profile/5377instablog.png.webp

Instablog9ja

David Mark Resigns From PDP After 26 Years, Cites Partys Decline And Unresolved Crisis

dataDp/1032.jpeg

Worldnews

Who Wins, Who Loses If Trumps One Big Beautiful Bill Passes?

The richest Americans, families with children, and traditional carmakers will gain; while EV makers and those on food stamps and Medicaid will lose. The United States Senate is debating President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill“, which promises sweeping tax breaks, as Republicans hope to pass it before Friday’s Independence Day holiday. On Saturday, the Senate voted 51-49 to open debate on the latest 940-page version of the bill,  despite two Republican senators joining the Democrats to oppose the motion. Trump’s Republicans hold 53 seats in the Senate, and Democrats hold 47. On May 22, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed an earlier version of the bill in a 215-214 vote. That bill has been revised by the Senate, and both chambers of Congress must pass the same legislation for it to become law. If the Senate passes its version, then members from both chambers would work to draft compromise legislation that the House and Senate would have to vote on again. Republicans hold 220 seats and Democrats hold 212 in the House. If the compromise bill is passed, it would advance to Trump, who is expected to sign it into law. So, who would be some of the winners and losers if the bill – opposed by Democrats and some conservatives – becomes law? The groups who would benefit include: The bill would extend tax cuts that Trump introduced during his first term. While Trump has pitched this as a gain for the American people, some will benefit more than others. More than a third of the total cuts would go to households with an annual income of $460,000 or more. About 57 percent of the tax cuts would go to households with a yearly income of $217,000 or more. According to an analysis by the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, the Senate bill would slash taxes on average by about $2,600 per household in 2026. “High-income households would receive much more generous tax benefits”, its analysis said. If the bill does not pass, the child tax credit, currently at $2,000 per child per year, would drop to $1,000 in 2026. However, if the current version of the Senate bill passes, the child tax credit will permanently increase to $2,200. This is a smaller increase than the $2,500 in the version of the bill that the House approved. Makers of traditional petrol-driven cars could benefit from the bill because the Senate version seeks to end the tax credit for purchases of electric vehicles (EVs), worth up to $7,500, starting on September 30. This could decrease consumer demand for EVs, levelling the playing field for cars that run on petrol or diesel. Tips will not be taxed if the bill passes. Currently, workers – whether waiters or other service providers – are required to report all tips in excess of $20 a month to their employers, and those additional earnings are taxed. This bill would end that. Some of the groups that would not benefit include: The Senate version of the bill proposes slashing the food stamps programme, called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), by $68.6bn over a decade, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO). Food stamps help low-income families buy food. In the 2023 fiscal year, 42.1 million people per month benefited from the programme, according to the US Department of Agriculture. The Senate version of the bill proposes federal funding cuts by $930bn to Medicaid, the largest US programme providing healthcare to low-income people. These are cuts to budget outlays by 2034. The bill says that starting in 2026, able-bodied adults under the age of 65 will be required to work 80 hours a month to continue to receive Medicaid, with the exception of those who have dependent children. More than 71 million low-income Americans were enrolled in Medicaid for health insurance as of March. The EV tax credit would end on September 30 if the Senate version of the bill passes. The House version aims to phase out the tax credit by the end of 2025. Billionaire Elon Musk, who owns the EV manufacturer Tesla, has voiced his opposition to the bill online. “I’m sorry, but I just can’t stand it anymore. This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination,” Musk wrote on X on June 3. He doubled down on his criticism before the Senate deliberations on the bill on Saturday. “The latest Senate draft bill will destroy millions of jobs in America and cause immense strategic harm to our country,” Musk wrote on X, a platform he owns. The latest Senate draft bill will destroy millions of jobs in America and cause immense strategic harm to our country! Utterly insane and destructive. It gives handouts to industries of the past while severely damaging industries of the future. https://t.co/TZ9w1g7zHF — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 28, 2025 Some conservatives have criticised the bill, saying it would inflate the country’s enormous debt. The CBO estimated that the Senate version would raise the national debt by $3.3 trillion from 2025 to 2034. Under the House version, the CBO estimated a $2.4 trillion increase in the debt over a decade. The current US national debt stands above $36 trillion and represents 122 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP). Follow Al Jazeera English:...

