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Staten Island stands apart from the rest of New York City in more ways than one. But its status as a Republican redoubt in a Democratic stronghold is under threat.

In January, a state court judge ruled that New York’s 11th Congressional District, which encompasses Staten Island and a wedge of southwestern Brooklyn, violates the voting rights of minorities who live within it, and must be redrawn.

The judge had given a state panel, the Independent Redistricting Commission, until Feb. 6 to come up with a new map. But the process was paused after Representative Nicole Malliotakis, a Republican who’s held the seat since 2021, launched an effort to overturn the judge’s order. A new deadline of Feb. 23 has been set for the judge to finalize the lines.

“If the people of this district don’t want me to represent them, they can vote me out in the election,” Malliotakis said in an interview with Bloomberg News. She blamed the effort to revise her district’s borders on political operatives in Washington.

“In no way will we allow a Washington law firm to come along and dictate how this community is going to be represented,” she said.

The battle on Staten Island is playing out amid a nationwide campaign to redraw political borders and gain a leg up in the 2026 midterm elections. So far, the parties have largely dueled to a draw. With Congress narrowly divided, control of the House could turn on a small number of skirmishes over district lines.

Some Staten Islanders say the fight reflects deeper anxiety about how the borough is changing. Over the past 25 years, an influx of Latino and Asian residents have moved to the northern section of the island, drawn by the prospect of cheaper housing and a more suburban lifestyle. Meanwhile, its South Shore, with its more spacious homes and strong schools, has remained a Republican bastion.

Paul Alexander Shali-Ogli, an activist and campaign consultant who resides on the island, said the shifting demographics have unsettled parts of its electorate. “There are a lot of people who are hopeful for the future,” said Shali-Ogli. “But then there seem to be a minority who can’t accept that the island has changed since the ‘70s, ‘80s and ‘90s.”

Yet Joseph Pidoriano, a local entrepreneur, said reshaping the district would betray Staten Island’s conservative character.

“They’re going to redraw the lines and make this district a destination where our values aren’t represented,” said Pidoriano. “Our values are faith, family, freedom, leadership, and the ability to be successful.”

Malliotakis’s district has been New York City’s most durable Republican perch since the early 1980s, when the Staten Island-anchored seat, then numbered differently and once extending into Lower Manhattan, was redrawn to include a conservative-leaning sliver of Brooklyn. Only two Democrats – Michael McMahon in 2008 and Max Rose in 2018 – have won there since. Neither served more than one term.

Malliotakis, whose mother left Cuba following the rise of Fidel Castro, said that hers is “the only competitive seat” in New York City, and serves as a counterweight to Democratic dominance of local politics. Many Staten Island Republicans reject the idea that the district’s Black and Latino voters have been disenfranchised.

“It’s absurd that a district that elects a Latina would somehow empower minorities by removing the more diverse portion of NY-11 in Brooklyn and replacing it with a lily white district in Lower Manhattan,” said Joe Borelli, a former Republican city and state lawmaker for Staten Island who testified in the January court hearing.

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Conservative Culture

On the Staten Island Ferry, during the free, nearly 30-minute ride across New York Harbor, the Manhattan skyline recedes gradually. At the St. George Ferry Terminal, passengers step off the boat into a borough where most trips continue by car rather than subway, and where the pace and scale feel far removed from the rest of New York City.

Staten Island’s landscape looks less like Midtown than New Jersey, to which it is linked by three bridges. The island’s quiet streets are lined by single-family homes in car-dependent, hilly neighborhoods, where a plethora of American flags snapped in gusting wind on a frigid February morning.

Much of the borough’s commercial activity runs along Hylan Boulevard, a stretch of set-back strip malls and residential areas running from Tottenville at the island’s southern tip toward Fort Wadsworth, just across the water from Brooklyn on the island’s northeast.

For many commuters, getting to the city’s major employment hubs means a drive on the Staten Island Expressway and over the towering Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge, through traffic that island residents routinely rank among the worst in the city. Others rely on express buses that charge $7.25 each way.

Staten Island’s physical isolation from the rest of New York City and its status as a haven for blue-collar workers and city employees including police officers and firefighters has long defined its proudly conservative political culture.

