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NEW: The August trade deficit dropped to $59.6 billion — the lowest level this year. This Data release was heavily delayed due to the Democrat-led shutdown.

HaRav Eliezer Kahaneman, the Nasi of Ponavezh Yeshiva, shortly after the major decision was handed down in his favor.

Mount Semeru erupts in Indonesia, sending a 54,000-foot ash plume into the sky and prompting evacuations and flight warnings.

Israel’s Defense Ministry says the 1,000th cargo plane since the start of the war has arrived, delivering military equipment. In total, more than 120,000 tons of gear, weapons, combat supplies, and protective equipment have been shipped to Israel via 1,000 planes and about 150 ships.

NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch has agreed to stay on as top cop when he takes office, — a bridge-building move that comes despite their profound political differences.

VIRGINIA SCHOOL TO PAY $100,000 IN ANTISEMITISM CASE: A Northern Virginia private school will pay $100,000 to a Jewish family after their children were expelled following complaints of severe antisemitic harassment. As part of the settlement, the Nysmith School will adopt the IHRA definition, appoint an antisemitism compliance monitor, and institute mandatory training and reporting […]

Dubai International Airport, the world’s busiest for international travel, has seen 70.1 million passengers already pass through its terminals this year, officials announced Wednesday. The rapid growth of passengers at the airport underscores Dubai as a key hub for East-West travel in global aviation and the need for its $35 billion project to build a […]

US envoy Steve Witkoff’s scheduled meeting with Hamas leader Khalil al-Hayya in Istanbul has been called off, American sources told Yisrael Hayom on Wednesday. According to the report, Washington is furious with Hamas for its attempt to garner Arab support to oppose Trump’s peace plan before it was brought to a vote in the UN […]

The Education Department said Tuesday that it will move several of its offices to other federal departments, a unilateral effort aimed at dismantling an agency created by Congress to ensure equal access to educational opportunity but long derided by conservatives as ineffective.

The department has signed interagency agreements to outsource six offices to other agencies, including those that administer $28 billion in grants to K-12 schools and $3.1 billion for programs that help students finish college.

There was considerable speculation that the $15 billion program to support students with disabilities would be included in the announcement, but it was not. Other major functions of the Education Department, including its Office for Civil Rights and the federal student aid program, also were not affected by Tuesday’s changes, but a senior department official told reporters that officials are still exploring options for moving those programs elsewhere in the government.

President Donald Trump campaigned on a promise to shut down the agency, created in 1979, and in March, he signed an executive order seeking its elimination. He asked Education Secretary Linda McMahon to work with Congress to do so, but lawmakers have not acted or seriously considered Trump’s request.

That is at least in part because to clear the Senate, any legislation would require Democratic support, which appears highly unlikely.

McMahon and her backers advocate a shake-up of the federal education role, saying that falling test scores show the agency is not delivering and arguing that Americans are tired of government bureaucracy.

Supporters of the Education Department counter that administering education programs under one roof helps coordinate policy and better serves schools and students. The agency, they say, helps ensure that priorities important to students, parents and schools are high on the federal agenda. And they say it is illegal for the Trump administration to break up the department without congressional approval.

McMahon has acknowledged that only Congress can eliminate the department, but she has vowed to work to dismantle it from within. She has said the agency’s functions can easily be carried out elsewhere in the government, perhaps more effectively. This fall, she took a first step and moved career and technical education programs, including adult education and family literacy initiatives, to the Labor Department.

“The Trump Administration is taking bold action to break up the federal education bureaucracy and return education to the states,” McMahon said in a statement Tuesday. “Cutting through layers of red tape in Washington is one essential piece of our final mission.”

Shifting offices to other parts of the government will not by itself remove red tape or alter the power that Washington exerts over states and school districts. States and school boards already control most education decisions, but the Education Department enforces rules that are embedded in federal programs, such as requirements for grant funding.

Asked how moving offices to other departments will return education to the states, the senior official said states will have to work with fewer federal agencies. She argued that education’s purpose is to prepare students for the workforce.

