01/05/2026

FRIDAY | MAY 1, 2026

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UK probes ‘terrorist incident’ after Jewish men stabbed

lawmaker in the 1980s, the head of the University of Sinaloa in the 1990s, the adviser of two governors in the 2000s and then a state coordinator for Morena. The officials accused alongside Rocha Moya include a Morena senator, the Culiacan municipal president and the deputy prosecutor for the state attorney-general’s office. “These politicians and law enforcement officials have abused their authority in support of the cartel, exposed and subjected victims to threats and violence,” the US indictment reads. It said the defendants were mostly aligned with a faction of the Sinaloa cartel known as the “Chapitos”, who are loyal to the sons of cartel co founder Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who is serving a life sentence in the United States. – AFP US-Venezuela direct flights resume MIAMI: The first direct flight between the United States and Venezuela in seven years was set to take off yesterday, a new sign of a thaw after Washington deposed leftist leader Nicolas Maduro. The American Airlines flight was scheduled to take off at 10.16am (1416GMT) from Miami en route to Caracas, where the United States has resumed diplomatic relations after years of tension. To mark the occasion, representatives of the US government, the City of Miami and Venezuelan ambassador to Washington Felix Plasencia greeted passengers before the flight departed at Gate D55. The inaugural flights featured a special Venezuelan menu, including corn pancakes known as cachapas and a Venezuelan-style chicken salad with mayonnaise, according to the airline. Some 1.2 million Venezuelans live in the United States, and the thaw is expected to increase the US business presence in the South American nation, which has the world’s largest proven gas reserves. But US President Donald Trump has also been moving aggressively to remove Venezuelans from the United States, terminating a programme that shielded migrants from deportation back to the crime-ridden nation. US forces on Jan 3 carried out a deadly raid in Caracas, snatching longtime US nemesis Maduro and flying him and his wife to New York to face charges of drug trafficking, which they deny. Maduro was replaced by his vice-president Delcy Rodriguez, who has largely cooperated with the United States despite her ideological background. Trump has voiced satisfaction with her policies towards US companies and tried to enforce compliance by threatening violence. Venezuela has moved to open the oil and mining sectors to the private sector. Trump in turn has started an easing of sanctions on Venezuela, with measures imposed personally on Rodriguez dropped. American Airlines subsidiary Envoy Air will run the flight daily to and from Caracas and Miami, a hub for Venezuelans and other Latin Americans. American Airlines, which is based in Texas and has a large network in Latin America, started flights to Venezuela in 1987 and carried the highest number of passengers between the two countries. It ended flights in 2019 as relations deteriorated, with the United States and other Western and Latin American nations declaring Maduro to be illegitimate after an election marred by irregularities. The State Department continues to call on Americans to reconsider travel to Venezuela due to widespread crime, but in March it ended its blanket warning against any travel. – AFP

LONDON: Two Jewish men were wounded in stabbings in north London on Wednesday and police in the British capital are investigating the case as a “terrorist incident” after a series of antisemitic attacks in recent weeks. King Charles III and Prime Minister Keir Starmer led the condemnation of the late morning assaults in Golders Green, which is home to a large Jewish population. Police said a 45-year-old man, a British national born in Somalia, was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder. The victims, aged 76 and 34, were in stable condition in hospital. The suspect, who also tried to stab police officers, was detained after initially being taken to hospital but discharged. London’s Metropolitan Police said he is believed to have been involved in another incident on Wednesday morning in southeast London in which one person suffered minor injuries. o Community remains strong but such attacks must stop now: Chief rabbi THE HAGUE: A wildfire that broke out on Wednesday morning near the village of ‘t Harde in the Dutch province of Gelderland remained out of control, according to local media, reported Xinhua. According to Dutch public broadcaster NOS, the fire has spread over an area of about 2,200m in a military training camp in eastern Netherlands and has shown no signs of diminishing as of 7pm local time (1800GMT). Dutch outlet nu.nl reported that the Dutch Air Force has deployed several helicopters to assist in fighting the fire. About 400 firefighters were working to contain the blaze. The cause of the fire remains unknown and no injuries have been reported. NOS reported that authorities have warned of an increased risk of wildfires in the coming period due to persistent drought conditions. Several wildfires were reported across the country last week, raising concerns about a continued rise in such incidents. – Bernama-Xinhua Wildfire rages in Netherlands