Democrats argue that their party would better represent the island’s changing makeup. Assemblymember Charles Fall, chair of Staten Island Democrats, sees it as a question of how effectively the district’s interests are represented in Congress.

“If we had a Democrat in this seat, I think we would see a representative that was much more reflective of what hardworking people need in this area,” Fall said.

With half a million residents, Staten Island is the least populous New York City borough. Its median annual household income of nearly $100,000 is around $20,000 higher than the citywide average. It is majority White, according to the US Census, but its Asian American and Hispanic populations have surged in the past 25 years.

Many of those new residents have clustered on the island’s North Shore, where denser housing, lower incomes and higher shares of Black, Latino and immigrant residents contrast with the predominantly white South Shore. The island is bisected by the Staten Island Expressway, a six-lane artery that residents and planners have long described as a social and economic boundary.

Staten Island Republicans fear that if Democrats prevail in their redistricting push, they would be losing representation, and that has renewed talk of seceding from the city to get out from under Democratic domination.

“It’s a serious conversation, and I feel it’s percolating again,” Staten Island Borough President Vito Fossella said.

Secession efforts have surfaced before at times when borough leaders felt Staten Island’s needs weren’t being addressed. In 1993, nearly two-thirds of voters approved a referendum to secede from the city, but the movement stalled in the New York State Assembly.

– – –

National Redistricting Push

The legal dispute over the district’s shape will likely turn on the question of whether it is being redrawn to benefit one party or another.

New York passed an amendment to its state constitution in 2014 that prohibits the redrawing of congressional districts to favor candidates or parties.

“Political gerrymandering sets up a system where it’s more like an incumbent protection program,” Malliotakis said. “You eliminate competitive seats like mine, and you make them lopsided where only one party can win, and therefore the voters can’t hold that individual accountable.”

On a national level, the pressure to revise electoral boundaries is likely to persist. The unusual middecade scramble to design new districts – previously, most states only altered their maps after the decennial US census – could become a new norm amid increased polarization and closely divided government. But some onlookers have recoiled at leaving much of the process in the hands of courts.

“You don’t want to see lines drawn by judicial decree,” said Richard Flanagan, a political science professor at the College of Staten Island. “You’d rather have a good state legislative process draw the lines.”

GOP officials have signaled their willingness to take their case to the US Supreme Court, if necessary. In the meantime, Republicans on Staten Island fear that they could lose one their few remaining avenues for exerting national influence.

“One of the few ways in which Republican voters can have a voice, at least on the national stage, is through this seat,” Fossella said. “And to silence it in this way, in this form, just reaffirms people’s cynicism.”

(c) 2026, Bloomberg 

An annual meeting of the nation’s governors that has long served as a rare bipartisan gathering is unraveling after President Donald Trump excluded Democratic governors from White House events. The National Governors Association said it will no longer hold a formal meeting with Trump when governors are scheduled to convene in Washington later this month, […]

US Attorney General Pam Bondi asked an appeals court to resurrect the scuttled indictments of two of President Donald Trump’s perceived enemies, former FBI director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

Bondi, joined by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, said in a 56-page court filing Monday that a lower court erred in November when it disqualified the prosecutor who handled the indictments and tossed them out.

The prosecutor was Lindsey Halligan, one of Trump’s former personal attorneys, who he brought in to serve as interim US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia after his first pick for the office declined to bring charges against Comey and James, citing a lack of evidence.

Halligan quickly secured indictments against the two, accusing Comey of lying to Congress and James of committing mortgage fraud – charges they each denied.

US District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie threw out the indictments, ruling that Halligan’s appointment was unlawful because she was the second lawyer in a row to hold the office on an interim basis. Federal law allows presidents to appoint US attorneys for 120 days on an interim basis before they are approved by the US Senate.

In her filing, Bondi accused the judge of infringing on the president’s power to appoint US attorneys. The judge’s ruling, “mistakenly aggrandizes the district court’s appointment authority at the expense of the Executive Branch’s, which is where the Constitution assigns authority to prosecute crime,” the attorney general argued.

Bondi said that even if there was a “paperwork mistake” in the appointment of Halligan, it hasn’t “prejudiced” the rights of Comey and James and has since been “cured several times over” by the attorney general signing onto the indictments.

