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Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has placed a hold on the Trump administration’s proposed $2.8 billion munitions sale to Israel, joining House Foreign Affairs Committee ranking member Rep. Gregory Meeks of New York in withholding support for the transaction. Semafor reported that Shaheen’s hold has been in place since July.

Shaheen has raised concerns about the Israeli government’s military actions in Gaza and Syria, as well as violence by extremist Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank. According to Semafor, she has also sought information from the Trump administration about how Israel intends to use the weapons included in the proposed package.

The $2.8 billion package includes 40,000 2,000-pound bombs — 20,000 MK-84 bombs and 20,000 BLU-117 bombs, according to Reuters. The Biden administration had previously withheld a shipment of some 2,000-pound bombs to Israel because of concerns about their potential use in densely populated areas of Gaza.

Palestinian health authorities currently say that more than 73,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the war began following the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. Those figures do not distinguish between civilians and combatants. Israel says its military operations are directed against Hamas and other terrorist groups and has accused Hamas of operating among civilians.

Because Shaheen is the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, her objection can delay the informal congressional review that generally precedes major U.S. weapons sales. Such holds are not themselves a binding legal prohibition on an administration proceeding with a sale, but the State Department traditionally attempts to address concerns raised by the senior lawmakers overseeing foreign affairs before formally notifying Congress.

Semafor first disclosed Shaheen’s hold, reporting that it has been in effect since July. Her move became public shortly after Meeks announced his own opposition to advancing the same package through the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

Meeks said his concerns centered on whether the Netanyahu government would use the American-supplied weapons in compliance with U.S. law and international humanitarian law. His objection alone does not legally prevent the administration from proceeding with the sale.

Asked by CNN on Wednesday about Meeks’s decision, Shaheen said, “all of us share concern about what Israel is doing.”

“What they’re doing in Gaza, they’re bombing in places like Syria and what that means for any peaceful solution in the Middle East,” she said.

Shaheen then expanded on her objections to the policies of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, particularly in the West Bank.

“Netanyahu needs to hear from America that we don’t like what he’s doing. We don’t like what’s happening in the West Bank where settler violence is killing Palestinians, sending them out of their homes, disrupting basic infrastructure. And the Netanyahu administration has basically done nothing to address that,” Shaheen continued.

The holds by Shaheen and Meeks amount to opposition from the ranking Democrats on both congressional committees that review major foreign arms sales. The administration could nevertheless attempt to move the transaction forward despite those objections; Semafor noted that congressional holds during the informal review process are customary rather than legally binding.

The proposed sale comes amid continuing debate in Congress over U.S. military assistance to Israel. In April, 40 members of the Senate Democratic caucus voted to block a separate arms sale to Israel, reflecting increased opposition among Democratic lawmakers to some weapons transfers.

The Trump administration, meanwhile, has continued to support substantial military assistance and weapons sales to Israel. Reuters reported that the current package was informally presented to the congressional committees responsible for reviewing major arms transactions before any formal notification of the sale.

Neither the State Department nor the Israeli Embassy immediately responded to Reuters’ requests for comment when details of the proposed $2.8 billion package emerged earlier this week.

For now, the package remains caught in the congressional review process, with the senior Democrats on both the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and House Foreign Affairs Committee seeking additional assurances about how the weapons would be used before giving their approval.

{Matzav.com}

President Donald Trump’s planned Triumphal Arch in Washington, D.C., has cleared a key aviation review, with the Federal Aviation Administration determining that the towering monument would not endanger aircraft — provided that an “eternal flame” and extensive lighting are installed to ensure pilots can see it.

“The FAA’s determination includes conditions for the Arch to be appropriately marked with a non-standard eternal flame on top of the structure and floodlight projectors pointed towards the Arch to make it noticeable for pilots,” an FAA spokesperson told The Hill.

The agency issued its hazard determination Friday following an examination by FAA safety specialists. The review considered “airspace, air traffic patterns and procedures around Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, as well as operations at nearby military/public-use airports,” before concluding that the proposed structure “would not pose a hazard to aircraft.”

The lighting requirements represent a change from an earlier FAA recommendation. The agency had previously indicated that the arch would need conventional red obstruction lights, similar to those used atop the Washington Monument, but those lights are no longer required under the newly released determination. Instead, the eternal flame and floodlighting would serve to make the structure visible to pilots.

