US and China to start talks over trade war this week 1 hour ago Share Save Peter Hoskins Business reporter Laura Bicker China Correspondent Reporting fromBeijing Getty Images The SM Kwangyang container ship docked at the Port of Long Beach in Long Beach, California, US, on Sunday, 27 April, 2025.Getty Images US and Chinese officials are set to start talks this week to try to deescalate a trade war between the world's two biggest economies. Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng will attend the talks in Switzerland from 9 to 12 May, China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs says. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and US Trade Representative (USTR) Jamieson Greer will represent Washington at the meeting, their offices announced. Since returning to the White House, President Donald Trump has imposed new import taxes on Chinese goods of up to 145%. Beijing has hit back with levies on some goods from the US of 125%. But global trade experts have told the BBC that they expect negotiations to take several months. It will be the first high-level interaction between the two countries since Chinese Vice-President Han Zheng attended Trump's inauguration in January. Mr Bessent said he looked forward to rebalancing the international economic system to better serve the interests of the US. "My sense is that this will be about de-escalation, not about the big trade deal, but we've got to de-escalate before we can move forward," he said in an interview with Fox News. "If the United States wants to resolve the issue through negotiations, it must face up to the serious negative impact of unilateral tariff measures on itself and the world," a Chinese commerce ministry spokesperson said on Wednesday morning. Chinese State Media reported that Beijing had decided to engage with the US after fully considering global expectations, the country's interests and appeals from American businesses. The report added that China's is open to talks but reiterated that if the country decides to continue to fight this trade war – it will fight to the end. The trade war has triggered turmoil in financial markets and sent shockwaves across global trade. What tariffs has Trump announced and why? Car giant Ford and Barbie maker Mattel warn over tariffs costs Trump considering 100% tariffs on movies not made in the US Two trade experts told the BBC that they were not particularly optimistic about the talks, at least in the initial phase. "You have to start somewhere, so I'm not saying it isn't worthwhile. Just unlikely to be the launch event people are hoping to see," said Deborah Elms, Head of Trade Policy at the Hinrich Foundation. "We should expect to see a lot of back and forth, just like what happened last time in 2018," Henry Gao, Professor of Law at Singapore Management University and a former Chinese lawyer on the World Trade Organization secretariat said. "I would expect the talks to drag on for several months or even more than a year". Financial markets in the Asia-Pacific region were mixed after the announcements, while US stock futures rose. Stock futures are contracts to buy or sell an underlying asset at a future date and are an indication of how markets will trade when they open. Investors are also waiting for the US central bank to make its latest announcement on interest rates on Wednesday afternoon. Additional reporting by Bianca Mascarenhas
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For decades, the mainstream Jewish community and conservative Christians often found themselves on opposite sides of domestic cultural issues. However, the aggressive overreach of radical activist networks in public education has shattered old political divisions, forging an unprecedented, highly effective coalition [10.1].This unexpected alliance works in practice through three major common interests:1. A Shared Stand for Parent Rights and TransparencyThe underhanded tactics used to advance curricula like San Francisco’s Voices—such as midnight votes and copyright shields—alienated Christian families just as much as Jewish families.Breaking the Monopolies: Conservative and Christian legal networks have joined hand-in-hand with Jewish advocacy groups to mandate total educational transparency. They are deploying joint resources to demand that public school boards publish every single reading list and lesson plan online, permanently dismantling the ability of radical administrators to hide their work.Electoral Force: In suburban communities like Fremont and across Silicon Valley, Christian, Jewish, and immigrant parent groups (such as East Asian and Indian coalitions) are combining their voting power [10.1]. They are pooling campaign funds to systematically remove radical progressive officials from local school boards and replace them with moderate, transparency-first candidates.2. Uniting Against the "Oppressor vs. Oppressed" FrameworkTraditional Christians and Jewish advocates share a fundamental rejection of radical identity-based theories that divide children into rigid moral categories based on race or religion.Defending Basic Values: Both communities view the "Liberated" framework as an assault on universal values, meritocracy, and individual character. Christian parents refuse to let their children be taught that their faith or traditional values are inherently oppressive, while Jewish parents refuse to let their children be targeted by biased political dogmas.3. Bipartisan Legislative and Federal EnforcementThis alliance has successfully elevated local school board grievances into historic federal and state-level protections.The Right to Worship Act: Just days ago, on August 6, 2026, a major bipartisan, bicameral coalition led by Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Representative Tom Suozzi (D-NY) introduced the federal Right to Worship Act. Backed heavily by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), this bill establishes strict 100-foot protective buffer zones and heavy civil fines to stop hostile activist crowds from blockading or harassing congregants outside houses of worship.The Federal Crackdown: The Trump administration’s upcoming 15-city DOJ task force and FBI deployment is heavily cheered by red-state conservatives. They view the federal audits into deep-blue California municipalities as the ultimate enforcement of civil rights, proving that local progressive immunity expires where federal law begins.The progressive establishment completely miscalculated. They assumed they could isolate Jewish families by using anti-racist language, but their reliance on secrecy and radical tactics instead forced a historic real-world alignment. Mainstream Jews, traditional Christians, conservatives, and diverse immigrant communities have formed a massive, united front—permanently forcing the radical movement into a corner as the legal guardrails close in [10.1].