Bondi is asking the Richmond, Virginia-based 4th Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse the lower court orders.

The case is United States v. Comey, 25-4674, 4th Circuit Court of Appeals.

(c) 2026, Bloomberg 

Trump on the Minnesota Fraud: “We think it’s at least $19 billion of fraud… We’re going to get to the bottom of it. We have the best people maybe in the whole country looking at that. We’re looking at California, too, because California is worse.”

TRUMP: “Interest rates should be lower. Every point is $600 billion… if we went down two points, we don’t have a deficit anymore—and that’s without cutting… When you think about it, it’s a paper charge. We should be the lowest interest rate in the world.”

TRUMP: “We want to get the SAVE America Act passed… We want people to have voter I.D., we want people to have proof of citizenship, and we want to have no mail-in ballots, other than if you’re in the military or you’re sick or… some reasonable, but good excuse.”

President Donald Trump has threatened to block the opening of a bridge between Michigan and Ontario, claiming Canada is trying to “take advantage of America” and calling for compensation in the latest flash point in the simmering tensions between the United States and its northern neighbor.

The Gordie Howe International Bridge – a six-lane bridge between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, that has cost about $4.7 billion to build – has been under construction since 2018 and is due to open early this year, according to the organization behind it.

On Monday, Trump said he “will not allow” it to open in a post on Truth Social, saying Canada had treated the U.S. “very unfairly for decades” and that the U.S. would not benefit from the project.

“I will not allow this bridge to open until the United States is fully compensated for everything we have given them, and also, importantly, Canada treats the United States with the Fairness and Respect that we deserve,” he said. It was unclear how Trump would be able to delay or block the project from opening.

“We will start negotiations, IMMEDIATELY. With all that we have given them, we should own, perhaps, at least one half of this asset,” he said, adding that the revenue generated from the project “will be astronomical.”

The bridge, named after Canadian ice hockey legend Gordie Howe, who played for the Detroit Red Wings, has been labeled a “once-in-a-generation undertaking” by the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority, the Canadian government entity responsible for delivering it. It is set to have U.S. and Canadian entry ports and an interchange connecting to Michigan’s road network.

The bridge is financed by the Canadian government but is publicly owned by the governments of Canada and Michigan, with terms outlined in a 2012 Crossing Agreement. The agreement stated all iron and steel used in the project must be produced in the U.S. or Canada.

Canada will recoup the costs of funding the bridge from toll revenue, the Canadian government said in 2022.

Candace Laing, president and CEO of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said regardless of whether Trump’s threat is real or an attempt at creating uncertainty, “blocking or barricading bridges is a self-defeating move.”

“The path forward isn’t deconstructing established trade corridors, it’s actually building bridges,” she said in an emailed statement.

The complaint is the latest in a string of blows he has leveled at Canada and Prime Minister Mark Carney, rupturing the traditionally close relationship between the two allies.

Last month, Trump threatened to decertify and impose tariffs on Canadian-built aircraft in a move that sparked fears of wide ramifications for U.S. air travel. He also traded barbs with the Carney on the world stage at the World Economic Forum in Davos, and later revoked his invitation for Canada to join the Board of Peace, an entity that Trump has claimed will resolve global conflicts.

The latest comments mark a sharp contrast to Trump’s previous support for the project. In a February 2017 statement with then-Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Trump highlighted the closeness of the two countries and praised the bridge as a “vital economic link.”

The Gordie Howe International Bridge is set to absorb traffic from the nearby Ambassador Bridge between Detroit and Windsor, which is owned by Detroit’s Moroun family and responsible for about a quarter of all trade between the U.S. and Canada. The owners have appealed to Trump to stop construction of the new bridge and sued the Canadian government for approving it, claiming it will infringe on their right to collect revenue.

Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that Trump’s post was “insane,” noting that U.S. steel was used in construction on the Michigan side of the bridge.

“I really can’t believe what I’m reading,” Dilkens said. “The faster we can get to the midterms and hopefully see a change, the better for all of us.”

He also mocked Trump’s suggestion – made in the social media post without any supporting evidence – that if Canada makes a trade deal with China, China would “terminate” Canadian ice hockey and eliminate the Stanley Cup.