security fears. “After attacks on synagogues, Jewish institutions, community ambulances and now Jews targeted in Golders Green, the UK government can no longer claim this is under control,” Israel’s Foreign Ministry said. The incident unfolded shortly after 11am (1000GMT), when the Shomrim Jewish neighbourhood watch group first reported that a knife-wielding man was “attempting to stab Jewish members of the public”. Shomrim members helped detain the suspect before police arrived and subdued him using an electroshock weapon. The response of the Jewish volunteers earned widespread praise. The victims were also treated at the scene by Hatzola, a Jewish volunteer ambulance service. The stabbings follow a deadly assault on a synagogue in Manchester last October on the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur that killed two people and seriously injured three. Britain’s chief rabbi Ephraim Mirvis told reporters that the community is “strong” and “resilient” but “such attacks need to stop now”. Monitoring groups have reported a surge in antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents in Britain, particularly since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. – AFP

In Golders Green, police commissioner Mark Rowley said the suspect has “a history of serious violence and mental health issues”. A little-known group believed to be linked to Iran, and which has claimed responsibility for the London arson attacks, said one of its “lone wolves” was behind the stabbings, the SITE Intelligence Group reported. Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiya, meaning the Islamic Movement of the People of the Right Hand, made the uncorroborated claim in a video posted online, said SITE. Starmer convened an emergency meeting of senior ministers and officials, telling broadcasters he would meet with “criminal justice agencies to make sure we have effective and swift justice in these cases”. “The government is taking action in relation to security, cohesion and extremism. But of course, it is our responsibility to coordinate the immediate response here to this appalling attack, to ensure security is in place.” King Charles III, who is on a state visit to the United States, said he was “deeply concerned” in a statement issued by Buckingham Palace. The stabbings follow a spate of arson attacks on synagogues and other Jewish sites in north London in recent weeks that have heightened

RECOVERING RUINS ... Disaster response workers on Wednesday pulling an SUV out of a tornado-damaged house at the Holiday Hills Golf Course development in Mineral Wells, Texas after six days of severe storms caused extensive damage and multiple injuries across the Midwest and Southern United States. – AFPPIC

Washington charges Mexican governor with drug trafficking NEW YORK: The US Justice Department on Wednesday charged the governor of the Mexican state of Sinaloa and other officials with drug trafficking. between two factions of the cartel of the same name that has left thousands of people dead. In Sinaloa’s capital Culiacan, residents said the possible connection between the government and organised crime could be an explanation for the security crisis in the state.

was announced”. It said the Mexican Attorney-General’s Office will decide whether to extradite Rocha Moya and the other suspects to the United States. Later on Wednesday, Mexican authorities announced their own probe to determine if “the accusation made by US authorities has legal grounds”, said attorney-general’s spokesperson Ulises Lara. Rocha Moya denied the drug charges “categorically and absolutely” in a statement. “This attack is not only against me, it is against the Fourth Transformation,” he said, referring to Mexico’s governing, left-leaning Morena party, in power since 2018. Rocha Moya has governed the state of Sinaloa since 2021. It has been battered by a war

The US attorney for the Southern District of New York said 10 people, including Governor Ruben Rocha Moya, are accused of working with the Sinaloa cartel to distribute “massive quantities” of narcotics to the United States. Without mentioning the indictment, Mexico’s Foreign Ministry said it received US extradition requests for “various people”. It complained that cases such as this are normally handled confidentially under bilateral treaties, rather than being announced publicly first, and said it would send a note of protest to the US embassy “over the way it

“This is something that, in a certain way, we saw coming. It was unsustainable, what was going on in Sinaloa. This explains to us a lot why the violent crime rate could not be lowered,” said 55-year-old restauranteur Miguel Taniyama. Rebeca Espinoza, 47, said: “These things that we feel and sense here ended up being corroborated by a foreign government’s indictment.” Rocha Moya has a long history in public life that included stints as a state congressional