Judge Benny Sagi, president of Israel’s Beersheba District Court, who presided over the corruption case against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was killed in a traffic accident on Route 6 when a vehicle struck his motorcycle.

Police said the vehicle had been driving off-road, entered the highway, and collided with Sagi’s motorcycle, according to Israeli media.

A major donor to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) could reap billions of dollars from a reshuffle in Venezuela’s oil assets following the US's abduction of President Nicolas Maduro on Saturday.

Maduro’s removal and a pliant government in Caracas could allow Singer to finalise a deal that would see his investment firm, Elliot Investment Management, gain control of a network of US-based oil refineries at a steeply discounted price.

Singer’s firm bid $6bn for refineries in Texas, Louisiana, and Illinois, which some analysts say could be worth $12bn. If Trump follows through on his pledge to revive Venezuela's oil industry, the country's heavy crude could start flowing back to the US in large numbers.

Elliot Investment Management is no stranger to the world of emerging market debt. It made billions of dollars in the aftermath of Argentina’s debt crisis. But it also has an inside track to the Trump White House.

In the aftermath of U.S. strikes and the capture of Maduro, Venezuelans are struggling to understand what just happened — and what might come next.

Updated January 4, 2026

https://archive.ph/KQwiA

In November, the White House published what it called a “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine — a 19th-century document asserting America’s hemispheric dominance — that promised to “restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere.”

Carolina Jiménez Sandoval, the Venezuelan president of the Washington Office on Latin America, said she could only make sense of Saturday’s stunning events in the context of the new document.

“The idea that you can take the most powerful man in the country and then see him surrendered to U.S. troops sends a very powerful message across Latin America that the U.S. is willing to go through with its threats,” she said. “They’re not saying they’re going to work through alliances; they’re saying they're going to impose their will through any means, including military power.”

Jan 03, 2026

Trump and his administration have often said they want to revive the Monroe Doctrine, claiming the United States has the right to dominate the affairs of the hemisphere. They have spoken openly about controlling Venezuela’s oil reserves, the largest in the world. This is rank imperialism. It recalls the darkest chapters of U.S. interventions in Latin America, which have left a terrible legacy. It will and should be condemned by the democratic world.