The FAA provided additional specifications in correspondence with the National Park Service, stating that the searchlight projectors accompanying the flame should “provide an average illumination of at least 15 foot-candles (161.46 lux) over the top one-third of the structure.”

Trump’s proposed arch is expected to rise approximately 250 feet, which would make it substantially taller than Paris’ Arc de Triomphe, which stands roughly 164 feet high, as well as Mexico City’s Monumento a la Revolución, which reaches approximately 220 feet.

The monument is planned for Memorial Circle on Columbia Island, between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery. The site lies along the Arlington Memorial Bridge corridor, whose historic design was intended to symbolize the reunification of the North and South following the Civil War.

The proposal has also generated opposition. A veterans organization launched a campaign against the project last week, arguing that placing the enormous structure between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery would interfere with an important historic and symbolic sightline.

The group argued that it was “entirely inappropriate and borders on sacrilege to the men and women buried” at Arlington National Cemetery to disrupt the visual connection between the cemetery and the Lincoln Memorial.

The National Park Service has separately concluded that the project could adversely affect numerous historic properties and landscapes in the Washington area, particularly through changes to established views and sightlines.

Its review identified nearly 40 historic locations that could potentially be affected by the project, including the Pentagon, Washington Monument, U.S. Capitol, National Mall, Lincoln Memorial, Robert E. Lee Memorial and Lyndon B. Johnson Memorial Grove.

Despite those concerns, the FAA’s latest determination removes a significant aviation-related obstacle facing the project. The proposed arch would stand close to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport and near heavily traveled flight paths, prompting questions from aviation experts and lawmakers about whether such a tall structure could complicate operations in Washington’s already tightly controlled airspace.

The FAA has now concluded that the arch can coexist with those aviation operations — as long as the required visibility measures are incorporated into the final design. Under the agency’s determination, that means Trump’s planned monument will not simply be illuminated at night: its enormous upper section will be continuously floodlit, with the distinctive eternal flame burning at its summit to make the structure readily identifiable to pilots.

{Matzav.com}

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President Donald Trump is proposing a new name for artificial intelligence, arguing that the term used to describe the rapidly advancing technology is both inaccurate and inelegant. On Saturday, the President posted a poll on Truth Social offering followers three possible replacements for “AI.”

Trump’s three choices were “Superior Intelligence,” “Extreme Intelligence” and “Supreme Intelligence.” He invited users to select their preferred option for what he described as an expanding technological revolution.

“Many people think that the words ‘Artificial Intelligence’ are inaccurate, and very ineloquent, relative to AI, or Artificial Intelligence,” he wrote.

Trump said his suggested alternatives are a “far more elegant and accurate description of this new phenomena.”

By 12:45 p.m. Saturday, more than 27,000 Truth Social users had participated in the poll, according to The Hill.

The President’s unusual proposal comes amid an increasingly intense debate over the future of artificial intelligence, including disagreements over whether the rapidly developing technology needs additional government safeguards. Several technology executives have recently urged the industry to slow the development of increasingly powerful AI systems, while Trump has generally opposed efforts that he believes could impede American AI development.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and Elon Musk have all recently expressed support for slowing or more carefully pacing the development of increasingly capable AI models. Their concerns have centered on whether safety measures and oversight can keep pace with rapidly improving systems.

At the same time, some Republican lawmakers have pursued measures addressing particular concerns surrounding AI and the infrastructure needed to support it, including data privacy, surveillance technology and the rapidly growing number of data centers.

Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Jon Husted of Ohio both advanced efforts during the past week dealing with aspects of the expanding technology. Husted has pushed legislation aimed at preventing ordinary utility customers from being saddled with infrastructure costs generated by large data centers.

Hawley, meanwhile, invited executives from companies that manufacture AI-powered license-plate-reading systems, including Flock Safety, to appear before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism as part of an inquiry into the technology.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has taken a position that combines some regulation with industry self-policing. Speaking to reporters Sunday, Johnson said, “Obviously, there’s a need for guardrails, but there’s also a keen need for the industry to self-regulate and self-monitor and report to us.”