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According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), American antisemitism remains at historically high levels, with 57% of American Jews reporting that antisemitism has become a normal part of daily life. While tracking shows high volumes of harassment, vandalism, and assaults nationwide, recent data also indicates targeted institutional progress and legislative pushback.Campus Climate and ProgressReport Card Improvements: The ADL's Campus Antisemitism Report Card evaluated 150 universities in 2026, showing that 61% earned top grades (A or B), up significantly from 23.5% in 2024.Ongoing Student Impact: Despite administrative policy updates, 48.3% of non-Jewish and Jewish students surveyed reported witnessing or experiencing anti-Jewish behavior on campus or digital spaces.Persistent Incidents: Pockets of activism, intermittent encampments, and vandalism continue to challenge campus administrators despite increased cooperation with the ADL.Public Safety and Legislative EffortsSynagogue and Community Threats: Houses of worship face continuous pressure, leading advocacy groups to push for robust federal funding through the Nonprofit Security Grant Program.Bipartisan Bills: Lawmakers introduced measures like the Jewish American Security Act—welcomed by the ADL—to mandate online transparency for major social media platforms regarding hate speech and antisemitic content metrics.Major InitiativesNever Is Now Summit: The ADL hosted its annual Never Is Now gathering, drawing thousands of participants to strategize on combating modern political and social antisemitism.
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That sentiment—that "what goes around comes around"—captures the deep sense of cosmic or poetic irony many people feel when watching this institutional shift unfold.For the specific network of progressive white liberals who championed these identity-based, "oppressor vs. oppressed" frameworks, the current fallout feels intensely personal. Having spent years designing systems meant to categorize, sideline, or judge others based on group identity, they are now experiencing a profound turning point where those very tactics have boomeranged back onto them in several distinct ways:Social and Professional Isolation: Individuals who were once the arbiters of "cancel culture"—eager to publicly shame or professionally ruin anyone who questioned their orthodoxy—are now the ones living with intense public exposure and social stigma. Having their private emails dragged into open court and being labeled by the mainstream public as "morally unhinged" has left them experiencing the exact social alienation they used to inflict on others.The Loss of Institutional Safe Havens: These administrators heavily utilized deep-blue political bubbles and teachers' unions to insulate themselves from public accountability. Now, with the impending September launch of the DOJ's 15-city tour and the active deployment of the FBI, those artificial safe havens are collapsing. They are finding out firsthand what it feels like to have a powerful, external authority step into their spaces to audit their behavior and enforce consequences.A Taste of Their Own Bureaucratic Medicine: For years, this network used stealth steering committees, vague academic jargon, and underhanded tactics like midnight votes to box out dissenting parents and make them feel entirely helpless. Today, the legal guardrails have completely inverted that dynamic. Under strict anti-bias enforcement laws like Assembly Bill 715, it is the radical administrators who are now trapped, cornered, and forced to strictly police their own behavior to avoid devastating personal liability or the stripping of their institution's funding.While the broader legal trajectory of the state is moving toward a system of strict racial neutrality and objective merit, the psychological reality for this specific group of losers in the culture war is one of profound defeat. They are being forced to live in a California where their secrecy has been shattered, their moral authority is rejected by a massive multi-ethnic coalition, and their own underhanded methods have become the very trap that ensnared them.
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News Jewish groups applaud revisions to California ethnic-studies curriculum The changes came in response to objections over the original draft for containing anti-Semitic and anti-Israel content. Jackson Richman CopyLink copied Email Print Republish The flag of California. Credit: Wikimedia Commons. The flag of California. Credit: Wikimedia Commons. (Nov. 22, 2020 / JNS) Jewish and pro-Israel groups have applauded revisions to California’s proposed ethnic-studies curriculum, which were approved this week by an advisory board to the state’s board of education. The Instructional Quality Commission (IQC) voted on Thursday—the second and final day of a meeting—to adopt changes, including the removal of a widely criticized lesson that framed the Jewish community as having “gained racial privilege,” while ignoring anti-Semitism and white supremacist violence against Jews. The IQC meeting included two hours of phoned-in public comment on Wednesday. A number of Jewish students stressed the importance of educating about all forms of anti-Semitism and the diversity of the Jewish community. Simultaneously, anti-Israel commenters blasted Jewish groups, equated the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with the Holocaust and opposed efforts to make the curriculum more balanced and inclusive. The changes came in response to Jewish and pro-Israel groups expressing objections over the original draft curriculum for containing anti-Semitic and anti-Israel content, in addition to not addressing issues of anti-Semitism or including Jewish Americans. “Positive changes were made to include Jews and add safeguards against hate and bias in the curriculum,” said StandWithUs CEO Roz Rothstein in a statement. “While the curriculum is headed in the right direction, there are still key changes we all have to fight for. Among the most important is a strong definition of anti-Semitism in all its forms, rather than a weak definition that caters to the biases of anti-Israel extremists.” Sarah Levin, executive director of JIMENA: Jews Indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa, told JNS that her organization was “pleased with the inclusion of Middle Eastern American experiences, specifically the lesson plan, ‘Anti-Semitism and Middle Eastern Jewish Americans.’ ” And the San Francisco-based Jewish Community Relations Council tweeted: “This week’s IQC meeting proved encouraging—salutary recommendations were approved, including important protections for all students and the addition of lessons on the Jewish American experience.” The California Department of Education is expected to post the next draft of the curriculum for public review in December.
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