While it's common for U.S. presidents to visit churches, only a few have made official visits to mosques.

(Image credit: Brendan Smialowski)

The Trump Administration has a new plan for delivering aid to Palestinians in Gaza. Israel has blocked all food, fuel and medicine for more than ten weeks, accusing Hamas of stealing aid meant for civilians. The U.S. says their plan will address those concerns, but experts worry the plan could set a bad precedent. We learn more.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy went to Turkey for direct talks with Russia. But the Kremlin sent a lower-level delegation that doesn't include President Vladimir Putin.

(Image credit: Turkish Presidency)

President Trump is visiting Qatar and the U.A.E. after inking big weapons and tech deals in Saudi Arabia. So far, his trip hasn't seemed to push forward chances for a ceasefire in Gaza.

(Image credit: Win McNamee)

The visit comes as relations between the U.S. and South Africa are at their lowest since the end of apartheid. Trump has repeatedly claimed that "terrible things are happening" in South Africa.

(Image credit: Jerome Delay)

Former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), now a star at the far-right One America News Network, took the lead with a delegation of mostly Republican lawmakers to visit an infamous megaprison in El Salvador that President Donald Trump is using as part of a deal with that country's autocratic President Nayib Bukele to house large numbers of deportees the administration accuses of being gang members.

But the narrative he and some other outlets have pushed about what the cameras saw when they visited the wing for U.S. deportees at the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, is completely false, one immigration expert wrote.

"Throughout Gaetz’s report, which included the Trump loyalist walking through the halls of the maximum-security facility with several members of Congress, much of the footage focused on the difference in behavior between accused MS-13 members and those incarcerated in the TdA ward," reported The Independent. “What no other news organization has shown you until now is the specific ward at CECOT that holds the Venezuelan-based Tren de Aragua members President Trump deported. See if you can notice them reacting differently,” Gaetz told his viewers.

EXCLUSIVE: Breastfeeding mom of US citizen sues Kristi Noem after being grabbed by ICE

The footage then showed what The Independent claimed to be the deportees "loudly heckling, taunting and shouting at the OAN host and lawmakers" — but that's not actually what the footage showed, American Immigration Council attorney Aaron Reichlin-Melnick wrote on X.

"This was an outright lie," wrote Reichlin-Melnick. "There was no taunting, they were shouting 'freedom!' and 'kidnapped!' while making the international handsign for people who are victims of trafficking and abuse!"

Gaetz, who resigned from Congress shortly after the 2024 election, was Trump's initial pick to serve as attorney general. But this was derailed as the House Ethics Committee concluded its lengthy investigation into accusations that Gaetz engaged in child sex trafficking, illicit drug use, and campaign finance violations.

Service at high-profile MAGA supporter Kid Rock's Nashville restaurant came to an abrupt halt on a busy Saturday night after undocumented workers fled en masse to avoid rumored immigration raids favored by President Donald Trump, Nashville Scene reported.

The restaurant Kid Rock’s Big A-- Honky Tonk Rock N’ Roll Steakhouse is licensed to wealthy conservative restaurateur Steve Smith.

According to the report, managers instructed employees without legal immigration status to leave to avoid ICE detention. Two other Smith-owned restaurants were also affected by the walkout, which lasted at least through Sunday.

An employee told the publication, “We were already understaffed because of the ICE raids throughout the weekend. Then, around 9:30 p.m. on Saturday, our manager came back and told anyone without legal status to go home. Events at the Ryman, Ascend, the Savannah Bananas’ baseball game all let out, and it was crazy busy. But there was no one in the kitchen to cook the food.”

EXCLUSIVE: Breastfeeding mom of US citizen sues Kristi Noem after being grabbed by ICE

"State troopers and unmarked ICE vehicles dramatically increased nightly traffic stops on May 3 in South Nashville, where the joint operation has resulted in at least 196 arrests by ICE agents," the report continued. "These arrests included 101 individuals with no criminal history, contradicting Trump administration claims that immigration enforcement has been targeted toward violent criminals."

