair of aides against the instructions of the White House, and flying first class around the country and the world at taxpayer expense. His reported taste for sirens and flashing lights, bulletproof cars and soundproof phone booths has also invited ridicule from critics.

But Trump is giving no signal he is prepared to part ways with Pruitt. As is his custom, the president is blaming the media for Pruitt’s troubles. On Friday morning, he took aim at news reports that Trump was contemplating naming Pruitt as attorney general.

President Trump will skip the White House Correspondents’ Assn.’s annual awards dinner for the second time since taking office, but he apparently will encourage his aides not to follow his lead as they did last year.

“The White House has informed us that the president does not plan to participate in this year’s dinner but that he will actively encourage members of the executive branch to attend and join us as we celebrate the First Amendment,” association president Margaret Talev, a reporter for Bloomberg News, said in a statement.

Talev said Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders would represent the administration at the head table at the April 28 event. The White House did not immediately comment. Presidents occasionally decline their invitations and usually send the vice president in their place but Huckabee’s designation suggests Vice President Mike Pence also will not attend.

The Trump administration on Friday announced new sanctions against seven Russian oligarchs, 12 companies and 17 senior government officials for a variety of acts, including what one official called “attacks to subvert Western democracies.”

“Russian oligarchs and elites who profit from this corrupt system will no longer be insulated from the consequences of their government’s destabilizing activities,” Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin said in a news release. 

Mnuchin criticized the Russian government for engaging in “a range of malign activity around the globe, including continuing to occupy Crimea and instigate violence in eastern Ukraine, supplying the Assad regime with material and weaponry as they bomb their own civilians, attempting to subvert Western democracies, and malicious cyber activities.”

Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto forcefully criticized President Trump in a public address Thursday, calling Trump’s recent attacks on Mexico “offensive and unfounded.”

In his strongest rebuke yet of Trump, Peña Nieto said he will not tolerate threats to Mexico’s dignity or sovereignty and said the U.S. president should focus on domestic policy issues instead of lashing out at its southern neighbor. 

Peña Nieto spoke one day after Trump, citing rising crime in Mexico, signed an order to deploy National Guard troops to the southern border. Also this week, Trump has threatened to pull out of the North American Free Trade Agreement if Mexico doesn’t do more to stop immigrants from reaching the United States.

President Trump said Thursday that he did not know his personal lawyer had made a $130,000 payment days before the 2016 presidential election to a pornographic movie actress who had accused Trump of engaging in a consensual affair.

Asked whether he was aware of the payment to Stormy Daniels, Trump offered a one-word response: “No.” He spoke during an Air Force One flight from an event in West Virginia to Washington.

It was not clear from the brief comments when Trump became aware of the payment to Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford. He said reporters would have to ask his attorney, Michael Cohen, why Cohen made the payment.

Copyright © 2018, Los Angeles Times

Gun store employee says YouTube shooter did not stand out

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An employee at a San Diego gun store where a woman bought the pistol used to shoot three people at YouTube headquarters said there was nothing remarkable about the transaction, a newspaper reports.

Manny Mendoza, rangemaster at The Gun Range, said that the woman now widely known for posting prolific and bizarre videos on exercise, animal cruelty and veganism was not memorable.

“It’s not like she stood out,” Mendoza said to the Bay Area News Group. “I wish we could look into someone’s soul.”

Nasim Aghdam, an Iranian native in her late 30s, walked through a parking garage into a courtyard at the YouTube campus Tuesday and opened fire, police said. She wounded three people before killing herself.

San Bruno Police Commander Geoff Caldwell said Aghdam legally bought the 9mm handgun Jan. 16, and it was registered in her name. She was found with two magazines and the pistol.

Authorities and family members say she was angry about the policies and practices of the company.

She posted videos under the online name Nasime Sabz, and a website in that name decried YouTube’s policies, saying the company was trying to “suppress” content creators.

Aghdam took the pistol from the store the same day that the world’s biggest online video website announced stricter requirements for video producers to make money from views of their videos.

Her family has expressed shock and sorrow at the shootings, and said they warned law enforcement that she might be headed to YouTube and that she “hated” the company.

“Right now I’m thinking, she never hurt one ant. How (could) she shoot the people?” said her father, Ismail Aghdam, said in an interview with Good Morning America that aired Friday.

The family showed ABC News the sparsely furnished bedroom where she produced videos in which she exercised, promoted animal rights and explained the vegan diet, often wearing elaborate costumes or carrying a rabbit.

Ismail Aghdam reported his daughter missing on Monday.

Mountain View police encountered her sleeping in a car around 2 a.m. Tuesday, but had no reason to detain her. They say family members never said she could become violent or post a threat to YouTube employees.

San Bruno police say she practiced shooting at a local gun range on Tuesday before driving to YouTube headquarters.

Of three people wounded by gunshots, a 36-year-old man initially classified as critically injured remained hospitalized Friday in fair condition.

