--:-- Tracy Mumford: From the New York Times, it's the headlines. I'm Tracy Mumford. Today's Thursday, August 21st. Here's what we're covering.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The Israeli military says it's launched, quote, the next phase of its war in Gaza, moving forward with its plans to invade Gaza City and calling up over 50,000 additional troops for the effort.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Israel claims that the city and its surrounding neighborhoods are still a stronghold for Hamas, and said its troops will move into areas they have not previously entered during the war.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Military officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told the Times the operation will unfold in two parts. First, troops will encircle the city and order those still living there to move south. They'll have to pass through checkpoints, where Israel says it will screen for militants.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Then the soldiers will move in, in force. But some Palestinians in Gaza City tell the Times that Israeli troops have already been sending in remote-controlled vehicles, packed with explosives, to blow up buildings block by block.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: One resident said, I hear the big explosions all the time. They are getting closer.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: A government minister from Israel's high-level security cabinet, Eli Cohen, said the operation should turn Gaza City into a wasteland.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: In a recent interview on a right-wing TV channel, he said, Gaza city itself should be exactly like Rafa, which we turned into a city of ruins.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Rafa in southern Gaza was once viewed as a refuge for Palestinians trying to flee the violence, before Israel flattened much of it earlier this year.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Several world leaders rushed to condemn Israel's announcement yesterday that it's stepping up its offensive in the territory, including the president of France, who said that it, quote, risks plunging the entire region into a cycle of permanent war.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Meanwhile, Israel announced another new effort yesterday, despite international outcry, this one in the West Bank.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Officials have approved a highly controversial new settlement project there, even though much of the world considers Israeli settlements in the West Bank to be illegal.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The project had been delayed for more than two decades because of widespread opposition, including from the Biden and Obama administrations.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: But as the Trump administration has eased off on pressuring Israel, the Israeli government has raced forward this summer with its plan, which officials say is explicitly designed to crush Palestinians' hopes for their own independent state.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The idea is to build about 3 housing units on a strip of land that cuts right through the middle of the West Bank effectively chopping the territory into smaller pieces that would be harder to govern as one state in the future
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Israel's far-right finance minister said yesterday that every new housing unit and development would be another, quote, nail in the coffin of the idea of Palestinian statehood.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The Palestinian Authority, which administers parts of the West Bank, called the new settlement a dangerous escalation.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: In Washington, The Times has been covering a sweeping effort by President Trump to put pressure on the people he considers his political enemies.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Over the past few months, top officials in his administration have started to use the federal government's intelligence and law enforcement powers to go after those people, from former President Barack Obama on down, even if there's little evidence of any actual wrongdoing.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The president has given me a new assignment as the director of the Weaponization Working Group.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: At the center of the effort is Ed Martin, a lawyer and Trump fundraiser with virtually no experience overseeing investigations, who Trump tapped earlier this year to serve at the Justice Department.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: There are some really bad actors that did some really bad things to the American people. And if they can be charged, we'll charge them.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: But if they can't be charged, we will name them. And in a culture that respects shame, there should be people that are shamed.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Among the people Martin is now investigating is Letitia James, the attorney general of New York, who successfully brought a case against Trump for inflating the value of his family business.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Martin is now investigating James for allegedly committing fraud in real estate transactions.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: But my colleague Jonah Bromwich has been tracking how, as Martin has gone after James, he's violated the DOJ's own rules and code of ethics.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Ed Martin is appointed to oversee this investigation into Tish James. And days after he's appointed, he sends this very, very unusual letter to one of her lawyers.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: He essentially asks James to resign. And he says he would take it as a sign that she's acting in good faith.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: That in and of itself, to use the power of prosecution, to ask for a political official's resignation, that's far, far outside the norm.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: And then, days after sending this letter, Martin goes to James' house in Brooklyn, wearing a long trench coat in 85-degree weather.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: He appears to be posing for the New York Post. It's just the very image of kind of the law man doing the serious work.