“Thankfully the bridge was named after Gordie Howe before China terminates hockey and eliminates the Stanley Cup!” Dilkens quipped on X.

U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Michigan) said Trump’s threats to tank the bridge project meant he was “punishing Michiganders for a trade war he started.”

“The only reason Canada is on the verge of a trade deal with China is because President Trump has kicked them in the teeth for a year,” she wrote in a post on X.

“The President’s agenda for personal retribution should not come before what’s best for us. Canada is our friend – not our enemy. And I will do everything in my power to get this critical project back on track.”

(c) 2026, The Washington Post 

The U.S. is deploying 200 troops to Nigeria to help train its military in the fight against Islamist militants, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Trump on the economy: “I remember when I first won, they said, ‘If he gets the Dow up to 50,000 by the end of his fourth year, he will have done miracles’ — and we’re at the end of the FIRST year…Everything’s going great. We inherited a total mess from Biden…the inflation was the worst […]

Todd Lyons, the head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, defended his agency’s officers before Congress on Tuesday, standing behind their tactics and saying they would not be intimidated as they carry out the president’s mass deportation agenda. Lyons was one of the three heads of agencies implementing President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda to testify in a hearing […]

Acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement director Todd M. Lyons sparred with Democratic lawmakers who accused his agency of functioning like a violent secret police force at a House Homeland Security Committee hearing Tuesday. He vowed to press forward with Trump’s mass deportation campaign.

Legislators pressed Lyons for over three hours on the detentions of U.S. citizens, the fatal shootings of Renée Good and Alex Pretti, and aggressive actions by immigration officers in cities including Minneapolis. Lyons, at times, refused to answer questions, citing ongoing investigations, and complained about comparisons from Democratic lawmakers of ICE to Gestapo – a reference to the police of Nazi Germany, which conducted brutal arrests with no legal oversight.

In one contentious moment, Rep. Dan Goldman (D-New York) told Lyons that if he and his agents do not want to be referred to as a secret police force, then they should reevaluate their actions.

“I have a simple suggestion: If you don’t want to be called a fascist regime or secret police, then stop acting like one,” Goldman said.

Lyons was joined by Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney S. Scott and Customs and Immigration Services Director Joseph B. Edlow at the bipartisan hearing – the first time the heads of ICE and CBP had appeared before the committee in President Donald Trump’s second term. Although CBP and Border Patrol officers have been at the helm of some of the deportation campaign’s most controversial tactics – including use of force against protesters – much of the scrutiny was focused on ICE.

Republican legislators largely rallied to defend the administration’s immigration enforcement efforts and praised the Trump administration for drastically reducing illegal border crossings. But some of the strongest remarks came from House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Andrew R. Garbarino (R-New York), who appeared to take a swipe at Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem – despite not naming her – by criticizing Department of Homeland Security officials for rushing to conclusions “about law enforcement or their fellow Americans” without the completion of an impartial investigation.

“Officials and elected leaders should not rush to judgment,” Garbarino said. “Public trust and public safety go hand in hand.”

The testimony from Lyons and Scott came as public support for Trump’s hard-line immigration agenda has plummeted in the wake of the fatal shootings in Minneapolis last month. Though the Trump administration has taken some measures to try to tamp down protests in that city, including withdrawing 700 federal officers, tensions have remained between local officials and the federal government about the broad scope of the immigration enforcement operations and the aggressive tactics of officers.

“Some Minnesota officials are finally signaling the willingness to cooperate with ICE,” Lyons said. “Well, let me be clear: Promises are not enough. We need action.”

The hearing also took place as DHS is set to shut down Saturday unless lawmakers strike a last-minute deal to fund the agency.

Democrats have demanded new restrictions on federal immigration agents in exchange for their votes. Their demands include tighter rules around the use of warrants, independent investigations of alleged misconduct, a ban on agents wearing masks, and a mandate for them to wear body cameras. Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-New York) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-New York) have dismissed Republicans’ counteroffer as not detailed enough to negotiate over.

“I think it demonstrates that they want to be seen to be working with us, but they’re clearly sandbagging,” Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) said. Republicans have argued that there is not enough time to hash out a deal and pass it before DHS shuts down. They want Democrats to agree to fund the agency to allow more time for negotiations.