Canadian police: 14 fatalities after bus crash involving junior hockey league team

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NIPAWIN, Saskatchewan (AP) _ Canadian police said early Saturday 14 people were killed and 14 people were injured after a truck collided with a bus carrying a junior hockey team to a playoff game in Western Canada.

Police say there were 28 people, including the driver, on board the bus of the Humboldt Broncos team when the crash occurred around 5 p.m. Friday on Highway 35 in Saskatchewan.

“We can now confirm fourteen people have died as a result of this collision,” The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said in a release early Saturday.

“The other fourteen people were sent to hospitals with a variety of injuries; three of these people have injuries that are critical in nature.”

No names were released, and police would not say whether players or coaches were among the dead. There was no mention of the truck driver.

The team president said parents from across Western Canada were rushing to the scene as they struggled to cope with the tragedy.

“It’s one of the hardest days of my life,” said Kevin Garinger. “There have been multiple fatalities _ our whole community is in shock, we are grieving and we will continue to grieve throughout this ordeal as we try to work toward supporting each other.”

Michelle Straschnitzki, who lives in Airdrie, said her 18-year old son Ryan had been taken to a hospital in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. “We talked to him, but he said he couldn’t feel his lower extremities so I don’t know what’s going on,” she said. “I am freaking out. I am so sad for all of the teammates and I am losing my mind.”

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted his sympathies.

The team was on its way to play in Game 5 of a semi-final against the Nipawin Hawks.

Darren Opp, president of the Hawks, said a semi T-boned the players’ bus.

“It’s a horrible accident, my God,” he said. “It’s very, very bad.”

Opp said the coaching staff and players from the Hawks were waiting to help.

“They are sitting in the church just waiting to hear any good news,” he said. “I’ve got 50 phone calls at least saying `what do you want?’

“There’s uncles and moms and dads waiting to hear whether their sons and nephews are OK.

“It’s terrible. It’s absolutely terrible.”

Pastor Jordan Gadsby at the Apostolic Church in Nipawin said more than a hundred people had gathered at the church _ including parents and grandparents of the players who were on the bus.

“Lots of them are waiting for information,” he said. “Some of the families have gotten information and have gone to be with their kids. Some of them are waiting to hear if their kids are alive.”

Garinger said the Broncos are a close-knit team from the small city of Humboldt, Saskatchewan, which has a population of about 6,000.

Garinger said he still didn’t know the fate of one of the players living in his home.

“We don’t know who has passed and we don’t expect to know right away,” he said. “We know that the coroner and their office needs to do their work and let families know.”

Garinger said all the team can do now is help the players and their families any way they can.

“We just need to try to support each other as we deal with this incredible loss to our community, to our province, to our hockey world.”

Kevin Henry, a coach who runs a hockey school in Prince Albert, said he knows players on the team.

“This is I would think one of the darkest days in the history of Saskatchewan, especially because hockey is so ingrained in how we grow up here,” he said.

STARS air ambulance said it sent three helicopters to the scene.

The Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League is a junior `A’ hockey league under Hockey Canada, which is part of the Canadian Junior Hockey League. It’s open to North American-born players between the ages of 16 and 20.

‘I’m not going to be a Gabby Giffords’: Congressman draws gun in meeting with constituents

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Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., pulled out his loaded .38-caliber handgun and placed it on a table for several minutes while making a point about gun rights during a meeting with constituents Friday. 

“I’m not going to be a Gabby Giffords,” Norman said, during the “coffee with constituents” meeting at a Rock Hill, S.C., restaurant. Giffords, a former Arizona congresswoman, was shot outside a grocery store during a constituent gathering in 2011.

“I don’t mind dying, but whoever shoots me better shoot well or I’m shooting back,” Norman told The Post and Courier.

Giffords’ husband, retired NASA astronaut Mark Kelly, said in a statement that Norman is “no Gabby Giffords.”

“Americans are increasingly faced with a stark choice: leaders like Gabby, who work hard together to find solutions to problems, or extremists like the NRA and Congressman Norman, who rely on intimidation tactics and perpetuating fear,” Kelly said.

Norman vowed to continue to display his gun at future constituent meetings.

“I’m tired of these liberals jumping on the guns themselves as if they are the cause of the problem,” Norman told The Post and Courier. “Guns are not the problem.”

He told the paper guns are only dangerous in the hands of criminals. 

Contributing: The Associated Press

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The Russia Investigations: On The Hunt For Duffel Bags Full Of Cash

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Special counsel Robert Mueller (centers) leaves after a closed meeting with members of the Senate Judiciary Committee on June 21, 2017, at the Capitol in Washington, D.C.

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Special counsel Robert Mueller (centers) leaves after a closed meeting with members of the Senate Judiciary Committee on June 21, 2017, at the Capitol in Washington, D.C.

Alex Wong/Getty Images

This week in the Russia investigations: Mueller sends the feds to meet some international arrivees; new sanctions on some powerful, wealthy Russians; and Mr. Zuckerberg goes to Washington.

Fade in:

A gleaming new Gulfstream 650 — or maybe it’s a Sukhoi business jet — sweeps in for a landing at Teterboro Airport, the suburban New Jersey entrepôt for elite fliers on their way to nearby Manhattan.

