In today’s newsletter: Israeli attacks on Lebanon kill hundreds the day after a ceasefire between the U.S., Israel and Iran was announced. Some households say Trump’s “no taxes on tips” pledge has not led to the savings they hoped for. And diehard Buffalo Bills fans take home a piece of NFL history.
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Israeli attacks on Lebanon threaten delicate U.S.-Iran ceasefire
Israel’s military launched what it described as its most powerful attacks on Lebanon on Wednesday, killing hundreds of people and turning joy over the ceasefire in Iran into panic in less than 24 hours.
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The timing of the attacks affirmed what Israeli leadership made clear Tuesday night after the ceasefire was announced: that they remain determined to degrade Iran-backed militants Hezbollah despite U.S.-led talks to end the war.
Verified video and photos from the region showed how strikes shot towering columns of smoke into the sky above Beirut and sparked a desperate evacuation. Lebanon’s Health Ministry put the preliminary death toll from the new strikes at 203
Israel’s decision to attack Lebanon was wearing holes in the delicate U.S.-led diplomacy with Iran. The strikes could also threaten to divide the U.S. and Israel’s wartime alliance.
In response to the attacks, Iran threatened to suspend traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, according to Fars, a semi-official news agency. President Donald Trump’s ultimatum to Iran was centered around the key trade route, and Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said the attacks were a violation of the negotiating framework that Trump had agreed to.
Read more about the significance of the attacks.
Follow our live coverage of the conflict.
More Iran news:
- Oil prices dropped the day after the ceasefire announcement. But that doesn’t mean the price you pay for gas will return to pre-war levels. Find out why in this subscriber exclusive.
- What exactly have the U.S., Israel and Iran agreed to? Who negotiated the ceasefire deal? And what comes next? Here’s what we know — and don’t know so far.
How Trump’s tax law boosts the wealthy and leaves behind some workers he promised to help
Sherie Cummings, a cocktail waitress on the Las Vegas strip, was looking forward to a bigger tax refund this year following Trump’s pledge of no taxes on tips. But that didn’t happen. She and her husband’s tax refund wasn’t as big as expected because of a cap on how much in tips they could deduct. Cummings and her husband are not alone in their disappointment.
Trump has repeatedly touted “no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, no tax on Social Security” as a key success of his second term, and many Americans are benefiting: The average refund this tax season was $3,521, about $350 more than last year, according to IRS data as of March 27.
But some middle-income households are finding the benefits are smaller than they anticipated because of how certain tax cuts are structured, according to interviews with workers, accountants and tax policy analysts. Large groups, including many railroad workers and truck drivers, are excluded from the overtime tax savings. The Social Security deduction excludes both very low and higher earners. And the tips deduction is capped at $25,000 — even for couples like Cummings and her husband who both earn a big share of their wages from tips.
Meanwhile, the highest-income households are reaping the biggest gains. Find out the ways in which some of the wealthiest households could see millions of dollars in savings.
Eerie silence, fluorescent lights and a packed room: Inside the Gilgo Beach killer’s guilty plea
In a drab courtroom 10 miles north of the shoreline where the Gilgo Beach serial killer dumped the bodies of his victims, the man accused of terrorizing Long Island’s coast for nearly two decades stood in front of a judge and uttered a word the grieving families had waited years to hear: “guilty.”
Rex Heuermann, a former Manhattan architect accused of killing seven women, spoke in a high, soft voice that belied his towering 6-foot-4 frame. Hands clasped behind his back and occasionally fidgeting, the 62-year-old answered without hesitation — “yes,” “yes,” “yes” — as the judge asked him a series of questions about the women he admitted to strangling and dismembering during a 17-year period. The proceedings were clinical in nature, funereal in spirit and took all of 30 minutes.
Heuermann pleaded guilty to counts related to seven murders and admitted that he intentionally caused the death of an eighth woman, Karen Vergata. However, as part of a plea deal, he will not be charged with Vergata’s uncharged murder.
In this subscriber exclusive, Matt Lavietes, Daniel Arkin and Adam Reiss share the sights, sounds and mood inside the Suffolk County Courthouse. Read the full story here.
Read All About It
- A husband has been arrested after the disappearance of his American wife in the Bahamas. Brian Hooker says his wife Lynette fell overboard during a dinghy ride on Saturday evening.
- Jasveen Sangha, also known as the “Ketamine Queen,” was sentenced to 15 years for illegally selling the drugs that killed “Friends” actor Matthew Perry.
- The Hawaii doctor charged with trying to kill his wife during a birthday hike last year was convicted of attempted manslaughter.
- A Tennessee county school board voted to censure a member who told a student, “God, you’re hot” at a recent public board meeting.
- ICE arrests of immigrants without criminal convictions have increased eightfold during Trump’s second term, a new analysis shows.
- Want to decrease your dementia risk? New research suggests two simple ways to protect your brain health long-term.
Staff Pick: Selling pieces of Highmark Stadium
It wasn’t clear when we left for our shoot at one of the oldest and most storied venues in the NFL — Highmark Stadium in Orchard Park, New York — what it would feel like inside. After all, it was built more than 50 years ago for a little more than $20 million. Across the street, you’ll find a gleaming new stadium (with the same name) that cost more than $2 billion and features a canopy that shields Buffalo Bills fans from the notoriously frigid winter conditions, a heated playing field and climate-controlled warmup spaces.
And yet… The old Highmark Stadium is a special space. Even with the seats ripped up in rows and the bleachers bent and cracked into pieces along the lower part of the bowl as the dismantling and sell off gets underway, the place just emanates history.
So when Brandon Steiner, a famed collectibles expert who is spearheading the process, tells us that they expect to sell pretty much all of the turf — when many football venues don’t even sell half — that tracks. When he said thousands of season ticket holders are buying their seats, that makes sense. Heck, even when he said there’s serious interest in the bathroom troughs (one was just purchased by a Barstool Sports personality), I guess that lines up, too. This is the story of why one of the most passionate fanbases in professional sports will do just about anything to get a piece of their history. — Sam Brock, correspondent
NBC Select: Online Shopping, Simplified
It’s never too late to invest in quality wellness gear. The NBC Select team spent over eight weeks testing dozens of leggings to find the absolute best ones on the market right now. We also found a simple way to upgrade your home workouts for less than $60, and we put a viral posture correcting sports bra to the test to find out if it’s really worth the almost $200 investment.
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