The mother of a 23-year-old American among the 132 hostages who remain held by Hamas militants said Sunday that the U.S. should not be considered a ‘neutral negotiator’ and ‘was also a victim’ on Oct. 7.

On Mother’s Day, Rachel Goldberg-Polin, mother of 23-year-old Hersh Goldberg-Polin, said during an appearance on ‘Fox News Sunday’ that ‘it’s clear not enough is being done because we still have 132 cherished souls who are being held captive for 219 days, and within that cohort of 132 souls, there are the American 8.’ 

Fox News correspondent Benjamin Hall asked Goldberg-Polin whether she wanted to see ceasefire talks continue. 

‘I think we really have to be creative and inciteful and figure out a way forward. Both sides really have to figure out a way forward, and calling for a timeout certainly will give some time for people to start to think straight again,’ Goldberg-Polin said in response. ‘I think really what gets lost in this is America should not be considered sort of this neutral negotiator. America was also a victim on Oct. 7. Forty-five Americans were killed on Oct. 7. Twelve were taken into captivity, and eight are still being held hostage.’ 

‘And I certainly want all the suffering in the region, and there’s so much suffering to go around, I mean there’s no competition here. There are hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians in Gaza who are suffering, and there are also 132 innocent civilians in Gaza who were dragged there on Oct. 7 who are suffering. I think people have trouble holding those two truths, and that does an injustice to everyone involved,’ she said. 

Goldberg-Polin said she did not believe most Americans know that American innocent civilians still remain held captive in Gaza, as do people from other nationalities around the world. 

‘There are a lot of people in that hostage cohort that we don’t hear about,’ she said. ‘When we hear a lot of noise about the hostages being held you very rarely hear about the Muslim Arabs who are hostage, you very rarely hear about the Thai Buddhists who are hostage, you very rarely hear about the Black Christian Africans who are being held hostage. There’s Nepalese. There are Mexicans, there are Argentinians, there are Germans, and somehow there has been an attempt to make this group of people a monolithic, homogenous group.’ 

‘I find it curious and suspicious that for whatever reason, that has not been publicly saturating the news,’ Goldberg-Polin added. 

‘Do you think that an Israeli invasion into Rafah – do you think that perhaps that would put your son, put all these other hostages, their lives in danger? Hall also asked. 

‘I’m not a military strategist,’ Goldberg-Polin responded. ‘I am a mother who is horribly, miserably worried about her only son who has been in an active war zone for 219 days, along with 131 other people.’ 

She noted how the oldest remaining hostage is Shlomo Mansour an 86-year-old grandfather, while the youngest is Kfir Bibas, a one-and-a-half-year-old child. 

‘We have daughters, sons, sisters, brothers, spouses, fathers, mothers, grandparents, and we are all horribly worried about our loved ones being in harm’s way,’ she added. 

The Oct. 7 attack killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took another 250 hostage. Militants still hold about 100 captives and the remains of more than 30. Internationally mediated talks over a cease-fire and hostage release appear to be at a standstill.

Israeli forces pushed deeper into Gaza’s southern city of Rafah on Sunday and battled Hamas in parts of the devastated north that the military said it had cleared months ago but where militants have regrouped, the Associated Press reported. Warnings continued against the growing offensive in Rafah, considered the last refuge in Gaza for more than a million civilians as well as Hamas’ last stronghold. 

Some 300,000 people have fled Rafah following evacuation orders from Israel, which says it must invade to dismantle Hamas and return scores of hostages taken in the Oct. 7 attack against Israel that sparked the war. 

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reiterated opposition to a major military assault on Rafah, telling CBS that Israel would ‘be left holding the bag on an enduring insurgency’ without an exit from Gaza and postwar governance plan.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., said Friday that military aid to Israel should continue in a departure from the White House position.

In a statement, Cardin said he disagreed with President Biden, who has threatened to withhold offensive aid from Israel if it proceeds with a ground invasion of the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where millions of Palestinians have sought refuge from the war. 

‘While the most recent report regarding Israel under the NSM-20 has raised concerns, I agree with its assessment that Israel has not violated International Humanitarian Law and that military assistance to support Israel’s security remains in the U.S. interest and should continue,’ Cardin said. 

‘In this regard, I differ with President Biden’s recent decision,’ he said. 

