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US Has No Leverage Against China in Rare Earths Market – Expert

China holds all the cards when it comes to rare earth elements (REE) extraction, processing, and supply, Jeff J. Brown, China expert and founder of the Seek Truth From Facts Foundation, tells Sputnik.

Ahead of US President Donald Trump’s visit to China, the nation’s Ministry of Natural Resources released data underscoring China’s achievements in the REE sector.

“China long ago did its homework and knew the value of REEs, across all sectors of science, technology, the space race, industry, manufacturing and military applictions,” Brown says. “They allocated huge resources to perfect not only extraction, but processing and downstream, discovering new sources underground.”

Presently, China controls 90% of the world’s REE processing and thus global supply chains and logisitcs. Moreover, the Chinese spent decades mastering techniques to achieve high-purity output at the lowest cost.

Why are REEs Important?

“REEs make the world go round,” Brown notes. “Without them, countries can’t build weapons, send astronauts into space, manufacture mobile phones, all kinds of electronic gadgetry, medical equipment, and thousands of other mundane to high-tech applications.”

The Chinese bet on the REE research – and it paid off, according to the pundit.

The West “sat on its hubristic laurels and did almost none of this,” using China as a reliable supplier.

Now the US is signing contracts worldwide to mine REE ore, but it’s struggling to catch up — the West remains far from becoming a high-volume processor on a par with China.

“The US has no real leverage at all, except the tired old playbook of boycotts, blockades, sanctions and tariffs,” Brown concludes.

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Somali Terrorist In London Previously Stabbed Police Officers, Was A Known Extremist

The knife wielding Somali maniac who attempted to murder two Jewish people on the street in London yesterday had already been convicted for stabbing two police officers and was a known extremist who was referred to the government’s counter terrorism program, yet was left free to launch another attack.

The suspect has now been named as Essa Suleiman, a 45-year-old Somali-born man who arrived in Britain as a child in the early 1990s and now holds British citizenship. The details of his past make the attack not just predictable – but preventable.

In 2008 in Swindon, Suleiman was convicted of grievous bodily harm after stabbing two police officers and a police dog while officers responded to a 999 call. 

PC Neil Sampson and his dog Anya were among those attacked. Suleiman received a nine-year sentence. 

He was also referred to the government’s Prevent counter-extremism programme in 2020. However, the case was closed later that same year.

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Trump presented with RISKY secret Iran plan using US ground troops as oil prices plunge global economy into chaos

Donald Trump may escalate the Iran war by sending ground troops to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and deploying special operations forces to seize the nuclear materials the regime needs to build a bomb.

The President’s top military advisers are set to brief him on new options for military action designed to force Iran back to the negotiating table and end the war.

CENTCOM’s secret plans include using ‘short and powerful’ strikes on Iranian infrastructure to force Tehran to show more flexibility on ending its nuclear program, according to Axios.

It would amount to the most intense US combat activity in Iran since the beginning of the month, when Americans staged a high-stakes rescue of downed crew members. 

One plan Trump is expected to review calls for reopening commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz with US ground troops. The passage, which transits one-fifth of all global oil shipping, has been stalled for seven weeks.

Another strategy the President will hear involves using special forces to enter Iran and recover its stockpile of highly enriched uranium. During prior negotiations, the regime refused to hand over the nuclear material to the US.

After peace talks stalled earlier this month, Trump imposed a naval blockade on all Iranian ports in the Gulf.

Tehran, meanwhile, has shut down oil shipping lanes by attacking tankers with speedboats and laying sea mines in the strait.

Trump’s new pressure campaign to reopen the strait comes as the global oil market has plunged into chaos, driving US gas prices to their highest level per gallon since 2022.

US gas prices rose another 7 cents on Thursday to $4.30 for a gallon of regular, the biggest one-day jump in prices since the start of the war. 

Gas is now at its highest price since the consumer inflation crisis of July 2022, according to the data from AAA. 

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Trump DOJ, ATF Unleash Massive Second Amendment Overhaul — 34 New Reforms Slash Red Tape for Gun Owners, Dealers and Small Businesses

In a HUGE victory for the Second Amendment and law-abiding Americans everywhere, the Department of Justice and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives announced this week they are unleashing 34 notices of final and proposed rulemaking to slash the mountain of Biden-era red tape strangling gun owners and Federal Firearms Licensees.

The move follows a top-to-bottom review of ATF regulations ordered by President Trump’s Executive Order 14206, “Protecting Second Amendment Rights.”

