Today’s edition of quick hits.
* At the White House: “President Joe Biden welcomed Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to the White House for a visit on Wednesday in the shadows of wars in Israel and Ukraine, which the leaders addressed multiple times throughout their public events.”
* Speaking of Biden: “President Joe Biden said today that he was ‘alarmed about extremist settlers attacking Palestinians in the West Bank.’ Biden said those incidents were ‘pouring gasoline on fire’ and ‘they have to be held accountable. It has to stop.’ He also said Hamas ‘does not represent the vast majority of the Palestinian people on the Gaza Strip or anywhere else’ and Israel has ‘to do everything in its power’ to protect innocent civilians.”
* In Gaza: “United Nations fuel supplies in the Gaza Strip will likely run out today or tomorrow, a spokesperson for the world body told NBC News, adding that ‘very painful’ choices about rationing are to come.”
* In New York: “The judge presiding over the $250 million fraud trial against Donald Trump and his company fined the former president $10,000 on Wednesday for violating an order not to talk about his court staff. He later stormed out of the courtroom, appearing to surprise even his own lawyers.”
* The Al-Ahli Arab Hospital: “American intelligence officials said Tuesday they now had ‘high confidence’ that the blast at Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza last week was the result of a Palestinian rocket that broke up mid-flight, and that no Israeli weapon was involved in the explosion.”
* FAA: “The Senate voted 98-0 to approve President Joe Biden’s nominee to lead the Federal Aviation Administration on Tuesday, ending a span of nearly 19 months in which the agency was without a Senate-confirmed chief. Michael Whitaker is a former deputy FAA administrator and most recently served as chief operating officer of a Hyundai affiliate that is developing an air taxi.”
* Jacob Lew: “The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has advanced Jack Lew’s nomination to be the next U.S. ambassador to Israel. The Democratic-led panel reported the nomination out of the committee in a 12-9 vote Wednesday, a week after Lew — who served as treasury secretary and White House chief of staff under then-President Barack Obama — testified before lawmakers at his confirmation hearing.” * I’ve followed this story for a while, and these findings are awfully difficult to believe: “The Justice Department’s inspector general found no evidence that President Donald J. Trump had improperly pressured the F.B.I. to rebuild its headquarters on its current site, the crumbling J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington, according to a report released on Tuesday.” * The resolution to an unexpected story: “Scholastic apologized and reversed course on a recent decision to separate about 30 books on diverse topics in elementary school book fairs.” See you tomorrow.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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