Cardin’s statement came in response to a State Department report released Friday, which raised ‘serious concerns’ based on credible U.N. and non-governmental sources about alleged human rights violations by Israeli forces. The report documented credible allegations of human rights abuses by Israeli security forces, ‘including arbitrary or unlawful killings, enforced disappearance, torture, and serious abuses in conflict.’ 

The State Department report also said an estimated 34,700 Palestinians have been killed in the conflict with Israel since the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attack, citing figures from the Gaza Ministry of Health. The report deemed the estimate ‘credible’ but noted that the Hamas-controlled ministry does not distinguish between Hamas fighters and civilians in casualty counts.

The State Department said it is ‘reasonable to assess’ that U.S. defense articles ‘have been used by Israeli security forces since October 7 in instances inconsistent with its [international humanitarian law] obligations or with established best practices for mitigating civilian harm.’ However, the report came short of accusing Israel of specific humanitarian law violations and noted that Hamas hides military targets behind civilian populations and infrastructure. 

Israel’s continued military operation in Gaza has created a political problem for Biden as left-wing anti-Israel agitators in the U.S. have grown increasingly upset at his support for Israel. 

Biden signed off on a pause of a shipment of bombs to Israel that could be used in a potential assault on Rafah last week — but the White House National Security Council kept the decision quiet until after the president delivered a long-planned speech on Tuesday to mark Holocaust Remembrance Day, the Associated Press reported.

The shipment was supposed to consist of 1,800 2,000-pound bombs and 1,700 500-pound bombs, a senior U.S. administration official told the AP on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter. 

In an interview with CNN on Wednesday, Biden said he would halt some shipments of U.S. weapons to Israel if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered a major invasion of the city of Rafah, the last major Hamas stronghold in the Gaza Strip. It was the first time Biden said he was prepared to condition American weaponry on Israel’s action in the seven-month-long war launched in response to the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks. 

‘Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs and other ways in which they go after population centers,’ Biden told CNN’s Erin Burnett. ‘I made it clear that if they go into Rafah – they haven’t gone in Rafah yet — if they go into Rafah, I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities — that deal with that problem.’ 

His decision has prompted backlash from a growing chorus of pro-Israel Democratic lawmakers — now including Cardin — some of whom have suggested Biden’s decision was motivated by politics and the upcoming election in November. 

‘I suspect it’s pandering to the far left,’ Rep. Ritchie Tores, D-N.Y., told Axios. ‘It looks like election year politics was driving it. That’s my impression.’ 

The Democratic Party is divided on Israel amid a massive wave of student protests at U.S. college and university campuses. Anti-Israel agitators have set up illegal encampments on at least 50 campuses and more than 2,800 have been arrested by police called to disperse the unlawful gatherings, according to the Associated Press.

Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., an outspoken advocate for Israel’s right to defend itself from Hamas, told Axios that he opposed Biden’s pause on weapons shipments. 

‘I strenuously disagree,’ Fetterman said. ‘We have to stand with our key ally throughout all of this.’

Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., said security assistance to Israel should be ‘unconditional’ while Israel faces threats from Iran and its proxy groups, like Hamas. 

‘The administration should not do anything that undermines Israel’s ability to defeat Hamas and address mounting threats across the region,’ she told Jewish Insider.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., agreed that U.S. support for Israel should continue. 

‘I don’t know what the president meant. I haven’t seen what the actual operation in Rafah is, but I certainly hope that we’ll continue to provide support militarily and diplomatically that Israel needs to defend itself,’ he said. 

The White House pushed back on the suggestion that Biden’s decision on Israel was motivated by politics. 

‘The American people expect their presidents to have the guts to make hard national security decisions, and to put our safety, interests, principles, and alliances above politics,’ White House spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement. ‘That’s exactly what Joe Biden is doing.  He is standing with Israel as they fight the Hamas terrorists who committed the hideous October 7th attacks, and is making clear that how Israel defends itself matters because we do not want to see any more civilians killed.’

‘Joe Biden is the only president in our history to have ordered the American military to actively defend Israel from a foreign attack, and the only president to have literally stood with Israel — on Israeli soil — during wartime,’ Bates added. 

Fox News Digital’s Jeffrey Clark and Danielle Wallace contributed to this report.

A controversial judicial nominee proposed by President Biden will expire at the end of the 118th Congress in just months, and some experts are speculating that this is just what the president and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., are planning for. 

