Lianne Kolirin, CNN

(CNN) — For weeks, months and even years before World War II broke out in September 1939, many Jewish people in Germany and beyond became increasingly fearful for their lives and frantically sought out ways to flee.

Now, more than 80 years after the end of the war, an incredible trove of documents from a prestigious art school has been unearthed, containing photographs, detailed letters and samples of artworks from nearly 100 applicants who hoped to escape Nazism.

Acceptance to the Bezalel art school (now Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design), first established in 1906, sometimes gave Jews fleeing Nazism the possibility of entering Palestine, immigration to which was tightly controlled under the British Mandate.

Only a fraction of those who applied were accepted, and among those even fewer were able to undertake the journey.

The documents were discovered on the shelves of the municipal archives of Jerusalem in 2022 by staff from Bezalel’s archive who were researching the institution’s history. What they found amazed them: Dozens of detailed applications dating back to the 1930s which had never been digitized or even researched.

They reached out to Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center in Jerusalem, in the hope of preserving evidence of what, for many, turned out to be a last-ditch attempt to find a safe haven.

Yad Vashem’s researchers set about researching the applicants, comparing details in the file with information in their extensive databases.

“It’s very, very special to find such a huge collection that hasn’t been touched or researched before,” said Orit Noiman, head of Yad Vashem’s “Gathering the Fragments” initiative, which collects, preserves and catalogues Holocaust-era artifacts from personal collections. While some of those were found to have survived, “most of the applicants we’ve looked at up until now were killed,” she explained in a video call.

Applications came from across Europe, including Amsterdam, Berlin, Vienna, Prague and Łódź. Most date from the 1930s, although several were made during and even after the war.

It’s unclear how the files came to be in the archives, located in Jerusalem’s city hall, but Noiman believes they may have been accidentally left behind when Bezalel moved premises in 1990.

Noiman believes the submitted portfolios indicate that while some aspiring artists applied, many did so not out of a lifelong desire to pursue a career in art, but their desperate hope of fleeing the Nazis.

“They might have known how to paint or make something with their hands, but they weren’t really artists. It’s clear they wanted to try and find a way out,” she said.

A fuller picture is drawn from another element in the paperwork: a slew of correspondence between Bezalel’s then director Josef Budko, the Jewish Agency and other organizations that hoped to facilitate a large-scale rescue of persecuted Jews.

“There are letters from Budko which show they tried to find ways to help these young people,” said Noiman.

Lital Spivak and Neta Eran-Cohen were the two Bezalel researchers who made the discovery.

“We were both astonished and deeply moved,” Spivak, now an art historian working on a PhD at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem that incorporates the research, told CNN in an email. She detailed correspondence showing Budko attempting to obtain immigration certificates as well as financial support for accepted candidates – which in many cases proved successful.

Spivak said the archive featured 88 personal files, but that around 40 further individuals were mentioned in Budko’s correspondence. A total of 49 candidates were accepted, she said, but only 27 succeeded in traveling to Jerusalem to study at Bezalel.

“Others emigrated e

By Paula Reid, Casey Gannon, CNN

(CNN) — The Trump Justice Department released a new report Tuesday accusing the Biden administration of unfairly using a federal law meant to protect access to abortion clinics to go after anti-abortion protesters.

The report is the first product from DOJ’s “Weaponization Working Group” – established early in President Donald Trump’s second term – and comes as Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche faces pressure to pursue prosecutions against Trump’s political adversaries.

The report accuses the Biden Justice Department of being biased in its enforcement of the FACE Act, which was passed in 1994 in the wake of attacks on abortion providers. The law also prohibits threats or obstruction at places of religious worship.

Biden’s former top civil rights lawyer defended the department’s work.

“The Civil Rights Division brought law enforcement leaders, crisis pregnancy center representatives, faith leaders, and reproductive health care staff together to address the real violence, threats of violence, and obstruction that too many people face in our country when it comes to reproductive health care,” Kristen Clarke said in a statement. “We enforced the law even-handedly and put public safety at the center of this work.”

CNN has also reached out to other Biden DOJ officials for comment.