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Except of course Justice Department officials who are overseeing investigations like this would never themselves go to the site of an investigation.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: At best they would send an assistant U attorney. More likely it would be an FBI agent.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: So this conduct from Martin is very theatrical, very much in violation of some of the basic principles of prosecution and highlights the way that the Trump administration is playing these investigations for the media, for their base, to score political points and to intimidate the president's enemies.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: This week, the Times learned that another target of Martin's investigations, Senator Adam Schiff, has started a legal defense fund to cover the costs that could come with the increased scrutiny.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Schiff, a Democrat from California, was a key player in the impeachment proceedings against President Trump during his first term, and he was on the committee that investigated the January 6th attack on the Capitol.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Trump has called Schiff a danger to the country and told the Justice Department to investigate him.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: I need some advice right now because I fear that I'm being stalked and I genuinely don't know what to do or who to go to.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: A new investigation from my colleagues at The Athletic has found that a longstanding issue in the world of women's sports is getting worse. stalking.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: At this point, every time I travel, I'm afraid that these men, it's three to six of them, middle-aged, are going to show up and harass me.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The Athletic looked into more than 50 stalking cases involving current or former athletes that have happened in the past few years, including the Olympic sprinter Gabby Thomas, who posted about her experience on social media, and tennis star Emma Raducanu.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: It doesn't look good, does it, for Radhikarni, appears to be in tears here.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: And this is very, very concerning. She's dealt with multiple stalking incidents.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The most high-profile happened at a tournament in Dubai earlier this year, where officials had to stop the match to kick out a man who they said was showing, quote, fixated behavior towards her.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: You never want to see a player in tears on court. This is meant to be a fun game.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Experts say that the stalking problem has been fueled in part by the rising popularity of women's sports, as well as easy access to the athletes on social media.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: In some cases, law enforcement has stepped in. Men who targeted the WNBA players Caitlin Clark and Paige Beckers have faced criminal charges, even jail time.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: And sports leagues are also trying to do more to protect their athletes. The WNBA, NCAA, and Women Tennis Association have all hired a firm that tracks social media activity to find threats and report them.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: And the LPGA recently added a new service for its golfers where they can press a button while out on the course, and security will come straight to their location.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: And finally, for a long time, fan fiction was kind of a niche little corner of the internet.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: It's where people write their own spins on popular movies, TV shows, and books, basically crafting the storylines they want to see with their favorite characters.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: A lot of it relies on the premise, what if they kissed? Think Buffy and Spike, Kirk and Spock, Mulder and Scully, something for everyone.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Over a decade ago, fanfic made the leap to publishing in a big way when Fifty Shades of Grey came out.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: That had started as Twilight fanfic. And this summer, fanfiction has fully established itself as an undeniable force in book sales.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: To understand any of what I'm about to say, you do have to learn a new word. This one is for all my Jermione girlies.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: And I am completely Jermione obsessed. Jermione girlies, I need a recommendation for a fic that's going to wreck me.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Jermione is a super popular subgenre of Harry Potter fanfiction that imagines what would happen if the arrogant Draco Malfoy and the bookish Hermione Granger got together.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Last month, the novel Rose in Chains, which is adapted from a Dramione story originally published online, debuted at number one on the Times' fiction bestseller list.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The number two spot? Also a Dramione adaptation.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The authors have changed all the names to avoid any copyright issues, but everybody knows that the books are channeling Harry Potter, just hotter.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: The books are not G-rated.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Publishing insiders say it's all part of the rise of romanticy, the mix of romance and fantasy that's basically propping up the whole industry right now.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: While fiction sales overall have flattened out, last year, romanticy sales jumped almost 50%.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: Those are the headlines today on The Daily.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: How the far-right activist Laura Loomer has become one of President Trump's most influential advisors, even though she has no official role in the administration.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: You can listen to that in The New York Times app or wherever you get your podcasts.
--:-- Tracy Mumford: I'm Tracy Mumford. We'll be back tomorrow with the latest news and the Friday News Quiz. Thank you.