‘This nominee has lost all hope from the Biden White House of getting a floor vote, given we are months away from the election,’ explained Ron Bonjean, a former spokesman for former Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., and former chief of staff of the Senate Republican Conference. 

‘They are more than likely going to let him twist in the wind hoping he withdraws on his own,’ he continued. Bonjean ran communications for the Senate confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch while working in the upper chamber and has experience with the process. 

Neither the White House nor Schumer’s office provided comment to Fox News Digital regarding their plans for Mangi’s nomination and whether it would ever see the chamber floor for a vote, where it would likely fail.  

‘Having a vote and losing it, due to members of your own party, would only serve to advertise the problems the president is having related to the Israel-Hamas war,’ said Grant Reeher, a political science professor at Syracuse University. 

Ross Baker, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Rutgers University, suggested, ‘If there is any way in which a member of Congress can avoid taking a controversial vote, that would be the course that they will take on this nomination.’

One of the significant critiques of Mangi’s nomination has been his association with the Rutgers University Center for Security, Race and Rights (CSRR), where he served on the board of advisers from 2019 to 2023. CSRR has been accused of antisemitism, particularly in the wake of the Hamas terrorist attack against Israel and subsequent war.

Critics have pointed to an event held on the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that hosted controversial speakers such as Hatem Bazian, who in 2004 called for an ‘intifada,’ according to video from an anti-war protest in San Francisco. 

Another speaker was Sami Al-Arian, who, In 2006, pleaded guilty to ‘conspiring to provide services to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad,’ according to the Justice Department. 

Noura Erakat, a human rights attorney, Palestinian-American activist and associate professor at Rutgers, has also been a speaker for CSRR. It was uncovered that she had separately been advertised as a panelist for an event alongside Hamas commander Ghazi Hamad. 

CSRR did not provide comment to Fox News Digital.

‘That’s not a message you want six months out from an election,’ Reeher added. 

The political science professor concluded that the odds of Mangi’s confirmation are low, noting, ‘Three Democrats have publicly said they would vote no, and it’s unlikely that he will get any Republican votes.’

Both Democratic Nevada Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto and Jacky Rosen came out against Biden’s nominee, citing concerns from law enforcement constituents and Mangi’s connection to a controversial and allegedly anti-law enforcement group. 

Mangi is a current advisory board member of the Alliance of Families for Justice (AFJ). The group’s founding board member was Kathy Boudin, who notably pleaded guilty to the felony murder of two police officers in 1981 after they died following an armored truck robbery. 

The robbery was carried out by the Weather Underground Organization, an FBI-designated domestic terrorist group, of which Boudin was a part.  

‘If religion, by itself, should not be an obstacle to confirmation, association with a controversial organization would probably be fatal,’ Baker explained.

‘Judges, especially, should be seen as free of problematic associations,’ he added. 

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin, D-Ill., has emerged as the fiercest proponent for Mangi, even as his confirmation likelihood looks dim. 

A spokesperson for the committee told Fox News Digital, ‘Sen. Durbin will continue to point out the false, baseless nature of Senate Republicans’ accusations against Mr. Mangi, a historic nominee who is well-qualified for the federal bench. These guilt-by-association smears are blatantly hypocritical coming from Senate Republicans and their dark money allies, who worked to confirm objectively unqualified nominees to the federal bench during the Trump Administration.’ 

Durbin did not provide comment on whether he thinks Biden and Schumer are waiting for the nomination to expire and whether he would be frustrated by this. 

His office also did not say if he would like to see it come to the floor for a vote. 

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., a member of the committee, claimed, ‘Adeel Mangi’s credible ties to antisemites and terrorist sympathizers make him wholly unqualified to serve as an appellate judge.’

‘By refusing to pull his nomination, President Biden is choosing to play electoral politics with our country’s judiciary,’ he said. 

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., addressed the still-active nomination of Mangi in floor remarks on Thursday, criticizing Democrats for mounting ‘an all-out campaign to gin up left-wing support for Mr. Mangi.’ 

He claimed they ‘can’t rebut these disqualifying associations because they’re facts.’

‘For the past few months, Democrats have paraded Mr. Mangi in front of liberal interest groups in order to secure their endorsements,’ McConnell explained, referring to a number of endorsements the Biden administration has rolled out to shore up support for the nominee, who would be the first Muslim circuit appellate court judge. 

The minority leaders suggested the meetings with these groups call into question Mangi’s ethics. 

