Appeals court throws out plea deal for alleged mastermind of Sept. 11 attacks
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National Post
3 hours ago
- National Post
Families of October 7 victims sue Meta for $1B for allowing atrocity footage on Facebook
Article content Families of victims of the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas invasion of southern Israel have filed a class-action suit against Facebook parent Meta for failing to block the distribution of footage of the murder, abduction and torment of their loved ones. Article content The lawsuit, filed in Tel Aviv District Court, seeks 4 billion shekels (approximately US$1.1 billion) in damages. This comprises 200,000 shekels (approximately US$58,000) for each October 7 victim whose suffering was documented and shared online; 200,000 shekels to their immediate family members and close friends who saw the footage and 20,000 shekels (approximately US$5,800) for each Israeli exposed to the footage, Calcalist reported on Monday. Article content Article content Article content According to the plaintiffs, which also include some survivors, the footage turned Facebook and Instagram into 'an integral part of the terrorist attack on Israel.' Article content Article content 'For many hours, in real time and long after the terrorist attack, horrific documentation from the attack (to put it mildly) was disseminated, showing innocent civilians — children, elderly, women, and men — subjected to atrocities that even paper cannot bear to describe,' the plaintiffs' attorneys wrote in the claim, Calcalist reported. Article content The footage included 'murder, extreme violence' and 'abduction of civilians and soldiers, both living and dead,' among other brutal scenes. Article content The attorneys from the firm argue that the videos were allowed to remain online for weeks in many cases, contradicting Meta's stated policies, Calcalist reported. Article content Mor Baider, one of the lead plaintiffs, discovered his grandmother's death through a Facebook post by the terrorists. Baider's grandmother, Bracha Levinson, was a resident of Kibbutz Nir Oz. Article content Article content 'Grandma was murdered on Facebook,' Baider said during an interview marking the first anniversary of the attack. Article content Article content The plaintiffs say Meta did not activate its live content monitoring systems, deploy its rapid response team or remove the content quickly, 'nor long thereafter (and in fact — to this very day,' according to the claim. Article content 'The Respondent acted contrary to its policy, its commitments, and its obligations, allowing its social networks to serve as a weapon, as an inseparable part of the terrorist attack on the State of Israel,' according to the claim. Article content According to Calcalist, Meta responded: 'Our hearts go out to the families affected by Hamas terrorism. Our policy designates Hamas as a proscribed organization, and we remove content that supports or glorifies Hamas or the October 7 terrorist attack. Article content
CTV News
13 hours ago
- CTV News
U.S. Justice Department to move forward on investigation into Trump-Russia probe
WASHINGTON — U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi has directed that the U.S. Justice Department move forward with a probe into the origins of the Trump-Russia investigation following the recent release of documents aimed at undermining the legitimacy of the inquiry that established that Moscow interfered on the Republican's behalf in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Bondi has directed a prosecutor to present evidence to a grand jury after referrals from the Trump administration's top intelligence official, a person familiar with the matter said Monday. That person was not authorized to discuss it by name and spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press. Fox News first reported the development. It was not clear which former officials might be the target of any grand jury activity, where the grand jury that might ultimately hear evidence will be located or which prosecutors — whether career employees or political appointees — might be involved in pursuing the investigation. It was also not clear what precise claims of misconduct Trump administration officials believe could form the basis of criminal charges, which a grand jury would have to sign off on for an indictment to be issued. The development is likely to heighten concerns that the Justice Department is being used to achieve political ends, given longstanding grievances over the Russia investigation voiced by U.S. President Donald Trump, who has called for the jailing of perceived political adversaries. Any criminal investigation would revisit one of the most dissected chapters of modern American political history. It is also surfacing at a time when the Trump administration is being buffeted by criticism over its handling of documents from the Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking investigation. The investigation into Russian election interference resulted in the appointment of a special counsel, Robert Mueller, who secured multiple convictions against Trump aides and allies but did not establish proof of a criminal conspiracy between Moscow and the Trump campaign. The inquiry shadowed much of Trump's first term and he has long focused his ire on senior officials from the intelligence and law enforcement community, including former FBI Director James Comey, whom he fired in May 2017, and former CIA Director John Brennan. The Justice Department appeared to confirm an investigation into both men in an unusual statement last month but offered no details. Multiple special counsels, congressional committees and the Justice Department's own inspector general have studied and documented a multi-pronged effort by Russia to interfere in the 2016 presidential election on Trump's behalf, including through a hack-and-leak dump of Democratic emails and a covert social media operation aimed at sowing discord and swaying public opinion. But that conclusion has been aggressively challenged in recent weeks as Trump's director of national intelligence and other allies have released previously classified records that they hope will cast doubt on the extent of Russian interference and establish an Obama administration effort to falsely link Trump to Russia. In one batch of documents released last month, Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, disclosed emails showing that senior Obama administration officials were aware in 2016 that Russians had not hacked state election systems to manipulate the votes in Trump's favor. But former U.S. president Barack Obama's administration never alleged that votes were tampered with and instead detailed other forms of election interference and foreign influence. A new outcry surfaced last week when Sen. Chuck Grassley, the Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, released a set of documents that FBI Director Kash Patel claimed on social media proved that the 'Clinton campaign plotted to frame President Trump and fabricate the Russia collusion hoax.' The documents were part of a classified annex of a report issued in 2023 by John Durham, the special counsel who was appointed during the first Trump administration to hunt for any government misconduct during the Russia investigation. Durham did identify significant flaws in the investigation but uncovered no bombshells to disprove the existence of Russian election interference. His sprawling probe produced three criminal cases; two resulted in acquittals and the third was a guilty plea from a little-known FBI lawyer to a charge of making a false statement. Republicans seized on a July 27, 2016, email in Durham's newly declassified annex that purported to say that Hillary Clinton, then the Democratic candidate for president, had approved a plan during the heat of the campaign to link Trump with Russia. But the purported author of the email, a senior official at a philanthropic organization founded by billionaire investor George Soros, told Durham's team he had never sent the email and the alleged recipient said she never called receiving it. Durham's own report took pain to note that investigators had not corroborated the communications as authentic and said the best assessment was that the message was 'a composites of several emails' the Russians had obtained from hacking — raising the likelihood of Russian disinformation. The FBI's Russia investigation was opened on July 31, 2016, following a tip that a Trump campaign adviser, George Papadopoulos, had told a Russian diplomat that Russia was in possession of dirt on Clinton. Eric Tucker And Alanna Durkin Richer, The Associated Press
CBC
21 hours ago
- CBC
Hong Kong cancels passports, bans financial support for wanted overseas activists
Social Sharing Hong Kong authorities on Monday strengthened a crackdown on 16 overseas-based activists who were previously targeted by bounties on suspicion of endangering national security, implementing measures that include banning financial support to them and cancelling passports for most of them. The activists were among 19 people who were targeted with arrest warrants in July for alleged roles in Hong Kong Parliament, a pro-democracy group the police called a subversive organization abroad. The organization is not the region's official legislature and its influence is limited. Three of the original 19 activists were already targeted by similar measures last year. Secretary for Security Chris Tang banned providing funds or economic resources to the 16 activists, including Victor Ho, Keung Ka-wai, Australian academic Chongyi Feng and U.S. citizen Gong Sasha, the Hong Kong government said in a statement. Travel documents were cancelled for 12 of the 16 who hold Hong Kong passports. Hong Kong police issue fresh wave of arrest warrants for 19 overseas activists 7 days ago Police in Hong Kong have issued a fresh wave of arrest warrants for 19 activists overseas, including some in British Columbia. Ottawa is condemning the move, calling it a threat to Canadian safety and sovereignty. CBC's Michelle Ghoussoub reports. The government also prohibited properties from being leased to the people on the list or forming joint ventures with them. Anyone violating the orders risks a penalty of up to seven years in prison. The 16 activists are hiding in the U.K., the United States, Canada, Germany, Australia, Thailand and Taiwan, among other regions, the government said, accusing them of continuing to engage in activities endangering national security. The notice also accused them of intending to incite hatred against Beijing and Hong Kong through smear and slander. "We therefore have taken such measures to make a significant impact," the statement said. WATCH | 'We all live in fear,' democracy advocate says following Hong Kong arrest warrants: 'We all live in fear,' democracy advocate says following Hong Kong arrest warrants | Canada Tonight 7 months ago Hong Kong police on Tuesday announced arrest warrants for six overseas activists, including two Canadian citizens, and offered bounties of $185,000 for information leading to their arrests. Cheuk Kwan with the Toronto Association for Democracy in China discusses how his community is being impacted and how Canada should respond. Beijing imposed a national security law on the territory in 2020 that has effectively wiped out most public dissent following huge anti-government protests in 2019. Many activists were arrested, silenced or forced into self-exile. The measures announced on Monday were issued under the powers granted by Hong Kong's homegrown national security law enacted last year. The arrest warrants issued in July have drawn criticism from foreign governments, including the U.S., the U.K. and the European Union. Police offered rewards ranging from 200,000 Hong Kong dollars ($35,114 Cdn) to one million Hong Kong dollars ($175,574 Cdn) for information leading to their arrests. WATCH | Hong Kong law cracking down on dissent comes into effect: Hong Kong law cracking down on dissent comes into effect 1 year ago Article 23, a controversial national security law in Hong Kong, has come into effect. Many fear the crackdown on dissent will further erode civil liberties. In a July statement, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio condemned the moves. "The extraterritorial targeting of Hong Kongers who are exercising their fundamental freedoms is a form of transnational repression," he said. "We will not tolerate the Hong Kong government's attempts to apply its national security laws to silence or intimidate Americans or anyone on U.S. soil." The Hong Kong office of the Chinese Foreign Affairs Ministry responded by opposing criticism from foreign politicians, insisting the actions were legitimate.