Kid Rock, real name Robert James Ritchie, played at President Donald Trump's inauguration and visited the White House at the end of March as Trump signed an executive order to stop "price-gouging" by concert ticket brokers.

The musician dressed up for the Oval Office visit, opting for a "loud red, white and blue American flag jumpsuit and matching hat ensemble."

The report concluded that the "recent panic" indicated that Smith's restaurant empire "relies directly on employing immigrants not authorized to work in the United States."

Smith didn't comment for the story.

Read the Nashville Scene article here.

President Donald Trump's grift has gotten so big, he's actually selling off access to the United States itself, columnist Brian Karem claimed in a new column for Salon.

Karem quoted a former Trump official saying, "If you think Trump is holding a yard sale, I would remind everyone that the United States is the yard that is for sale and everything, including security secrets, defensive initiatives, private data, and secrets most people don’t know about are for sale. And no one in this administration is going to call him out," the official added. "The new Trump regime is becoming increasingly insulated while his activities grow more outrageous. Everything he does is pay to play.”

Enter the $400 million luxury Qatari airliner "gifted" to the Defense Department, but which Trump will get for his own use.

"You’d think someone would tell [the Qataris] that Trump’s price tag is a lot less than $400 million," Karem quipped. "Hell, Elon Musk, the immigrant who criticizes other immigrants, bought Trump for about half that much."

EXCLUSIVE: Breastfeeding mom of US citizen sues Kristi Noem after being grabbed by ICE

Meanwhile, White House press secretary Karoline Levitt scolded reporters for even suggesting that “President Trump is doing anything for his own benefit."

And now, Karem wrote, Trump is leveraging the Middle East "to pad his own pocket."

In addition to plans for an 80-story Trump Tower in Dubai, Karem wrote that Trump's business interests include a partnership with real estate company Qatari Diar, which happens to be backed by the sovereign wealth fund in Qatar. The resulting project: a luxury golf resort with the Qatari royal family, which has ties to terrorists, including Hamas.

"Wonder why Trump got the 747?" Karem asked. "Come on."

Karem wrote that even MAGA faithful such as Laura Loomer, Mark Levin and Ben Shapiro have joined forces with progressives like Bernie Sanders and James Carville in coming down hard on Trump for accepting the audacious gift.

"Perhaps Donald Trump is right: He’s bringing unity to the United States," Karem wrote. "At least on this issue, we’re united against Trump."

Read the Salon article here.

The Qatari royal family has been trying for five years to unload one of the jumbo jets in their fleet, but they had been unable to find a buyer until they foisted the massive aircraft on president Donald Trump.

Airlines have been retiring the Boeing 747 over the last decade because they're too expensive to fly, cost more to maintain and require longer runways for landing, and the Qataris had struggled to find a buyer for one of their three remaining "flying palaces" before offering it to the U.S. president as a gift, reported Forbes.

“Qatar, like many modern states, is shifting toward leaner, more versatile aircraft, which offer better economics and more discreet presence for official travel,” said Linus Bauer, managing director of the Dubai-based aviation consulting firm BAA & Partners.

EXCLUSIVE: Breastfeeding mom of US citizen sues Kristi Noem after being grabbed by ICE

Dumping the $400 million jumbo jet on Trump is a “a creative disposal strategy” that signals “a farewell to a bygone model of geopolitical theater in the skies," Bauer told Forbes.

The Qataris have been trying to sell the plane since 2020, and giving it to the president would save them massive amounts in maintenance and storage costs, aviation experts said, and would carry the added benefit of currying favor with the U.S. president.

“The market is incredibly illiquid for a jet like this,” said Richard Aboulafia, an aerospace consultant with Aerodynamic Advisory, who said these ostentatious giant planes are a security risk. These things are big targets.”

The 747-8 remains in high demand as a freighter due to its massive internal volume, but Qatar's jet would be impractical to convert because it was structurally and mechanically optimized for long-range flight with only a few passengers.

“It would require gutting the interior, reinforcing the floor, cutting a cargo door, and re-certifying structural integrity — an extremely expensive and complex process,” Bauer said.

