conspiracy theories, did not make it clear whether he was referring to a recommendation for children or pregnant women getting vaccinated for the first time, for getting subsequent booster shots, or both. Days after the announcement, HHS’s website provided no clarity, saying, “COVID-19 vaccines are available to everyone 6 months and older. Getting vaccinated is the best way to help protect people from COVID-19.” A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention webpage dated January 7 – before Kennedy was secretary – provided a similar broad vaccine endorsement.
Islamophobic bigotry“American Muslims for Palestine is an easy target. Given the Islamophobic tendencies, it’s easy to assume guilt of American Muslims, Palestinians. That’s a name that sticks,” Abuirshaid told Al Jazeera.
He added that the group is also a target because it is effective and has a “solid constituency”.“If they can cripple and bring down AMP, that will have a chilling effect within the movement. So they think, if they can bring us down, other organisations will stop working on Palestine solidarity,” Abuirshaid said.Why focus on universities?
Tariq Kenney-Shawa, a US policy fellow at Al-Shabaka, a Palestinian think tank, said Project Esther targets universities because Israel is bleeding support among young people in the US.“That’s why there’s such an overwhelming focus on universities and college campuses,” he told Al Jazeera’s
Kenney-Shawa explained that support for Israel’s war on Gaza has been trending downwards across US demographics. But on college campuses, the change is more pronounced.
“While this change is absolutely across the political spectrum, it’s obviously a lot more acute in the left and among young Americans,” Kenney-Shawa said.Russia has consistently warned that Western-provided weapons striking inside the country would be seen as an escalation, one that Putin said in September could attract nuclear retaliation. But Merz’s move attempts to circumvent that threat.
After Merz’s election victory in April and his continued assuredness of his willingness to send Taurus missiles to Ukraine, Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Maria Zakharova repeated that Russia would take a Taurus strike as Germany’s “direct” involvement in the war.The Kremlin has also reacted to Merz’s comments this week, according to the Russian news agency TASS. Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Merz “has confused everyone, if not himself”, after the vice chancellor denied that such decisions had been made. Peskov warned Berlin against an escalation, saying it would be an “extremely dangerous decision” that goes against ongoing peace efforts.
“It is literally several steps towards additional confrontation,” he said.Zakharova added that Germany would “drive itself deeper into the hole in which the Kyiv regime it supports has long been”.