After years of the Biden ATF acting as an unaccountable attack dog against honest gun shops and citizens, the agency is finally being forced to listen to industry experts, FFLs, and everyday Americans who just want to exercise their God-given constitutional rights without the federal government breathing down their necks.

This is the first wave of reforms. More are coming. The Trump administration is keeping its promise to dismantle the deep-state gun-control apparatus piece by piece.

“The Second Amendment is not a second-class right,” said U.S. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. “This Department of Justice is ending the weaponization of federal authority against law-abiding gun owners. We will continue to vigorously defend their rights as the Constitution demands.”

Below are the summary of the 34 proposed and final regulatory changes affecting firearms, explosives, importation, federal firearms licensees (FFLs), and ATF procedures.

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Israel Attacks Gaza Flotilla Near Greek Waters

On Wednesday evening Israeli naval forces attacked the Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF) to Gaza. 

An unknown number of Israeli military ships went over 700 miles to attack the 54-ship flotilla that was headed for Gaza.

It was attempting to break the illegal Israeli naval blockade and to bring worldwide attention to the continuing genocide of Palestinians in Gaza; the Israeli ethnic cleansing of the West Bank; the destruction and occupation of southern Lebanon and the attacks on Iran.

Twenty-one boats were attacked by Israeli naval forces about 80 nautical miles west of the Greek island of Crete in international waters. 

One hundred seventy nine participants from 33 countries were taken against their will from boats that were damaged by Israeli naval forces and put onto a commercial cargo ship that may arrive at the Israeli port of Ashdod around Saturday.

We anticipate that they will be processed at a dock facility in Ashdod, then transported to an Israeli prison and in three-to-five days be deported from the country with a 10-100 year ban on returning to Israel.

That means that one cannot get to the West Bank for actions in solidarity with Palestinians who are under attack by Zionist Israeli settlers who steal Palestinian land and animals and burn Palestinian houses and cars. 

Fifteen U.S. citizens were among the 179 that were kidnapped by Israeli forces.

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Biden-Appointed Judge Orders Release of Dominican Illegal Alien Wanted for Murder by Interpol Red Notice Fugitive Now Roaming Free After ICE Arrest!

A Biden-appointed federal judge in Rhode Island has ordered the release of a Dominican illegal alien who is the subject of an Interpol Red Notice for murder in his home country.

The criminal illegal alien, Bryan Rafael Gomez, was arrested by ICE Boston in Worcester, Massachusetts on April 4th.

He had just been picked up locally for domestic abuse when a background check revealed Dominican authorities issued a criminal arrest warrant against him for homicide in 2023.

He is also the subject of an active Interpol Red Notice, an international arrest warrant for murder.

Gomez was detained at an ICE facility in Rhode Island. An immigration judge issued a deportation order on April 28th. But on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Melissa DuBose, a Biden appointee confirmed in 2024 as the first Black and openly LGBTQ federal judge in Rhode Island, ordered him released on the grounds of “continuous unlawful detention.”

ICE argued Gomez was subject to mandatory detention because of the international homicide warrant. The judge ignored that and set the wanted murderer free.

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US wants to use hypersonic missile on Iran. Problem is, it may not work.

The U.S. is mulling using its first hypersonic missile against Iran — even though it may not yet be ready for battlefield use.

CENTCOM says it needs to deploy the “Dark Eagle” missile against Iran because it has been forced to move its launchers out of range for Washington’s Precision Strike Missile, which the U.S. is now running low on, according to a report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Although it completed some successful tests in 2024, the Dark Eagle repeatedly failed to launch during other tests because of launcher and production quality issues. An unnamed defense official told Fox News that the weapon has reached “initial operational capability,” but the Pentagon testing office says it won’t have enough data to evaluate Dark Eagle’s combat effectiveness until early 2027.

The request comes amid a deadlock in U.S.-Iran talks that could spark a return to all-out war. President Donald Trump has pledged to maintain a blockade of Iranian shipping in the Persian Gulf, but Iran says it will only come to the table if the U.S. lifts the siege.

As Jennifer Kavanagh, senior fellow and director of military analysis at Defense Priorities, told RS, the possible Dark Eagle deployment “suggests that the Pentagon has lost all perspective.”

“Iran is not an existential threat, and the United States should not be expending its highest-end missiles there no matter what,” Kavanagh said. “The unit cost per missile is $41 million or so. Are any targets in Iran worth this much?”

Another expert observed that a deployment soon might help the Dark Eagle get more funding for next year’s defense budget.

“How do you know it is defense budget season in Washington? An unnecessary push to deploy a not-yet-fully-operational hypersonic missile against Iran,” Kelly Grieco, Senior Fellow at the Stimson Center, wrote on X. “Nothing says ‘fund me’ like first use, I guess.”