The cost would be staggering to turn the Qatari jet into a highly specialized and secure airborne command center, and Aboulafia said that would take at least five years unless security requirements were loosened.

“I can't imagine any well-trained senior Air Force officer saying this is a good idea,” Aboulafia said.

The Qataris also gave a 747-8 to Turkish president Reycep Tayyip Erdogan in 2018 and an older model to an asset management firm, leaving Trump's gift plane as one of three 747-8s currently in the royal air fleet, but the royal family still has a number of other planes in their stable and enjoys access to Qatar Airways executive jets.

“I don’t think they’ll miss it," said business aviation consultant Brian Foley.

Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan was relentless in her questioning of U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer Thursday as he presented the Trump administration argument to end birthright citizenship in the United States.

As part of his extreme immigration policy, President Donald Trump issued an executive order at the start of his second term proclaiming that children born in the U.S. to undocumented immigrants are not citizens.

Three federal judges ruled the order unconstitutional, which lead to the Supreme Court case.

Before the oral arguments, Trump claimed on Truth Social, "Birthright Citizenship is about the babies of slaves" and not about "people pouring into our Country from all over South America, and the rest of the World."

Kagan asked Sauer if "every single person" affected by Trump's executive order will have to "bring their own suit" before the court. After he attempted an answer, Kagan told Sauer to put his main argument aside, "because, I got to tell you, that does not fill me with great confidence. How else are we going to get to the right result here, which is on my assumption that the [executive order] is illegal?"

EXCLUSIVE: Breastfeeding mom of US citizen sues Kristi Noem after being grabbed by ICE

"That would be a profoundly wrong result," Sauer answered, before diving into the "1789 Judiciary Act."

"I mean, that's a lot of words," Kagan said, "and I don't have an answer for if one thinks — and, you know, look. There are all kinds of abuses of nationwide injunctions. But I think that the question that this case presents is that if one thinks that, it's quite clear that the [executive order] is illegal, how does one get to that result? In what time frame on your set of rules without the possibility of a nationwide injunction?"

Sauer was mid-sentence talking about nationwide injunctions, when Justice Amy Coney Barrett interrupted.

"Are you really going to answer Justice Kagan by saying, there's no way to do this expeditiously?"

Later, Kagan declared, "I'm suggesting that in a case in which the government is losing constantly… It's up to you to decide whether to take this case to us. If I were in your shoes, there is no way I'd approach the Supreme Court with this case."

Court observers on social media were stunned by the way the administration's argument was tanking.

Journalist Ed Krassenstein posted, "In the Trump administration's SCOTUS hearing where they are trying to overturn Birthright Citizenship, Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan calls out and criticizes the Trump administration for not respecting court decisions. We are a nation of laws! Don’t forget that!"

Meanwhile, @mmpadellan , with 1.3 million followers wrote, "Justice Kagan is ripping this dude Sauer to shreds in this Birthright Citizenship case, hoo boy!"

Watch the clip below via CNN or click here.

Reuters and Rheinische Post (RP) may seem like very different types of news organisations: one is a global news agency serving media outlets around the world, while the other is a regional publisher based in Düsseldorf that produces four regional and local dailies, including Rheinische Post itself.

But when it comes to AI, the companies share an approach that is pragmatic and cautious, focused on exploring concrete use cases – also beyond editorial workflows – while rigorously protecting journalistic integrity.

The two organisations discussed their AI journeys at our Frankfurt AI Forum.

AI supporting call centres and logistics

New AI tools have allowed RP to streamline its customer service. They implemented an AI-powered assistant, available 24/7, that handles all inbound calls from customers – the most common questions being: “Why haven’t I received my newspaper?” and “Can I pause my subscription during the holidays?” said Margret Seeger, Director Digital Publishing and Head of AI at Rheinische Post Mediengruppe.

This has made their call centre operation particularly effective, said Seeger: “Within the media industry, we’re among the two or three top players in that area. And we’ve achieved significant savings with that.”

A similar system is now being introduced in RP’s logistics department, where an AI tool will take calls from newspaper deliverers and reorganise their delivery shifts as needed.