“Nowhere is that better housed than the Department of Labor,” she said.

But most K-12 schools do not typically work with the Labor Department now. The K-12 grant programs that Labor stands to take on address a plethora of subjects not directly related to the workforce, such as support for children in poverty, after-school programs and aid for rural education. Critics noted that under this arrangement, states and school districts will be required to engage with more – not fewer – federal agencies.

“It is difficult to see how transferring cornerstone programs … out of the department will result in streamlined operations, especially for the nation’s small, rural and low-capacity districts,” said David R. Schuler, executive director of AASA, the School Superintendents Association.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-Washington) noted that federal law requires an act of Congress to close the department. She said in a statement that the administration is pretending that the constitutional separation of powers is “a mere suggestion.”

“This is an outright illegal effort to continue dismantling the Department of Education,” Murray said. “And it is students and families who will suffer the consequences as key programs that help students learn to read or that strengthen ties between schools and families are spun off to agencies with little to no relevant expertise.”

Under the new agreements, the Labor Department will inherit the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education, including 27 K-12 grant programs, and the Office of Postsecondary Education, which administers 14 programs to help students enroll in and complete college. The Education Department will move the Indian education program to the Interior Department; child care access and foreign medical education to the Department of Health and Human Services; and foreign-language education to the State Department.

Some of these are lower-profile offices without large constituencies that might vocally oppose the moves. By contrast, there was an outpouring of concern among disability advocates amid rumors that special-education programs would be moved.

The senior department official said Tuesday that the interagency agreements will ensure that experts from the Education Department still manage the day-to-day operations of the programs.

Federal law requires that many of the programs be housed in the Education Department. The interagency agreements amount to a work-around under which policy decisions will remain with the Education Department but the programs will be administered elsewhere. Staffers who work on the programs are expected to move to the new agencies.

The senior official said these types of arrangements have been used many times before. But in this case, officials are hoping that the transfers will lay the groundwork for eventually closing the agency altogether.

The announcement was welcomed by House Education Committee Chairman Tim Walberg (R-Michigan), who has noted that there is not enough support in the Senate to pass legislation to eliminate the department.

On Tuesday, he praised the actions as a much-needed break from the status quo at the Education Department, where, he contended, bureaucracy and liberal ideology have wasted taxpayer dollars and failed students.

“The Trump administration is making good on its promise to fix the nation’s broken system by right-sizing the Department of Education to improve student outcomes,” he said. “It’s time to get our nation’s students back on track.”

But public education advocates were furious.

“This administration is taking every chance it can to hack away at the very protections and services our students need,” Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association, said in a statement.

McMahon has made the case for eliminating the Education Department in appearances across the country. Last month, department spokeswoman Madi Biedermann said the agency was exploring the move of special-education services to another agency.

“Secretary McMahon has been very clear that her goal is to put herself out of a job by shutting down the Department of Education and returning education to the states,” Biedermann said in October.

The Trump administration laid the groundwork for this change earlier this year when it signed an agreement to move career, technical and adult education grants out of the Education Department to the Labor Department. Under the arrangement, Education retains oversight and leadership while managing the programs alongside Labor, a way of sidestepping the federal statute.

“We believe that other department functions would benefit from similar collaborations,” McMahon wrote in an op-ed essay published Sunday in USA Today.

More broadly, McMahon argued that the recently ended government shutdown showed how unnecessary her agency is.

“Students kept going to class. Teachers continued to get paid. There were no disruptions in sports seasons or bus routes,” she wrote. “The shutdown proved an argument that conservatives have been making for 45 years: The U.S. Department of Education is mostly a pass-through for funds that are best managed by the states.”

The agency has taken other steps to shrink itself, including reducing its staff, which stood at 4,133 at the start of Trump’s term. That number was cut by about half earlier this year through layoffs and incentives to resign or retire.

The administration also tried to lay off an additional 465 people during the shutdown, a move that was blocked by a court and then reversed in the legislation signed to reopen the government.

