TV News LIES

Virginia voters gave Democrats another special election win on Tuesday, according to Decision Desk HQ, adding to a string of recent victories for the party in the Old Dominion.

Democrat Garrett McGuire will replace state Del. Mark Sickles (D), who has been tapped to be Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s secretary of finance, in the 17th House District.

The Tuesday contests are part of a series of special elections prompted as Spanberger, who was elected governor last year and inaugurated over the weekend, called on several state lawmakers to join her administration.

Democrats have the majority in the House of Delegates, where state lawmakers moved forward quickly this month with constitutional amendments on abortion access, mid-decade redistricting and other major issues.

Democrats were expected to win in the district, which went to former Vice President Kamala Harris by 43 points in 2024.

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The Israeli military has launched a “large-scale” operation in Hebron in the southern occupied West Bank, deploying hundreds of soldiers and heavy machinery in a move that has paralysed the city’s southern districts.

In a joint statement issued on Monday, the Israeli army and the internal security service, Shin Bet, confirmed the offensive, stating it aims to “thwart terror infrastructure” and confiscate weapons in the Jebel Johar area.

Reporting from the scene, Al Jazeera Arabic’s correspondent Montaser Nassar described a state of total lockdown.

“We are in the so-called southern region of Hebron, which has been under a curfew since dawn,” Nassar said. “There is an intensive deployment of occupation forces … including bulldozers and tracked armoured vehicles.”

“We witnessed tracked armoured vehicles … the last time we saw these in Hebron was during the second Intifada during [Israeli] Operation Defensive Shield,” he said, noting the significance of the heavy equipment.

While the army cited “counterterrorism goals”, Nassar observed soldiers installing new metal barriers, warning of a long-term tightening of control.

“They brought in iron gates a short while ago, and this is the dangerous part,” Nassar said. “It seems that what is happening on the ground is a prelude to dividing the already divided.”

Video footage verified by local sources showed Israeli forces closing the Tariq bin Ziyad roundabout with cement blocks and earth mounds. Palestinian news agency Wafa reported at least seven arrests.

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“I never lost hope, and I never will,” said Nael Barghouti, a 68-year-old Palestinian from the occupied West Bank who spent more than four decades in Israeli captivity. It has been a year since Barghouti won his freedom through a prisoner exchange deal signed between Hamas and Israel in January 2025.

As a condition of his release, Barghouti had to agree to go into exile and was deported to Egypt a month later. “I have been optimistic from the very first day I began my struggle,” he said. “In prison, I was optimistic that I would be frehttps://www.dropsitenews.com/p/nael-barghouti-palestinian-prisoners-liberation-palestine-israel-united-statese one day. And, even if I were to die in prison, I would remain content, because those who come after me will continue the path, because they are convinced that we are in the right.”

According to the most recent and reliable statistics, there are approximately 9,300 Palestinians currently held in Israeli captivity. Nearly half of these have not been charged or brought to trial. Additionally, there are an unknown number of Palestinians held in military camps run by the Israeli army.

At least 87 Palestinians have been killed inside Israeli prisons since October 7, 2023, including several documented cases of death by torture, abuse, or intentional neglect. “Without any prior warning, a prisoner is detained with no charge—a 15 year old [boy], or a woman. Malicious arrest—arrest simply to send a lesson to entire generations. They are received with beatings, bone‑breaking, and the spread of infectious diseases,” Barghouti told Drop Site.

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At a meeting in Seoul on Monday, leaders from Italy and South Korea agreed to cooperate on the defense industry, marking a new collaboration between two strong allies of Ukraine who are, coincidentally, prohibited by their respective constitutions from directly sending Kyiv all the military help for which it might ask.

At his office in Seoul, President Lee Jae Myung hosted Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and the two agreed to expand cooperation in artificial intelligence, space and the defense industry, citing concerns about “global challenges.”

It was the first visit by an Italian leader to South Korea in almost two decades, AFP noted.

Lee said the two countries would “further expand the horizons of cooperation into advanced industries such as artificial intelligence, space, and aviation.

“In addition, we will pursue complementary cooperation in the defense industry based on each side’s strengths,” he said. Lee also vowed to “work closely together to contribute to global peace” and “safeguard the universal value of peace, extending our efforts ... to the wider world.”

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New documents show the crew on board the United States' newest aircraft carrier are growing increasingly frustrated by design flaws that lead to regular failures in the ship's toilet system.