Reuters focuses on speed gains

For Reuters, AI’s core value lies in speed.

“We found that AI can help us be faster. And Reuters does want to be faster – that’s our business model,“ said Sabine Wollrab, Bureau Chief of Reuters for Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

One concrete example of speed gains is Fact Genie, an in-house tool that scans press releases in seconds and suggests key alerts for the newsroom to publish. Crucially, a human editor must still approve any publication.

“That’s a strategy we really stress: AI is a tool, but the journalist is responsible for what is being published,“ Wollrab said.

Read more: From lab to newsroom: How Reuters builds AI tools journalists actually use

The human-in-the-loop approach is is non-negotiable for Reuters, she said: “Trust is one of our selling points. Reuters is a very trusted brand. And we don’t want to sell that for AI.“

Changing the value of the editorial process

As for assessing AI’s impact on journalism, one could simplify the journalistic process down to two parts: the first step is about gathering information, and the second is writing it up, said Christoph Mayer, Partner and Managing Director, AI & Data Science Practice at the Schickler/Highberg management consultancy.

AI changes the value of those two steps significantly, he said.

“The second step is not so valuable anymore, because you can highly automate it. But the first step becomes even more valuable,“ said Mayer.

He estimated that AI will end up handling much of the content drafting and repurposing across platforms, freeing up journalists to focus more on sourcing, researching and storytelling.

From experimentation to structure

With regard to AI experiments, both Reuters and RP have moved from a somewhat unsystematic initial experimentation to a more structured approach involving the integration of AI tools across individual titles and journalists.

Even with a more centralised approach, RP’s local editorial departments still have a lot of freedom to try out new solutions, said Seeger.

“That’s the beauty of having four titles: we have four departments where we can test things. And once we approve something, we can plug-and-play it for everyone,“ she said.

Reuters also began using AI through grassroots experimentation, with journalists testing various tools to solve practical problems. That bottom-up momentum has since evolved into a more structured approach, including the development of custom in-house AI tools (such as Fact Genie).

“Being part of the Thomson Reuters group is an advantage. We can use their Thomson Reuters labs to work with LLMs and other experiments,” said Wollrab.

No AI for video or images

Both publishers are careful to draw a line between AI as a productivity enhancer and AI as a content creator.

Reuters does not use AI to generate journalistic content, video or images, Wollrab said. “With a photo you really want to show what is real, and not some kind of artificial reality.”

Transparency is a core principle, and any AI-generated content on Reuter’s platforms is clearly labeled, including transcriptions and translations.

RP’s policy is similar: “Our editorial guidelines say that we do not publish AI texts or pictures,” said Seeger.

On the other hand, RP has experimented using AI-generated images (labelling them as such) in marketing campaigns – but those campaigns performed worse than those using real images.

Is AI disclosure necessary in every use case? Probably not, said Mayer.

“If a large amount of the text is AI generated, you need to mark it. But if AI somehow helped you in that process, I don’t think you need to mark it,” he said. In his view, minor AI use could be compared to using a tool like a spell checker that no one thinks to disclose.

He also said that audiences may expect less transparency in some contexts, such as automated weather reports.

Enhanced translation tools

Looking ahead, rather than chasing new breakthroughs, both Reuters and RP are focusing on optimising the AI use cases that are already available to them in the near-term.

“There are so many use cases out there already. It’s really about applying them … If we get the basics right, already that would be a huge step ahead,“ said RP’s Seeger.

For Reuters, translation remains a critical bottleneck. “It’s not a word-by-word translation we need. We need to adapt something that’s been written for an international audience in English, in an English news style, into a German news article,” Wollrab said.

Translation tools that can also adjust relevance and structure to different cultural and media contexts would be tremendously helpful for them, she said.

“That’s always what we look for when we get a text from an international colleague. How can we transform it so that our German media clients can use it instantly?“

Hyperlocal AI: The next big leap?

Another future AI opportunity is in creating new processes for gathering and handling information, especially for local and regional publishers, Mayer said.