Earlier this year, Trump’s DOJ used the FACE act to bring charges against former CNN journalist Don Lemon and others after a protest entered a church in Minnesota.

The Biden administration initiated approximately two dozen cases under the act.

The Justice Department now accuses Biden prosecutors of engaging in inappropriate conduct and withholding evidence in cases it brought against anti-abortion activists. They also accuse prosecutors of trying to screen jurors based on religion and using “aggressive” arrest tactics.

The Trump administration repeatedly points to the arrest of Mark Houck – an anti-abortion rights activist and Catholic father of seven – who was accused of pushing an escort outside of a Planned Parenthood facility. The report accuses the Biden Justice Department of letting the FBI move forward with a coordinated arrest for Houck instead of allowing him to surrender to law enforcement.

The report also alleges the lead Biden prosecutors on each FACE Act prosecution served as a reference for the National Abortion Federation’s application for a private grant. The report accuses Sanjay Patel, a longtime prosecutor in the Civil Rights Division who specialized in FACE Act prosecution, of ethical violations related to the group’s grant application.

Patel and at least three others who worked on FACE Act prosecutions were fired Monday, according to a source familiar with the matter.

“DOJ has terminated the employment of personnel responsible for weaponizing the FACE Act who still remained at the department,” a spokesperson for the Justice Department said.

CNN has attempted to reach Patel for comment.

The report says the Biden DOJ pursued significantly harsher sentences for anti-defendants than violent pro-abortion defendants. According to a press release from the Justice Department, the Biden DOJ requested an average of 26.8-month sentences for anti-abortion advocates in comparison to the 12.3-month sentences they recommended for pro-abortion defendants it prosecuted.

“This Department will not tolerate a two-tiered system of justice,” said acting Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. “No Department should conduct selective prosecution based on beliefs. The weaponization that happened under the Biden Administration will not happen again, as we restore integrity to our prosecutorial system.”

CNN

By Meteorologists Chris Dolce, Briana Waxman and CNN’s Hanna Park

(CNN) — A week of severe storm threats across the Central US started with a bang Monday, with multiple tornadoes demolishing buildings in Kansas, heavy rain stranding vehicles on flooded streets in Wisconsin and hail up to softball size battering parts of four states. It’s part of a weeklong severe weather threat across the region – and today has the potential to be the most dangerous.

Tornadoes were confirmed Monday in eastern Kansas, northern Iowa, southern Minnesota and northern Wisconsin. Nearly softball-sized hail fell south of Minneapolis and damaging winds toppled power lines and trees in northeast Illinois.

On Tuesday, tens of millions of people from the Texas-Mexico border to the Great Lakes are at risk of seeing a severe storm, including in Chicago, Milwaukee and Des Moines, Iowa, where there’s a Level 3 of 5 threat for large hail, damaging wind gusts and tornadoes.

About a dozen states from Texas to the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes will see a threat of severe storms on one or more days through Friday. The threat zone will shift each day depending on where surges of jet stream energy mix with warm, humid air to trigger intense thunderstorms.

Dangerous flooding is also a concern, especially where rivers are already running high in water-logged northern Michigan and northern Wisconsin.

Tornadoes and giant hail

Monday’s most intense severe storms produced several tornadoes in eastern Kansas and dropped hail ranging in size from golf balls to softballs across southern Minnesota and central Wisconsin. More than 80,000 customers are without power in Wisconsin early Tuesday, according to PowerOutage.us, after rounds of severe thunderstorms blasted through overnight.

Multiple buildings were “demolished” after a tornado touched down in Kansas’ Linn County, Randy Hegwald, the county’s emergency management director, told CNN. A lake community southeast of Mound City “took a direct hit,” but only a few minor injuries have been reported, Hegwald said.

About 45 miles north, a tornado impacted dozens in the city of Hillsdale, Miami County Undersheriff Matthew Kelly told CNN. One minor injury has been reported, and emergency officials are working to arrange shelter for those displaced from their homes.

The storm also caused structural damage in nearby Ottawa, most of which was without power Monday night, according to Franklin County Emergency Management.

Senator Jerry Moran, who represents Kansas, said he was “hearing reports of potential tornado damage” in Ottawa and urged residents to heed warnings from weather officials.