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More Details Emerge of Trump’s Secret Use of ICE to Spy on Critics

Lawmakers and privacy advocates are demanding answers from the Trump administration about its weaponization of digital tools and popular web platforms to spy on critics and activists. Targets have included a student who attended a pro-Palestine protest and anonymous web users posting about President Donald Trump’s violent immigration crackdown, but the administration’s secret systems of surveillance likely cast a wide net.

Privacy groups are also making demands of Big Tech firms such as Meta and Google, which have come under pressure from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to hand over identifying information for anonymous users. Officials from the agency have wielded legally dubious administrative subpoenas — meant to be used to determine duties on imported products — in an attempt to compel the information.

The efforts to expose domestic spying under the Trump administration offer a preview of how Democrats could yield subpoena power next year if voters hand them the House majority in November. Rep. Delia Ramirez, a Democrat from Illinois who was appointed ranking member of the cybersecurity subcommittee of the House Committee on Homeland Security this week, said emerging technologies are being used to violate civil rights and target Trump’s critics.

“The Trump-Miller regime is weaponizing the government and abusing every authority to persecute anyone whom they perceive as an enemy,” Ramirez told Truthout in a text on April 29, referencing Stephen Miller, the anti-immigrant extremist serving as a top adviser to Trump. “And fascism always requires a public enemy.”

ICE Targets Personal Information of Trump Critics

On April 17, attorneys with the Civil Liberties Defense Center filed a motion in federal court to throw out a grand jury subpoena that Reddit received from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) demanding “extensive private information” about an anonymous user. The user had posted statements critical of ICE and other political content on Reddit, a popular online discussion forum.

Reddit originally received an administrative subpoena from an ICE official in Virginia demanding the user’s personal information, The Intercept first reported earlier this month. The Civil Liberties Defense Center, representing the Reddit user, immediately filed a motion against the summons. Rather than defend the original administrative subpoena in court, ICE switched tactics in early April and demanded that Reddit attorneys appear before a secret grand jury, according to organization’s executive director Lauren Regan.

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New York Jewish man found dismembered, stuffed in closet after being killed by Colombian gang

A Hasidic dad from Brooklyn who mysteriously disappeared in Colombia was found dismembered inside a bloodstained wardrobe — after traveling to the South American nation to meet a potential wife, his friends say.

Nachum Israel Eber’s mutilated remains were discovered inside the abandoned closet after it was dumped on a street in Bogota on Sunday — just days after his family reported him missing, local media reported.

The 51-year-old divorced father, a member of the Belz Hasidic community in Borough Park, was looking for a love connection, a pal told The Post.

“It’s a terrible tragedy,” friend Motti Dresdner said. “A person, a gentleman in his prime. He was always talking about his future, how he was going to get remarried and find a perfect bride and have a beautiful life. And to be cut off like this is very sad,” he said. 

He was originally mistaken for a rabbi by Colombian police and media, but his pal said he’s a property developer and plumber.

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House Renews FISA Section 702, Rejects Warrant Requirement

The House voted 235 to 191 on Wednesday to keep Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act running for another three years, declining once more to require federal agents to get a warrant before searching Americans’ communications scooped up under the program.

Around twenty Republican privacy hawks broke with leadership and joined Democrats in opposition, but the bill cleared the chamber with hours to spare before the Thursday midnight expiration.

Section 702, first authorized in 2008, lets intelligence agencies intercept the electronic communications of foreign nationals outside the United States without a warrant.

The catch, and the part that has driven nearly two decades of reform fights, is that those intercepts routinely sweep up the texts, calls, and emails of Americans who happen to be in contact with the roughly 350,000 foreign targets surveilled each year. That data sits in a federal database, and the FBI can search it for Americans’ information without going to a judge first.

The reforms attached to the renewal do not change that. They tinker around the edges. Federal agents will need an attorney’s sign-off before targeted reviews of Americans’ data, each query will require written justification submitted to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and misuse can now carry up to five years in prison.

The FBI will also have to file monthly reports to oversight officials defending searches involving Americans.

None of this requires a judge or forces the government to articulate probable cause before reading what an American wrote or said.

A bipartisan bloc has pushed for almost twenty years to require specific court approval before agents can pull up an American’s communications from the 702 trove, arguing that anything less is a Fourth Amendment workaround.

The bill that passed Wednesday explicitly references the Fourth Amendment in its text. It just does not require a warrant to honor it.

We obtained a copy of the bill for you here.

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