profile/5377instablog.png.webp

Instablog9ja

Influencer Egungun Recounts How He Almost Linked His Wife Up With A Wealthy Friend For Mere N3k, As He Wishes Her A Happy Birthday

dataDp/1032.jpeg

Worldnews

Israel Has Killed 1,000 Palestinians In The West Bank Since October 7, 2023

Since Israel began its genocidal war on Gaza, it has also killed 1,000 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank. Since October 7, 2023, Israel has escalated its violence in the occupied West Bank, killing 1,000 Palestinians. As the world was distracted by Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, which has killed more than 56,331 people and uprooted nearly the entire population of 2.3 million, Israel ramped up its violent raids on the West Bank, as well as its silence as Israeli settlers attack and kill Palestinian villagers. The most recent casualty was Samer Bassam al-Zagharneh, a young man who was shot by Israeli soldiers on July 1. According to the Wafa Palestinian news agency, al-Zagharneh was killed near the separation barrier, which Israel began building in 2002 to divide Jerusalem from the rest of the West Bank and which cuts through Palestinian communities and agricultural fields. This is all you need to know about how we got here. Israeli forces and Israeli settlers from illegal settlements that are choking the West Bank. Settlers launch sudden, violent raids on towns, burning property, attacking people, and trying to drive them out of their homes. At the same time, the security forces have surrounded refugee camps and raided them relentlessly, driving yet more people from their homes and not allowing them to return. Many settlers have also been handed semi-automatic weapons and “integrated” into Israeli forces in the West Bank, to compensate for all the personnel deployed to carry out the war on Gaza. This has blurred the lines between the security forces and settlers, empowering the latter to escalate violence against Palestinians. To displace Palestinians and annexe their land, according to residents, experts, rights groups, and observers. In 2024, Israel confiscated more Palestinian land in the West Bank than in the previous 20 years combined, according to Peace Now, an Israeli nonprofit tracking land theft in Palestine. Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has led the charge after assuming control of the newly established “Settlements Administration” in February 2023. The position allows Smotrich to advance Israel’s de facto annexation of the occupied West Bank by working to extend Israeli civil law over the area, in direct contravention of international law. Smotrich has approved new outposts – illegal not only under international law but also under Israeli law – confiscated land, and enforced “settlement and construction regulations”. In reality, Smotrich is relying on the occupation and settler violence to uproot Palestinians so that he can extend and approve new illegal Israeli settlements, Al Jazeera previously reported. Every day. Israeli forces killed 70 Palestinians in the West Bank in the first month of 2025. Over the last two months, they have killed 34 people, according to the Shireen Monitor, a local observatory named after the murdered Palestinian Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh. Many of the casualties were the result of Israel’s ongoing raids. Israel says the raids are to root out Palestinian armed groups, which sprang up in 2021 to resist Israel’s worsening violence and entrenching occupation, in refugee camps across the West Bank. However, Israel has reportedly committed myriad human rights abuses on the ground, such as killing unarmed civilians, preventing families from burying their murdered loved ones and razing entire neighbourhoods to the ground to trigger mass displacement. Israel is attacking the refugee camps in Jenin, Tulkarem, Nur Shams, Far’a and Nablus, generating mass displacement. Israel has used some of the same tactics it has deployed in Gaza – such as laying complete siege to the camps and uprooting most of the inhabitants, according to Forensic Architecture, a research group that investigates and monitors human rights abuses. Israel has also attacked medical facilities and bombed Tulkarem and Jenin camps, indiscriminately killing civilians. There were about 1,800 settler attacks across the occupied West Bank between October 7, 2023, and December 16, 2024, according to data collected by Tech for Palestine, a collective of tech volunteers that monitor rights abuses and advocates for the liberation of Palestinians. What’s more, the Israeli army reported that there were at least 414 settler attacks against Palestinians during the first half of 2025. Yet the real figure is likely higher. Many of the attacks have taken place in Area C. The 1993 Oslo Accords, which were signed between Israeli and Palestinian then-leaders to initiate a peace process, carved up the occupied West Bank into three zones: A, B and C. Area A is ostensibly under the full administrative and security control of the Palestinian Authority (PA) – an entity born out of the Oslo Accords – while Area B is under the PA’s administrative governance and Israeli security. Area C makes up more than 60 percent of the occupied West Bank and is under Israeli administrative and security control. It doesn’t look like it. The Israeli army and settlers have stepped up attacks against Palestinians in recent days. The United Nations has warned that the army is trying to evict 12 communities in Masafer Yatta, in the southern Hebron hills in Area C. Israel is trying to justify this expulsion as the area being a “military zone”, and, therefore, needed for military training – a pretext used to uproot Palestinians from their lands for decades. On June 25, about 100 heavily armed Israeli settlers violently attacked Palestinians in the village of Kfar Malik, killing three people. The settlers were reportedly trying to burn homes to the ground when Palestinians came out to try and stop them. In the neighbouring village of Taybeh, settlers burned a car to ashes, as seen in a video obtained by B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights group monitoring abuses against Palestinians. Al Jazeera has spoken to several Palestinians who say they are bracing for more attacks. They often say they are defenceless and fear any resistance will be met with greater force from Israeli troops and settlers. Follow Al Jazeera English:...