The debate intensified after Amodei published an essay calling for companies developing the most advanced AI models to deliberately moderate the pace at which their capabilities increase, arguing that additional time is necessary to develop appropriate safeguards.

“We must slow the pace at which we improve the capabilities of AI models,” Amodei wrote in a blog post. “Progress will still seem fast, and we must make wise use of the time we gain.”

Trump’s idea of replacing the term “artificial intelligence” is not entirely new. He previously suggested “supreme intelligence” as an alternative in late 2025, though he indicated at the time that technology industry leaders would ultimately determine what terminology to use.

The President has increasingly made artificial intelligence a major focus of his administration’s economic and technology policy. He has also developed relationships with prominent technology executives, several of whom are expected to attend a White House state dinner during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s upcoming visit to Washington.

Trump has repeatedly described artificial intelligence as an enormous economic opportunity for the United States and has resisted calls for restrictions that he says could weaken the country’s position relative to China. He recently described AI technology as “the Greatest Economic Development Engine in History,” arguing that its potential economic impact exceeds that of traditional commodities such as oil, gold and diamonds.

In a September 14 social-media post, Trump went further, dismissing calls for additional AI regulation and arguing that strong presidential oversight was sufficient to address potential dangers associated with the technology.

“The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!” the president wrote.

Trump has since expanded his AI proposals further, announcing plans for an “AI Force” and saying he intends to name an AI “Czar,” as his administration seeks to accelerate American development of the technology while a growing number of industry figures and lawmakers debate what safeguards should accompany it.

{Matzav.com}

It is with great sadness that Matzav.com reports the petirah of Dr. Asher (Allan) Plaut z”l, the longtime pediatrician whose Kingston Avenue office in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, was a familiar address to generations of local families and who devoted more than four decades to caring for the community’s children.

Dr. Plaut was niftar on Shabbos following a short illness. He was 75.

Although he resided in Lawrence, New York, Dr. Plaut’s professional life was deeply intertwined with Crown Heights. His pediatric practice, located at 372 Kingston Avenue, became a fixture of the neighborhood, where parents brought their children for everything from routine examinations and childhood illnesses to the anxious moments that inevitably send a parent searching for a trusted doctor.

For many Crown Heights families, Dr. Plaut was not simply the pediatrician listed on an insurance card. He was the doctor they knew. Parents who had brought one child to him returned with the next, and as the years passed, his decades of practice meant that he cared for multiple generations of families throughout the community.

Dr. Plaut graduated from SUNY Downstate Medical Center in 1977 and went on to specialize in pediatrics. He was a board-certified pediatrician, with hospital affiliations that included Maimonides Medical Center and Long Island Jewish Medical Center. His medical career ultimately stretched for nearly half a century.

Day after day and year after year, he made the trip from his home in Lawrence to Kingston Avenue and continued serving a community that had come to depend upon him.

His commitment to Crown Heights did not go unnoticed. In 2018, Dr. Plaut received a Citation of Honor from New York State Senator Jesse Hamilton recognizing his exemplary service to the community.

But perhaps the greatest testimony to his work was something no citation could capture: the enormous number of children who passed through his office during more than four decades of practice.

There were the routine visits and annual checkups, the winter viruses and summer injuries, the worried telephone calls, the prescriptions, the referrals, and the countless questions from nervous parents. There were families who knew that when something was wrong with a child, Dr. Plaut’s Kingston Avenue office was where they turned.

The length of his tenure itself tells a remarkable story. A physician who remains in one neighborhood for more than 40 years does not merely accumulate patients; he becomes part of the community’s history. Children grow up, marry, and have children of their own, while the same familiar doctor remains behind the desk and in the examination room.

Dr. Plaut continued that avodas hakodesh of healing and helping others for decades, quietly carrying the responsibility that comes with being entrusted with the health of another person’s child.

Dr. Plaut is survived by his wife, Mrs. Dina Plaut, as well as his children and grandchildren, who continue the family he cherished.

The levayah is taking place this morning at Bais Medrash Ateres Yisroel, Rabbi Blumenkrantz’s shul, located at 8-27 Cornaga Avenue in Far Rockaway.

Kevurah will follow at King Solomon Memorial Park in Clifton, New Jersey.

Yehi zichro baruch.