The USS Gerald R. Ford has been deployed for seven months since it left Norfolk in June. The carrier is currently at the center of the Trump administration's flotilla of Navy ships in the Caribbean. Since the raid that captured Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro, the carrier continues to work with the Coast Guard as the U.S. interdicts oil tankers tied to Venezuela.

On board the carrier, the crew is battling a toilet system that the General Accountability Office reported in 2020 was undersized and poorly designed. The system continues to fail during deployment, forcing the crew of 4,600 sailors to live with a system that randomly breaks down during their months at sea.

NPR has obtained documents that include a series of emails that detail the ship's effort to grapple with the breakdowns. Problems with the Vacuum Collection, Holding and Transfer (VCHT) system increased in 2025. The vacuum system was adopted in part from the cruise ship industry. It uses less water, but the system used by USS Ford is more complex. Breakdowns have been reported since the $13 billion carrier first deployed in 2023.

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The three highest-ranking heads of Roman Catholic archdioceses in the United States issued a strongly worded statement on Monday criticizing the Trump administration's foreign policy — without mentioning President Trump by name.

Cardinals Blase Cupich, archbishop of Chicago, Robert McElroy, archbishop of Washington, and Joseph Tobin, archbishop of Newark, say America's actions raise moral questions.

"Our country's moral role in confronting evil around the world, sustaining the right to life and human dignity, and supporting religious liberty are all under examination," the statement reads. "And the building of just and sustainable peace, so crucial to humanity's well-being now and in the future, is being reduced to partisan categories that encourage polarization and destructive policies."

They continued, "We seek a foreign policy that respects and advances the right to human life, religious liberty, and the enhancement of human dignity throughout the world, especially through economic assistance."

The senior leaders cited the recent events in Venezuela, Ukraine and Greenland, which they said "have raised basic questions about the use of military force and the meaning of peace."

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San Francisco will offer free childcare to families earning less than $230,000 a year, and a 50% subsidy to those earning up to $310,000, in an expansion of the city’s childcare offerings designed to make one of the world’s most expensive cities more affordable for residents.

San Francisco’s mayor, Daniel Lurie, announced the initiative as part of his “Family Opportunity Agenda” on Wednesday, alongside a package of housing, education, food, healthcare, transportation and other programs focused on afhttps://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jan/15/san-francisco-childcare-familiesfordability.

“Today marks the beginning of a powerful effort to reduce the cost of living for San Francisco families by tens of thousands of dollars each year,” Lurie said in a press release announcing the subsidies. “We’re committed to making San Francisco a place where families can stay, grow, and build their future.”

Democrats such as Lurie have seized on opportunities to respond to the affordability crisis across the United States in recent months, even as Donald Trump calls affordability “a hoax”. In his first week in office, New York’s new mayor, Zohran Mamdani, announced a program offering free childcare to all of the city’s two-year-olds, alongside a program led by Governor Kathy Hochul to invest in offering universal childcare to all children under age five in the state by August of 2028.

In November, New Mexico became the first state in the nation to offer free childcare to all its residents.

While many cities calculate eligibility for benefits based on national federal poverty guidelines, San Francisco generally uses area median income to calculate the cost of living. In 2025, the federal poverty level nationwide was $32,150 for a family of four, while the area median income for a family of four in San Francisco was $155,850.

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A second man being held at a US immigration detention facility in Texas has died in two weeks, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said on Monday.

Victor Manuel Diaz, 36, originally from Nicaragua, was found “unconscious and unresponsive in his room” on 14 January at the Camp East Montana detention facility in El Paso, ICE said in a press release.

“They immediately notified contract medical staff on site to conduct life saving measures,” it said, adding that emergency medical technicians arrived to the facility but could not revive Diaz, who was pronounced dead just after 4pm. ICE asserted that Diaz “died of a presumed suicide” but that the “official cause of his death remains under investigation”.

Diaz was detained on 6 January during the Trump administration’s controversial deportation blitz in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He initially entered the US through the Mexican border in March of 2024, when border patrol agents picked him up and he was given a court date with an immigration judge, then released on parole. On 26 August of last year an immigration judge ordered Diaz’s removal “in absentia”. ICE detained him on 12 January in order to deport him.

The extensive tent facility is located on the Fort Bliss military base in El Paso.

Thirty-two people died in ICE custody last year, the highest number of fatalities in two decades. At least five people have reportedly died in ICE custody this year.

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