After the government reopened, the Education Department mocked itself as irrelevant.

On social media, it posted a fake out-of-office message that it jokingly suggested its workers use: “We might be away from our desks … creating more red tape, and doing nothing to improve student outcomes.” It was signed, “Bureaucratically Yours.” In another post, the agency asked, “Let’s be honest: did you really miss us at all?”

(c) 2025 , The Washington Post · Laura Meckler, Danielle Douglas-Gabriel 

Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, dismissed the idea of U.S. military action on Mexican soil after Donald Trump suggested he might authorize strikes against drug traffickers south of the border. Speaking at a press conference, she brushed aside the proposal entirely. “It’s not going to happen,” she said, responding directly to Trump’s vow to do “whatever we have to do,” including potential operations inside Mexico.

Trump had raised the possibility during remarks in the Oval Office, insisting fentanyl trafficking warranted extreme measures. “Would I launch strikes in Mexico to stop drugs? It’s OK with me. Whatever we have to do to stop drugs,” he said. He then added, “I didn’t say I’m doing it, but I’d be proud to do it. Because we’re going to save millions of lives by doing it.”

His comments came as Washington continues a sweeping show of force in the Caribbean. Since September, the U.S. military has deployed the largest regional presence since the Cold War and carried out dozens of lethal air attacks on boats it claims were transporting narcotics. At least 83 individuals have been killed in those strikes, though U.S. officials have not released evidence proving the targets were involved in drug smuggling.

The escalating posture isn’t limited to maritime operations. Trump also signaled he would not eliminate the possibility of sending troops into Venezuela. Pressed on whether a ground invasion was off the table, he responded, “No, I don’t rule out that, I don’t rule out anything.” He also said, “At a certain period of time, I’ll be talking to [Maduro],” while arguing that the Venezuelan ruler “has not been good to the United States.” Emphasizing the scale of migration from Venezuela, Trump said, “We just have to take care of Venezuela. They dumped hundreds of thousands of people into our country from prisons.”

Shortly afterward, Nicolas Maduro responded on his weekly broadcast, announcing his willingness to engage directly with Washington. He said he was prepared to meet “face to face” with anyone in the United States “who wants to talk to Venezuela.”

Meanwhile, a U.S. Marine contingent is training in Trinidad and Tobago—the second round of joint drills there in under a month. The island nation, less than ten miles from Venezuela at its closest point, has emphasized that it will not be used for offensive military operations. Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar, a close ally of Trump, rejected any speculation that her country might serve as a staging ground. “The US has NEVER requested use of our territory to launch any attacks against the people of Venezuela,” she said. She added that “Trinidad and Tobago will not participate in any act that could harm the Venezuelan people,” and insisted disputes between Washington and Caracas must be resolved through dialogue.

Venezuela’s government, for its part, accuses the U.S. of trying to topple Maduro by amassing warships, stealth aircraft, and other assets near its shores. Washington counters by alleging that Maduro presides over a “terrorist” drug-trafficking operation—an accusation the Venezuelan leader firmly denies.

{Matzav.com}

New York City’s incoming mayor, Zohran Mamdani, hasn’t taken office yet. But he’s already the new avatar of evil for conservative media figures. He’s been called “downright sinister” and “incompatible with America.” His labels include commie, Marxist, jihadist sympathizer and “seething leftist.” Fox News’ Laura Ingraham warned her viewers not to be fooled by “smiling socialists who […]

WhatsApp’s effortless contact discovery—the feature that lets anyone plug in a phone number and instantly see if it belongs to a user—has long been touted as part of its appeal. But, Wired.com reports, the same mechanism that makes onboarding simple also created an enormous privacy gap: cycling through every possible number worldwide allowed researchers to gather the phone numbers of nearly every WhatsApp user on the planet, along with profile photos and public text for many of them.