Mangi did not return a request for comment to Fox News Digital. 

While Biden doesn’t appear to be publicly pushing Mangi’s nomination in the wake of Democratic defectors, ‘There is always a chance that there could be another push to confirm him during the lame duck session before the next Congress,’ said Bonjean.   

Former President Trump on Friday praised his 18-year-old son, Barron, as a ‘smart one,’ adding that the former first son likes to give his dad political advice. 

‘He’s seen it, he doesn’t have to hear it,’ the 2024 presumptive Republican nominee told Philadelphia’s Talk Radio 1210 WPHT after the host asked if he had advised Barron on ‘how nasty’ politics can be.

‘He’s a smart one,’ Trump continued. ‘He doesn’t have to hear much, but he’s a great guy. He’s a little on the tall side. I will tell you, he’s a tall one. But he’s a good-looking guy, and he’s really been a great student and he does like politics.’

He added that Barron, who will be able to vote for the first time this year after turning 18 in March, likes to give him political advice. 

‘It’s sort of funny, he’ll tell me sometimes, ‘Dad, this is what you have to do.’ So anyway, he’s a good guy. He’s a senior now in high school, and he’ll be going to college.’

The 18-year-old had been selected as a delegate by the Florida Republican Party to the Republican National Convention, but declined it in a statement through his mother, Melania Trump’s office. 

‘While Barron is honored to have been chosen as a delegate by the Florida Republican Party, he regretfully declines to participate due to prior commitments,’ the statement said.

The Republican National Convention is scheduled from July 15 through July 18 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 

His older children Eric, who is delegation chair, along with Donald Jr., his fiancée Kimberly Guilfoyle, Tiffany and her husband, Michael Boulos, will serve as Florida delegates, according to The Hill. 

In one of the greatest legal thrillers in film history, ‘Witness for the Prosecution’ (1957), the intrepid defense attorney confronts in court the prosecution’s star witness with her many lies.  

Played by the legendary actor Charles Laughton, the renowned barrister utters two famous sentences that have been recited by real defense attorneys ever since: ‘The question is…were you lying then or are you lying now? Are you not a chronic and habitual liar!’ 

It is indisputable that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s star witness, Michael Cohen, is an incurable and prodigious liar. It may take a full day in the courtroom just to read aloud his endless falsehoods and fabrications.  

So, don’t be surprised if the insufferable Cohen is bedeviled with Laughton’s exact same words when he is cross-examined this week by lawyers for former President Donald Trump.

Weaponization of the law or ‘lawfare,’ by any means, is now justified. It’s the popular currency among Biden Democrats. Abiding by the rule of law is a mere inconvenience, a pesky nuisance. It can be discarded like yesterday’s trash. 

Cohen is a disgraced, disbarred, and convicted perjurer who resided in a federal prison for the incalculable number of lies he peddled for years. He lied to banks, and he lied to Congress. Undeterred, Cohen is still lying. He is the subject of even more pending perjury referrals to the Department of Justice. 

For example, six months ago Cohen admitted that he lied under oath when he copped his original guilty plea. That prompted an incensed federal judge to denounced him recently as a ‘serial perjurer.’ Like Laughton, the judge said he wondered whether Cohen was lying then or lying now. 

Cohen is what is known as a Pinocchio witness. His nose is already so elongated that he may have trouble navigating himself through the courtroom door when he takes the stand on Monday. If he took a lie detector test, the machine would explode in flames.

With Cohen, it’s not a question of linguistic differences. Whenever he speaks, his statements are either demonstrable deceptions or obvious lies.  He wouldn’t know the truth if it slapped him upside his swollen head.  

Like Stormy Daniels before him, Cohen thinks he will be hailed as the indomitable Trump-slayer who saves America. In truth, he’s a loathsome and pathetic figure. Delusional, pompous, immoral, vengeful, and dishonest. And that’s just the top five in a long list of miserable human afflictions.

No ethical prosecutor would ever dare to call such a ticking time bomb as his leading witness. But Bragg and his team of partisan Democrats are desperate to nail Trump. They are bereft of the kind of moral code that normally restrains government prosecutors.  

In the Age of Trump, decency is eclipsed by the political imperative of disabling Joe Biden’s opponent in the upcoming presidential election.  Dictates of conscience are secondary to achieving the goal of wrongfully convicting an electoral enemy.  