The sleek aircraft turns smartly off the runway and heads for the “executive passenger terminal,” where a row of black vehicles is parked and waiting as usual. But when the hatch folds down to permit passengers to deplane and make their short drive into New York, someone is standing in the way:

Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller.

That, at least, was the scene painted in an exclusive report by CNN’s Kara Scannell and Shimon Prokupecz.

Mueller himself might not be standing on the tarmac, but FBI investigators from his office have interdicted at least two wealthy Russians recently on their way into the United States, they report.

The special counsel’s office is apparently trying to establish whether powerful Russians who owe fealty to President Vladimir Putin — the oft-referenced “oligarchs” — may have funneled cash donations to President Trump’s campaign or his inauguration fund.

On Friday, the Treasury Department targeted some of those same oligarchs for a new round of sanctions, along with a number of other Russian government officials and entities — including the state weapons exporter. And here was the description Treasury gave of the conduct of one targeted Russian, gold baron Suleiman Kerimov:

“He is alleged to have brought hundreds of millions of euros into France – transporting as much as 20 million euros at a time in suitcases, in addition to conducting more conventional funds transfers – without reporting the money to French tax authorities.”

More money, more problems

That pattern of conduct, and the nature of the interdictions described by Scannell and Prokupecz, raise questions about how long this smuggling of cash might have gone on. The CNN story suggests investigators want to know whether it might have gone into Trump’s inauguration accounts — or whether it continues to this day.

Either way, their story suggests that one way Russia might have injected money into the American political system for the 2016 election and beyond was not via traceable and accountable electronic transfers, but the old-fashioned delivery of cold, hard cash.

Flying around stacks of cash is a time-honored way to get money into circulation in a distant place with no one in between learning about it — most of the time.

If Russian officials were shipping cash to the United States in 2016 for deposit in American bank accounts, which were then the apparently legitimate points of origination for payments to political campaigns or political action committees, it could have been a powerful and deniable source of influence.

Investigators are believed to be looking into whether foreign cash got into the coffers of American political organizations and if this is how, the implications are huge.

Foreign contributions to U.S. elections are illegal. And people entering the United States must notify Customs and Border Protection if they’re bringing in currency or “monetary instruments” worth more than $10,000 — or it can be seized and those carrying it potentially could face civil or criminal penalties.

So much for all the “Miami Vice” drama — who are these latest Russians? What put the feds onto them? Where did the money they might have transported into the United States wind up? As usual, the news accounts fall short of the complete story and only Mueller and his team know for sure.

Citizen Zuckerberg

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is going through a rough patch. He built one of the world’s most lucrative and powerful tech titans by accumulating and exploiting its users’ personal data — and now is being pilloried for accumulating and exploiting users’ personal data.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg delivers the keynote address at Facebook’s F8 Developer Conference on April 18, 2017, in San Jose, Calif.

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images


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Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg delivers the keynote address at Facebook’s F8 Developer Conference on April 18, 2017, in San Jose, Calif.

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Facebook (and Big Tech more broadly) used to be “the hot girl,” as business guru Scott Galloway called them. They were too appealing and too intimidating for public officials to treat seriously because of how much they wanted to be in their good graces.

Now, however, months of “techlash” have meant that members of Congress are pushing each other out of the way to be the first to take Zuckerberg down a peg, first in a Senate hearing on Tuesday afternoon and then on Wednesday morning in the House.

So Zuckerberg and Facebook have been working overtime to dump as much news overboard before he goes under the klieg lights. He told reporters in a news conference, for example, that more users’ data than previously realized had probably been swept up by Cambridge Analytica, the political shop associated with the Trump campaign.

And Zuckerberg also discussed a separate “dark web” scam in which hackers used Facebook’s search to compile profiles of users based on data they’d already gotten elsewhere.

Do Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., have any more cards to play? Or having gone ugly early — as public relations pros like to say — will Zuckerberg be in a position to simply play rope-a-dope and respond to his inquisitors with something like “We’ve discussed this already and we know we must do better, senator.”

It’s worth remaining skeptical about some of the hype involving whether this episode could cost Zuckerberg his job — he retains a great deal of control over Facebook.

All the same, listeners will have their ears peeled for some kind of new details that bear on the Russia imbroglio.

The Cambridge Analytica data-vacuuming narrative has embarrassed Facebook but so far there has been no clear connection between it and Facebook’s use by Russian influence-mongers in Moscow’s attack on the 2016 election. That was the subject of its own three-hearing mega-marathon last year.

Maybe there is no connection between the active measures and the current concerns about data and privacy on Facebook. It’s been speculated about but not verified. Facebook says it’s leaning forward in banning accounts used by the Internet Research Agency — the troll shop indicted by Mueller and sanctioned by the United States — as part of what it calls its work dedicated to preventing a repeat of the Russian 2016 active measures campaign.

But Zuckerberg is going to be answering questions in public for hours and hours on Tuesday and Wednesday, so until it happens there’s no way to know what he or the committee members might say.