The deaths of Pretti and Good have prompted public backlash and bipartisan calls for an independent investigation. Noem has also faced bipartisan criticism for suggesting after Pretti’s death that he had committed an “act of domestic terrorism” and sought to kill law enforcement, despite video from witnesses contradicting that account.

Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (Mississippi), the top Democrat on the panel, directly condemned Noem’s actions in his opening remarks Tuesday, and he demanded that she resign.

“Secretary Noem is a liar with no concern for the lives of Americans killed by the department she runs,” he said. “She must go.”

Democrats also pressed the three officials on the ethics and morals of their actions. Rep. Shri Thanedar (D-Michigan) asked Scott and Lyons if they expect to get a presidential pardon at the end of their terms. Rep. LaMonica McIver (D-New Jersey) was more direct, telling Lyons he has blood on his hands over ICE’s tactics and asking, “Do you think you’re going to hell, Mr. Lyons?” before Garbarino interrupted her questioning.

Lyons said ICE has made 379,000 arrests in the first year of Trump’s administration, a figure that he said included 7,000 suspected gang members and more than 14,000 “known or suspected terrorists” – although he did not define who is given that designation. Federal data has shown that the majority of people who have been arrested do not have criminal convictions.

“The president has tasked us with mass deportation, and we are fulfilling that mandate,” Lyons said.

He said that immigration officers are facing “the deadliest operating environment” in history, including assaults and death threats, and that his family had been targeted. But he said: “Let me send a message to anyone who thinks you can intimidate us: You will fail.”

Noem announced last week that, “effective immediately,” DHS would deploy body cameras “to every officer in the field in Minneapolis” and would expand the body-cam program broadly, “as funding is available.” The Washington Post previously reported that in its initial budget proposal, the department said it planned to cut the staff of ICE’s body-cam program from 22 to three and reduce spending on the initiative from about $20.5 million to $5.5 million.

Lyons told lawmakers Tuesday that about 3,000 of ICE’s 13,000 officers in the field are assigned to wear body cameras, which can record their interactions with the public, and another 6,000 cameras are in the process of being deployed. Scott said that 10,000 of the 20,000 Border Patrol agents in the field have cameras and that the number is going to grow.

Asked about the training regimen of ICE officers, Lyons said the agency has not reduced the “meat of the training” but has sought to shorten amount of time it takes to get officers into the field. He said training used to take place five days a week for eight hours a day but has been changed to six days a week for 12 hours per day.

Scott said Border Patrol agents continue to undergo the standard 117-day training academy, while CBP officers attend for 103 days.

A poll from Quinnipiac University released last week found that 61 percent of voters did not think the Trump administration had provided an honest account of Pretti’s killing and that 58 percent said Noem should be removed. A recent poll from the Economist/YouGov found that 50 percent of U.S. adult citizens said ICE was making Americans less safe.

Under Noem, Border Patrol agents have played a growing role in conducting large-scale immigration enforcement operations in blue cities such as Los Angeles, Chicago and Minneapolis. Those operations were led by senior Border Patrol official Gregory Bovino.

But after Pretti’s death, Bovino, who suggested that Pretti wanted to “massacre law enforcement,” left Minneapolis to return to California, where he was stationed previously. Trump instead dispatched border czar Tom Homan to Minneapolis.

Edlow, Scott and Lyons are also set to appear before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs this week.


(c) 2026, The Washington Post 

{Matzav.com}

Anti-graft watchdog Transparency International is warning that corruption is worsening worldwide, even in established democracies, and says the United States has fallen to its lowest score ever on its 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index. In its annual report, the Berlin-based organization said the global average score has dropped to its weakest level in more than a […]

New York City is expected to see a noticeable warm-up in the days ahead, following an extended stretch of severe cold weather that has been linked to at least 18 deaths.

For close to three weeks, temperatures across the city have remained well below seasonal norms, with most days failing to rise above the freezing point.

The prolonged cold set in immediately after the major snowstorm on January 25, leaving behind layers of grimy, hardened snow and ice that complicated everyday life, from navigating sidewalks to finding parking and managing trash collection.