“There’s a huge opportunity in collecting and processing local information – emails, web crawling, municipality meetings – and developing a system that gives you your own agency feed of hyper-local information. I think this will be the next step, and I see that as a real game-changer,” he said.

RP tried something related to this three years ago: it automatically categorised content so that audiences in specific regions would get news based on their location. However, the tech wasn’t ready at the time.

Now they’re preparing to relaunch the feature using a more advanced, AI-powered solution.

“That’s an insight on how the technology has changed within the last three years,“ Seeger said.

The post From call centres to newsroom tools: How Reuters and Rheinische Post are making AI work appeared first on WAN-IFRA.

Just last Thursday (8 May), while issuing a live radio broadcast, Ukrainian journalist Mariana Chornievich received an anonymous email from an address on the mail.ru domain – banned in Ukraine – sent to her personal email address.

The message was obscene, with a clear threat: stop spreading “propaganda” – or risk having her image inserted into a porn video and posted online. 

According to Liza Kuzmenko, head of Ukraine’s Women in Media (WIM), this is just one example of the growing wave of gendered disinformation and online abuse directed at Ukrainian women journalists. She notes a marked increase in Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence (TFGBV), with online attacks often intensifying after female journalists release investigative pieces on critical issues such as war, corruption, or human rights.

“Narratives about Ukrainian women depict them as enemies of Ukraine, and are accompanied with open calls for physical violence against them; the technology of doxing on social media with subsequent dissemination of this information is also employed,” she explains.

In April, Women in Media released a comprehensive report: Her Voice, Their Target: Gendered Online Violence Against Ukrainian Women Journalists, revealing that most women journalists who participated in it had encountered various types of online violence.

WIM also launched an interactive online map to document these incidents.

The NGO was founded in April 2019 by Kuzmenko and fellow radio journalist Viktoriya Yermolaeva, as a Facebook group. Today, it’s a powerful peer-to-peer network, resource and support group for 1,500 female journalists, editors, producers, and other media professionals across Ukraine.

 Kuzmenko is an expert in and trainer on issues of gender equality and non-discrimination in media. She is also a member of the Commission on Journalistic Ethics, and a member of the public council under the Committee for Freedom of Speech of the Ukrainian Parliament.

She shared more about her organisation and the work they do to support their national network of women media workers. 

How has WIM been impacted by the war, in terms of the activities and functions it serves, and the support it provides? 

Since February 24, 2022, when Russia launched its full-scale invasion, life has changed dramatically for all Ukrainians — including women journalists. Many had to relocate, either within Ukraine or abroad, often with children, elderly parents, or relatives with disabilities. Others lost their income, their homes, or even their lives.

One heartbreaking example is journalist Viktoriia Roshchyna. She was declared dead in September 2024 in a brief statement from the Russian Ministry of Defence, and her body was only returned two weeks ago, with visible signs of severe torture.

Despite incredibly difficult circumstances, Ukrainian women in media continue to work. They face not only the everyday risks of war — including occupation, persecution, and trauma — but also the specific challenges women face: doing emotionally demanding journalism while also caring for families, navigating financial insecurity, and working under the constant pressure of hybrid threats and disinformation.

We at WIM have stayed true to our mission — uniting Ukrainian women journalists through solidarity, feminism, and shared professional goals, and advocating for a gender-sensitive media environment.

In 2024, Women in Media reached an important new stage in its development, and we now also support war correspondents reporting directly from the front lines, as well as women in leadership positions.

Tell us more about the work you do and programmes you offer?

We provide legal, psychological, and informational support to journalists affected by war and online violence, while also raising public awareness about these issues.

Our work focuses on two main areas:

• Equality in newsrooms – ensuring women have equal access to leadership positions, fair pay, and opportunities for growth.
• Equality in content – challenging sexism, promoting female leadership, and defending women’s rights through journalism.

We support women in media with everything from organisational help to psychological and financial assistance, much of it offered in peer-to-peer formats. We also conduct research, host advocacy events, honor journalists fighting gender inequality, and provide training.

One of our flagship initiatives is the Caring for Our Health program, launched as a permanent effort to help women media professionals prioritise their health — especially in times of war and chronic stress. In 2025, this work will continue with a series of self-support groups, training sessions, and advocacy efforts.