Weaponization of the law or ‘lawfare,’ by any means, is now justified. It’s the popular currency among Biden Democrats. Abiding by the rule of law is a mere inconvenience, a pesky nuisance. It can be discarded like yesterday’s trash. 

That is exactly what Bragg has done. His case against the accused is beyond anemic. It is an audacious corruption of the legal process.  

To fulfill his campaign promise to put Trump behind bars, the D.A. orchestrated a phony case by manipulating an inapplicable and expired misdemeanor statute. Then, in a head-spinning pirouette, he usurped federal authority to enforce campaign laws that were never violated.  

Voilà! A criminal case. In name only.

On direct examination, prosecutors will try to foreclose the Laughton line of questioning by preempting the attack. They’ll elicit voluntarily from Cohen his past lying transgressions but try to temper them in the most innocuous way.  Cohen will assure the jury that he is a reformed sinner and is now sincerely telling the truth.  

No sentient person should ever believe him.  

Like Daniels, Cohen has made a career out of spewing his hatred for Trump. Indeed, he profits from it financially.  His livelihood depends on it. Hence, he has every motive to embellish, invent, and lie. It is his only talent.   

On cross-examination, it is inevitable that Cohen will get bludgeoned. It’s too easy. There are simply too many bald-faced lies that can never be explained away or excused. This won’t be a beat-down, it’ll be a savage mauling. 

Cohen’s most recent social media antics will be rich fodder for the defense. During the trial, he has taken to TikTok while trolling for dollars by trashing Trump. He wore a T-shirt depicting his former boss behind bars in an orange jumpsuit. In another appearance, Cohen sported a Superman top because, in his twisted and delusional mind, he sees himself as the superhero of this legal farce. Here I come to save the day!   

Basically, Cohen persists in acting like an idiot, which proves the wisdom of the great American philosopher, Forrest Gump, who observed, ‘Stupid is as stupid does.’

As we enter the fourth week of testimony, none of the witnesses called thus far have connected Trump to any criminal wrongdoing. Apparently, Cohen is the prosecution’s only witness who can attempt to do that.  He’ll lie, of course. It’s a given. And that’s what Bragg is counting on.  

By putting a proven liar with no credibility on the stand, the D.A. is knowingly suborning perjury, which is a criminal act.  He knows in advance that Cohen will never tell the truth.  But who will prosecute Bragg and his confederates?  

The question answers itself.

The U.S. State Department on Friday criticized Israel’s use of U.S-supplied arms in a way that may be ‘inconsistent’ in ‘mitigating civilian harm’ in the war in Gaza. 

A report obtained by Fox News Digital, which was sent to Congress on Friday, admitted that ‘Israel has had to confront an extraordinary military challenge: Hamas has embedded itself deliberately within and underneath the civilian population to use civilians as human shields.’

The report added that ‘it is often difficult to determine facts on the ground in an active war zone of this nature and the presence of legitimate military targets across Gaza.’

Nearly 35,000 Palestinians have been killed in the conflict, including many women and children, according to the Palestinian government. 

The report was commissioned by President Biden to assess if Israel and other U.S. allies are adhering to international humanitarian law. 

Israeli officials have said the country is complying with international law ‘and have identified a number of processes for ensuring compliance that are embedded at all levels of their military decision-making,’ the report said, including giving advanced warnings, using specific weapons and avoiding places like schools, hospitals and places of worship.

‘Although we have gained some insight into Israel’s procedures and rules, we do not have complete information to verify whether’ U.S. arms ‘were specifically used in actions that have been alleged as violations of [international humanitarian law] or international human rights law during the period of the report,’ the report continued. ‘The nature of the conflict in Gaza makes it difficult to assess or reach conclusive findings on individual incidents.’

It said, however, that the United Nations, humanitarian organizations and international humanitarian law experts ‘have reported Israeli civilian harm mitigation efforts as inconsistent, ineffective, and inadequate, failing to provide protection to vulnerable civilians who cannot or chose not to relocate.’

Israel has the capability, experience and tools to mitigate civilian harm, the report said, adding, however, ‘the results on the ground, including high levels of civilian casualties, raise substantial questions as to whether the IDF is using them effectively in all cases.’ 

Despite misgivings, the State Department said it found Israel’s assurances that it had followed international law in the use of U.S. weapons ‘credible and reliable’ and will continue supplying arms.