According to AccuWeather, a shift in conditions is now underway. High temperatures are forecast to reach 35 degrees on Tuesday, climb to 41 on Wednesday, and hover between 35 and 40 degrees on Thursday and Friday.

After what residents have endured since late January, those readings may feel almost balmy by comparison.

The cold wave began intensifying on January 24, with temperatures staying largely in the teens and 20s through early February. Although daytime highs briefly edged above freezing on several occasions last week, nighttime lows and wind chills continued to plunge.

The most frigid night of the season occurred this past Shabbos, when temperatures dropped to 3 degrees and wind chills sank to nearly minus 20.

The toll of the cold was a major focus Tuesday at a City Council hearing examining City Hall’s handling of the Arctic blast, after at least 18 fatalities were recorded in New York City during the severe weather period.

{Matzav.com}

Turkey’s foreign minister has warned the United States against launching a military strike on Iran, saying there is “no immediate threat of war” and insisting that diplomacy remains the best path forward. In an interview with CNN Turk on Tuesday, Hakan Fidan revealed that ahead of last month’s 12-day conflict, U.S. Secretary of State Marco […]

Jurors in a landmark social media case that seeks to hold tech companies responsible for harms to children got their first glimpse into what will be a lengthy trial characterized by dueling narratives from the plaintiffs and the two remaining defendants, Meta and YouTube. At the core of the Los Angeles case is a 20-year-old identified only […]

As he prepared to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu, President Donald Trump said he believes the Israeli leader supports reaching an agreement with Iran and expressed optimism that the current round of nuclear negotiations could succeed.

Speaking with Israeli journalist Barak Ravid of Channel 12 and the Axios news site, Trump reflected on past confrontations with Tehran, referencing the US strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities in June 2025 following the breakdown of diplomatic efforts. “Last time they didn’t believe I would do it,” Trump said.

According to the president, Iran misjudged Washington’s resolve. “They overplayed their hand,” he said, contrasting that episode with the current talks, which he described as markedly changed. “We can make a great deal with Iran.”

Trump also rejected suggestions that Netanyahu opposes the ongoing dialogue between Washington and Tehran, including a senior-level meeting held over the weekend in Oman. “He also wants a deal. He wants a good deal,” Trump said of the Israeli prime minister.

The president added that Iran, too, is eager to reach an understanding, saying the country “wants to make a deal very badly.”

At the same time, Trump underscored that the United States is prepared to escalate if negotiations fail. “Either we will make a deal or we will have to do something very tough like last time,” he told Ravid.

Trump further noted the expansion of the US military footprint in the region, saying, “we have an armada that is heading there and another one might be going,” and added that he is “thinking” about deploying an additional aircraft carrier strike group following recent reinforcements.

{Matzav.com}

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was presented with Israeli military intelligence outlining Hamas’s plans for a large-scale assault years before the Oct. 7 attack, according to a report published by Ynet. Citing intelligence documents and testimony from senior officials, Ynet reported that as early as April 2018, Israel’s Military Intelligence Directorate circulated an assessment warning that […]

An Israeli-Russian journalist was removed Tuesday from Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s flight to Washington, just moments before departure, in an incident that raised questions about security vetting and press access ahead of the prime minister’s meeting with US President Donald Trump.

Nick Kolyohin, an independent journalist who was traveling as part of the press group invited to the White House, was already preparing to board the Prime Minister’s aircraft, known as the “Wing of Zion,” when security personnel stopped him and escorted him off the plane shortly before takeoff.

Kolyohin, who moved to Israel as a child and later served in the IDF, said the decision was made exclusively by security officials. He maintained that no explanation was provided to him at the airport, despite the fact that his participation in the flight had received prior authorization.

The Prime Minister’s Office addressed the incident in a brief statement, saying: “The security authorities decided not to approve the journalist’s participation in the flight due to security considerations, but we cannot provide further details at this stage.”

The Shin Bet also commented, emphasizing its statutory responsibilities. In its statement, the agency said: “According to its mandate and duties under the law, the service is responsible, among other things, for securing the Prime Minister. As part of this, decisions are made to minimize risks to the Prime Minister and the information surrounding him. Naturally, it is not possible to address the reasons behind individual decisions.”

{Matzav.com}