A team from Austria demonstrated that by repeatedly querying WhatsApp’s contact system through the web interface, they were able to retrieve 3.5 billion phone numbers tied to WhatsApp accounts. For 57 percent of those numbers, the researchers could also view profile photos; for 29 percent, they could read public “about” text. They accomplished this because Meta had imposed no practical limit on how many lookups they could perform, allowing them to sweep through roughly 100 million numbers per hour.

The scale of the exposure stunned the researchers, who wrote that the trove of information would have constituted “the largest data leak in history, had it not been collated as part of a responsibly conducted research study.” One of the authors, Aljosha Judmayer, noted, “To the best of our knowledge, this marks the most extensive exposure of phone numbers and related user data ever documented.”

Meta was notified in April, and the researchers deleted all 3.5 billion numbers they had collected. By October, WhatsApp had implemented new rate limits to prevent such mass scraping from recurring. But until the fix was put in place, the researchers warn, anyone else could have performed the same type of data sweep. As Max Günther put it, “If this could be retrieved by us super easily, others could have also done the same.”

In a statement to WIRED, Meta thanked the researchers and emphasized that users who had set their privacy options to restrict their profiles remained protected. “We had already been working on industry-leading anti-scraping systems, and this study was instrumental in stress-testing and confirming the immediate efficacy of these new defenses,” wrote WhatsApp engineering vice president Nitin Gupta. He added, “We have found no evidence of malicious actors abusing this vector. As a reminder, user messages remained private and secure thanks to WhatsApp’s default end-to-end encryption, and no non-public data was accessible to the researchers.”

The researchers, however, say that they never encountered the “defenses” Meta referenced—pointing out that this isn’t the first time WhatsApp has been warned. In 2017, Dutch researcher Loran Kloeze demonstrated that the same enumeration technique could reveal numbers, profile pictures, and online status. At the time, Meta (then Facebook) argued the platform was functioning as designed and told him he did not qualify for a bug bounty.

Asked by WIRED what protections were implemented in the years that followed, Meta asserted that evolving measures—including rate-limiting and machine-learning systems to detect scrapers—had been deployed. Yet the University of Vienna researchers not only reproduced Kloeze’s discovery, they expanded it dramatically by enumerating all 3.5 billion global accounts. They also analyzed how many users publicly exposed personal information, with 44 percent of the 137 million identifiable American numbers showing profile photos and 33 percent including visible “about” text.

In countries where WhatsApp permeates daily life, even higher percentages left profile photos open. The researchers collected nearly 750 million Indian numbers, 62 percent with photos visible, and 206 million Brazilian numbers, 61 percent displaying profile images publicly.

Their discovery came accidentally last year when they were studying other aspects of WhatsApp’s metadata. They noticed the absence of rate limits and tried enumerating US phone numbers. Within 30 minutes, they had gathered 30 million. “So we were kind of surprised. And then we just kept going,” recalls researcher Gabriel Gegenhuber.

Such a dataset would be invaluable to spammers, scammers, and criminal operations. But the implications extend beyond nuisance calls. The researchers identified millions of WhatsApp accounts registered in countries where the platform is banned—2.3 million numbers in China and 1.6 million in Myanmar. Governments hostile to WhatsApp could have used the same enumeration technique to identify and potentially target citizens using the app illegally. Reports have suggested that in China, some Muslims have been detained simply for having WhatsApp installed.

The Vienna team also examined the cryptographic keys associated with each account—keys used in WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption. They found an unexpected problem: many accounts shared identical keys. In some cases, hundreds of users were tied to the same key, and 20 US numbers even had an all-zero encryption key. The researchers suspect that these anomalies point to unauthorized or modified WhatsApp clients, possibly used by scam networks whose tools break standard encryption behavior.

At the heart of the issue, the researchers argue, is the flawed assumption that phone numbers make suitable identity tokens for a platform used by billions. Phone numbers simply do not contain enough randomness to serve as secure, secret identifiers—especially when the entire number space can be scanned. If WhatsApp insists on linking accounts to phone numbers for effortless discovery, they say, then no anti-scraping solution will ever feel airtight. WhatsApp is now testing usernames in beta, which could offer a more privacy-preserving alternative.

