…the period of security tensions isn’t really behind us. Iran’s warning of an attempt to settle accounts for the attack attributed to Israel in Syria still stands. Meanwhile, in mid-May a cluster of events is expected: the possible American announcement of a withdrawal from the Iranian nuclear agreement, the inauguration of the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem, and right after that, the Palestinians’ marking of the 70th anniversary of the Nakba. All these will require heightened preparedness.

Israeli security officials haven’t sounded the all-clear regarding Iran, because the matter seems far from concluded.

the Israeli paradox. On the one hand, Israel is, truly, a military and economic powerhouse. Its existence is not shrouded in doubt, and there are no forces threatening its existence. On the other hand, at any given moment, one of its battlefronts could burst into flames, leading to all-out war. Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman has raised this likelihood in Cabinet discussions and has even commented that he thinks that this scenario will, ultimately, come to pass: a multi-front war that will erupt between Israel and all the players on the northern front (that is, Iran, Syria and Hezbollah), and then Hamas will join the fray.

…the IDF continues to build and fortify its tangible security barriers — defenses against terrorism in the West Bank and aggression along the northern front with Iran’s puppet Syria and its surrogate Hezbollah. There is also a barrier separating Israel from Gaza, where Hamas has lately been staging marches under the under the century-old Palestinian banner of “Never!”

Hamas intends to march again during the Independence Day weekend. It is a futile gesture. The Iron Wall is no longer simply a metaphor. It is a description of the Jewish state itself. And, as [IDF Chief of Staff] Eisenkot says, it is invincible.

Trump is the one who has made a significant concession by becoming the first sitting U.S. president willing to meet with the leader of North Korea — an act that will inherently legitimize the ruler of the world’s most despotic regime and feed its propaganda that even the world’s sole superpower feels compelled to bow before its mighty nuclear arsenal. What is Trump getting in return? So far, not even freedom for the three American hostages in North Korea — although Kim hints that this small concession will come.

With his announcement on Saturday, Kim unveiled measures that many observers were hoping for as outcomes at the upcoming summit with Trump. But the United States cannot accept these measures as a victory—they’re a starting point for forging a verifiable cap on Pyongyang’s arsenal. A hard cap can keep America and its allies safer while Trump negotiates a more comprehensive agreement—something that can only happen if the president does not give in to overconfidence and optimism.

American officials say they have been repeatedly cheated by the North in previous talks on denuclearization. A deal in 1994 eventually collapsed when the United States accused the North of secretly enriching uranium. Another deal in 2005 fell apart in a dispute over how to verify a nuclear freeze. In 2012, the North launched a long-range rocket after agreeing to a moratorium on missile testing.

Mr. Kim’s decision to make the economy the nation’s priority and suspend nuclear tests was unanimously adopted at a Workers’ Party meeting on Friday. He also pledged to neither use nor proliferate nuclear weapons unless faced with a nuclear threat.

Trump chose to hire Giuliani despite the FBI investigation and the former mayor’s controversial tenure as a federal prosecutor and mayor. The question now is whether Giuliani will prove capable of doing something his predecessors on Trump’s legal team couldn’t: figure out how to protect a moody, dishonest and impulsive client from the skilled prosecutors who seem to be drawing closer and closer to Trump and his inner circle.

There’s a chance he indeed wants Giuliani to negotiate a swift end to the Mueller probe…

At least one of the president’s soothsayers has reportedly whispered in his ear that Cohen could flip when confronted with the prospect of jail time. His raided files are believed to hold a lot of skeletons for the President.

A mutual pal like Giuliani — one who stood by him in the darkest hour — might be Trump’s key to ending the Mueller probe legally before it ends his presidency.

Struggling to find excellent legal counsel is a problem no other president in modern times has faced, according to historians. Trump supporters say it’s a consequence of the president’s battle with the country’s legal and business establishments, which are intertwined with the most powerful law firms. It also shows the downside of the go-it-alone personality that aided Trump during the campaign, but is leaving him isolated as a leader.

Environmental health reflects and reinforces economic and racial inequality. There is a deepening understanding of the “social determinants of health,” thanks to the work of scholars like our Brookings colleagues Ross Hammond, Dayna Bowen Matthew, and Stuart Butler. But there are environmental determinants, too, and not only of health but potentially of opportunity. Earth Day is about the environment, of course – but it is also about equity.

Climate change poses a more significant threat to global security than the low probability event of a ground war with China. And yet, we spent $590 billion on defense in 2017 and maintained readiness against the unlikely prospect of a large conventional war. It’s time for conservatives to recognize our constitutional mandate to provide for the common defense by addressing the rising threat of climate change.

Maintaining biodiversity and changing our approach to land use is actually good for the economy, not a burden on it, as many tend to think, the study found. The researchers calculated the value of biodiversity ecosystems to be around $24 trillion a year, roughly equal to the GDP of the Americas. Land degradation to date has likely depressed the global economy by about 10 percent; that is, if humanity had not degraded its vital ecosystems, the economy would be 10 percent larger than it is today.

“When you look at the effect on the economy, many people immediately think of what I call the market value of food and water, but there’s a huge economic value in the way biodiversity — nature — regulates our climate, regulates pollution, regulates our pollination services and [controls] storm surges to protect the coast from sea level rise,” Watson explains.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer announced that he would be introducing a bill to decriminalize marijuana. “If smoking marijuana doesn’t hurt anybody else, why shouldn’t we allow people to do it and not make it criminal?” he asked.

As he explained in the interview and on Twitter, the bill would allow states to set their own policies on marijuana without federal intervention beyond preventing the flow of marijuana to states that haven’t yet legalized it. The bill would also fund research on THC and, in Schumer’s words, “inject real dollars into minority and women-owned businesses to ensure those disproportionately affected by marijuana criminalization can benefit from this new economy.”

Reed College announced last week that it will overhaul its core humanities course after students claimed the curriculum’s focus on the classics “perpetuates white supremacy.” Mark down another school that has succumbed to demands to let politics trump education…

But activists calling themselves Reedies Against Racism denounced the course as “oppressive” and “Caucasoid,” claiming too many of the writers were white men. You know, like that lame Aristotle dude. Last spring they demanded that their peers participate in sit-ins, and last fall the bullying grew worse.

Something has gone wrong with homeownership in America. Once the ladder to wealth, economic divides in real estate have increasingly become a driver of inequality, further entrenching political and economic privilege. Not only does this trend have knock on effects for the younger generation, but it’s not unique to the United States. The United Kingdom, Canada and possibly other countries are also feeling the shock of changing real estate markets… For every suburb where 1950s starter homes once sold for less than $10,000 are now worth around $700,000, there are places like Baltimore, Detroit, Buffalo, or Rochester, where many homes are basically worthless. In many areas, no matter how much money people invest in their homes, they are not sitting on hundreds of thousands of dollars in equity.