
US carries out strikes against Houthis in Yemen, defense official says
CNN
The US carried out a series of strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen late Saturday evening, according to a US defense official, targeting numerous weapons storage facilities across at least three locations.
The US carried out a series of strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen late Saturday evening, according to a US defense official, targeting numerous weapons storage facilities across at least three locations. The facilities housed advanced conventional weapons used to target ships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, said the official, who added that the US used fighter jets to carry out the attack. The Iran-backed Houthis have for months targeted ships in the Red Sea, one of the world’s busiest waterways, calling the attacks a response to Israel’s war in Gaza against Hamas. The Houthis, Hamas and Hezbollah are all part of an Iran-led alliance spanning Yemen, Syria, Gaza and Iraq that has attacked Israel and its allies since the war began last year. They say they won’t stop striking Israel and its allies until a ceasefire is reached in the Palestinian enclave. In mid-October, after more than a year of attacks by the Houthis on US and international vessels, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced that the US struck the militant group using stealth B-2 bombers for the first time. Austin said he authorized the strikes at the direction of President Joe Biden to “further degrade” the Houthis’ capabilities. The B-2 bombers, which can carry a far larger payload than fighter jets, were a clear message to Iran, with Austin saying afterward that the US can hit targets “that our adversaries seek to keep out of reach, no matter how deeply buried underground, hardened, or fortified.”

The Pentagon has ordered the military command that oversees new recruits’ enlistment to hold off on initial training for people who are HIV-positive and recently enlisted in the military, CNN has learned, saying that a decision on reinstating a Defense Department ban on their joining the military was “expected in the next few weeks.”

The European Union and the Mercosur bloc of South American countries formally signed a long-sought landmark free trade agreement on Saturday, capping more than a quarter-century of torturous negotiations to strengthen commercial ties in the face of rising protectionism and trade tensions around the world.

Judge restricts federal response to Minnesota protests amid outrage over immigration agents’ tactics
Immigration agents carrying out a sweeping operation in Minnesota can’t deploy certain crowd-control measures against peaceful protesters or arrest them, a federal judge ruled Friday. The order follows widespread outrage over a fatal shooting, reports of US citizens getting detained and Minnesotans getting asked for documents for no clear reason.

The smell of wet grass from the recent atmospheric river rains, mud and gasoline wafts through the warm Southern California air as Alec Derpetrossian works the chainsaw with a foreman, Randy Magaña, who helps him guide where to put the blade. Derpetrossian is still learning how to adequately use the large tool.