“Phone numbers were not designed to be used as secret identifiers for accounts, but that’s how they’re used in practice,” Judmayer says. “If you have a big service that’s used by more than a third of the world population, and this is the discovery mechanism, that’s a problem.”

{Matzav.com}

After decades of conflict in the Ponovezh Yeshivah, retired judge Dovid Cheshin, who was appointed as arbitrator between the parties four years ago, published a final ruling on Wednesday at noon that determined that the “Mechablim” must vacate the yeshivah by the summer of 2025. The conflict in Ponovezh has been ongoing for decades, since […]

A sweeping federal review has uncovered a massive breakdown in how Commercial Driver’s Licenses are being granted nationwide. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a Fox Business interview that roughly 200,000 foreign nationals have been granted CDLs, and investigators believe that about 194,000 of those licenses may have been issued unlawfully under federal rules.

Duffy stressed that the issue goes beyond paperwork errors, noting that individuals are receiving CDLs despite failing to meet the English-language proficiency required by the Department of Transportation. “People can’t understand the English language, they can’t read signs, and they don’t know the rules of our road. That’s a problem,” Duffy said. “Americans aren’t safe.”

He warned that the problem has been compounded by the rise of “CDL mills,” operations that fast-track foreign applicants through the licensing process with minimal training. According to Duffy, these outfits are pushing through drivers who have barely any grasp of American road regulations.

“We also see that there are CDL mills … people aren’t being properly trained, they’re being pushed through and getting licenses and driving across the country,” Duffy said. He added that the economic fallout has been substantial as well. “It’s driving American truckers out of business. And American trucking companies, driving the wages down,” he continued. “That’s not why we’re taking this action, but that’s a real consequence of having all of those foreigners come in. What we’re going to see is those wages rise.”

The emerging details show just how widespread the problem has become. DOT officials recently disclosed that California’s Department of Motor Vehicles acknowledged improperly granting 17,000 CDLs to foreign truck drivers.

The safety concerns deepened further this week when ICE agents arrested an illegal alien in Kansas — an individual accused of terrorism ties in Uzbekistan — who had been issued a Pennsylvania CDL after being released into the country by the Biden administration.

{Matzav.com}

Former FBI Director James Comey will make another run Wednesday at getting his criminal case dismissed, with his lawyers looking to convince a judge that the prosecution is vindictive and rooted in President Donald Trump’s hatred of him. The arguments arrive as the Comey case appears freshly imperiled following a judge’s excoriation of the Justice […]

In a dramatic ruling issued on Wednesday, the Supreme Court ruled that the state must formulate a full enforcement plan against Chareidi “draft-dodgers” within 45 days. In response to petitions by left-wing organizations, the Supreme Court slammed the inadequate enforcement of the Security Service Law against Chareidi draft evaders, a situation that constitutes, in its […]

WATCH:

A Gustav Klimt portrait painting that helped save the life of its Jewish subject during the Holocaust sold Tuesday for $236.4 million, a record for a modern art piece. Klimt’s “Portrait of Elisabeth Lederer” sold after a 20-minute bidding war at Sotheby’s in New York, where the flashiest item of the night was a solid […]

US envoy Steve Witkoff’s scheduled meeting with Hamas leader Khalil al-Hayya in Istanbul has been called off, American sources told Yisrael Hayom on Wednesday. According to the report, Washington is furious with Hamas for its attempt to garner Arab support to oppose Trump’s peace plan before it was brought to a vote in the UN […]

Batsheva Sadan, the daughter of the kedoshim Rabbi Eli and Dina Horowitz, H’yd, who were murdered in their home in Kiryat Arba in 2003, shared a heartbreaking post about the building where her late parents lived—following the murder of another resident of the building, Aharon Cohen, H’yd, in the Gush Etzion terror attack on Tuesday. […]