Women seem to dominate in the profession…

According to our latest annual analysis: Gender Profile Of Ukrainian Media, women form the majority of the workforce – but they are significantly overrepresented in creative roles, such as journalism, and remain underrepresented in leadership positions.

For example, women may account for 70–80% of journalists, but make up just over 50% of those in media management roles.

Interestingly, although men are in the minority across the media sector overall, they make up nearly 50% of those in leadership positions.

A survey we conducted in 2023, found that the size of newsrooms affects not only gender representation, but also the workload of women managers. In small teams, there is a tendency for one person to hold several managerial positions at once, due to the lack of staff and resources.

‘Some interviewees pointed out that it is the low incomes in the media that are the reason editorial offices consist mainly of women, who therefore occupy managerial positions.’

The military draft also significantly impacts the gender composition of newsrooms during martial law and the distribution of responsibilities within the team.

Ukraine media has received immense support, from industry peers, and international community: what has made the most significant difference to you?

The most significant support for me has been the sense that we are not alone. International solidarity – whether through emergency grants, equipment, safety training, or even just messages of support – has reminded us that our work matters and that the world is paying attention.

Personally, it gave me strength to keep going during the hardest moments. Professionally, it helped our organization stay active, support other women journalists, and continue documenting stories that need to be told – even in times of war.  

What would you most want to share with global journalists and news readers about life in Ukraine as a working journalist right now?

Being a journalist in Ukraine today means working under constant emotional pressure — but also with an even stronger sense of responsibility. 

‘We’re not just reporting on a war; we’re living through it, often while supporting our families, volunteering, or being displaced ourselves.’ 

And yet, despite the fear, fatigue, and grief, Ukrainian journalists continue to do their work with courage and dignity. We believe in the power of truth — and we know the world is listening.

We also see that women in journalism around the world face many shared challenges — including the rise of Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence (TFGBV) and the risks and uncertainties brought by artificial intelligence.

These global issues open up space for shared understanding and common solutions. We didn’t choose this war — but it has accelerated the way we respond to crisis and forced us to find creative, often unconventional solutions.

Ukrainian journalists, especially women, have had to adapt quickly, work under extreme pressure, and invent new ways to stay safe, connected, and effective. This experience may be valuable to the international media community as we all navigate growing threats and uncertainty.

The post Ukraine’s Women in Media: Networking against a war on all fronts appeared first on WAN-IFRA.

ABUJA, May 15 (IPS) - After graduating in 2019, Jeremiah Achimugu left Sokoto State in northwestern Nigeria for Abuja, the nation’s capital, in search of better opportunities. But life in the city brought unexpected challenges, especially the high cost of housing.

Read the full story, “Young Africans Priced Out of Cities as Urban Housing Crisis Deepens”, on globalissues.org →

OAKLAND, California, USA, May 15 (IPS) - Last week, at its annual Land Conference in Washington D.C., (May 5-8), the World Bank showed allegiance to the new US administration by dropping the pretense of promoting land reform for climate action and confirming that its land agenda is about boosting corporate profits.

Read the full story, “Mask Off – Recapping the 2025 World Bank Land Conference”, on globalissues.org →

Two families – one still waiting for answers 75 years after a father was taken during the Korean War, the other pleading for a son’s return from captivity in Gaza – shared their testimonies before the UN Security Council on Thursday.

Read the full story, “‘We are still waiting for our loved ones’: Families of the abducted speak out”, on globalissues.org →

Intensified hostilities continue in the Gaza Strip, bringing further death, displacement and destruction as the weeks-long aid blockade grinds on, the UN humanitarian affairs office (OCHA) said on Thursday.

Read the full story, “Gaza: New displacement orders force thousands to flee as famine looms”, on globalissues.org →

Amid escalating trade tensions and growing policy uncertainties, the global economy stands at a fragile turning point, according to a new report on Thursday from the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA).

Read the full story, “Sudden escalation of trade tensions sends shockwaves through global economy”, on globalissues.org →