Timing the severe storms

Going forward, the biggest concern continues to be large hail, which could dent cars, shatter windshields and damage roofs. The storms could also produce a few more tornadoes and winds strong enough to down trees and power lines.

Tuesday could have the most widespread number of severe s

SANTA MARIA, Calif. (KEYT) Firefighter crews are on the scene of a crash involving two semi trucks on highway 166 east of Pine Canyon.

Authorities say the collision happened at 9:50 pm Monday night and involved an offset head-on crash between the big rigs.

Two people were evaluated at the scene for minor injuries, but neither was taken to the hospital.

Highway 166 is currently closed in both directions as crews work to clear the trucks and contain a small fuel leak.

The cause of the crash remains under investigation, and no other injuries have been reported

Drivers are urged to avoid the area and use alternate routes.

The post Lanes closed after two semi-trucks collide appeared first on News Channel 3-12.

Análisis por Simone McCarthy, CNN

China, el mayor importador de energía del mundo, ha capeado hasta ahora bien la crisis energética mundial provocada por la guerra en el Golfo, en comparación con algunos de sus vecinos asiáticos.

Pero a medida que los mercados mundiales de combustible siguen siendo volátiles en medio de un frágil alto el fuego entre Estados Unidos e Irán y un nuevo bloqueo militar estadounidense que amenaza las exportaciones iraníes, lo que está en juego en este conflicto no hace más que aumentar para Beijing.

¿Una de las razones? Como principal importador de petróleo iraní, China es el país que más se verá afectado por las medidas estadounidenses que impactan su flujo.

Así fue el mes pasado, cuando la Casa Blanca levantó ciertas sanciones estadounidenses sobre los barriles iraníes, como ahora, cuando las fuerzas del Petágono han establecido un bloqueo de los puertos iraníes.

Es posible que estas medidas no provoquen una escasez inmediata en China, que se ha preparado bien para una crisis energética.

Pero esto ejerce aún más presión sobre la segunda economía más grande del mundo, justo cuando las subidas de los precios mundiales del combustible empiezan a tener repercusiones.

También, al mismo tiempo que los diplomáticos se preparan para un viaje crucial, y que ya se ha retrasado una vez, del presidente Donald Trump para reunirse con Xi Jinping en Beijing, previsto para el mes que viene.

Durante semanas, funcionarios chinos han recorrido el circuito diplomático abogando por la paz en la guerra entre Estados Unidos e Israel con Irán, un estrecho socio diplomático del gigante de Asia.

Trump incluso sugirió que China ayudó a que Irán se sentara a la mesa de negociaciones en las últimas semanas.

La forma en que Beijing ajuste ahora su diplomacia en esta fase crítica del alto el fuego estará ligada a la presión a la que esté sometida su economía.

“Con más intereses chinos en juego, Estados Unidos podría lograr que China se involucre más para impulsar a Irán hacia una solución negociada”, afirmó Yun Sun, director del Programa de China del centro de estudios Stimson Center en Washington.

Y agregó: “China recurrirá a la presión diplomática, tanto bilateral como multilateral, para lograr el rápido levantamiento del bloqueo”.

Entonces, ¿qué tan importantes son las implicaciones económicas para Beijing?

La mayor parte de la enorme cantidad de energía necesaria para impulsar la economía china y su sector manufacturero se produce en el país, y sus carreteras albergan una flota de vehículos eléctricos en rápido crecimiento que no dependen del gas.

Si bien China aún depende en gran medida de las importaciones de petróleo, que representan aproximadamente el 18 % de su matriz energética, Beijing lleva tiempo trabajando para diversificar su suministro.

Fundamentalmente, también se anticipó, acumulando suficientes reservas de petróleo para abastecerse durante al menos tres meses, entre las reservas comerciales y las estratégicas nacionales, según estiman los analistas, lo que proporciona a la economía china un margen de maniobra considerable.

El Gobierno chino ha dado luz verde a las refinerías estatales para que exploten las reservas comerciales de petróleo mientras la guerra con Irán se prolonga, informó Bloomberg News el jueves, citando a personas familiarizadas con el asunto.

Aun así, China no es inmune a las fl