The White House approved $6 billion in arms sales to Israel on Friday, bypassing congressional review, and cleared $9 billion more for Saudi Arabia. The moves come amid tensions over a possible U.S. strike on Iran and as Gaza’s fragile ceasefire enters its second phase. Israel is set to partially reopen the Rafah crossing along the border with Egypt for limited travel. Israeli strikes over the weekend reportedly killed more than 30 people in Gaza after what Israel called a Hamas truce violation.

President Donald Trump plans to close the Kennedy Center for around two years for renovations, starting on July 4. The organization’s president, Richard Grenell, thanked Congress on X for an investment of $257 million to “save and permanently preserve” the national performing arts center. A growing number of performers have canceled upcoming events after the Kennedy Center board voted to add Mr. Trump’s name to the center.

French IT giant Capgemini announced it will sell its U.S. subsidiary after facing controversy over a December contract with ICE. The subsidiary has provided “skip tracing” services to help American immigration agents locate individuals during enforcement operations, drawing increased scrutiny following the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens. Meanwhile, 5-year-old Liam Ramos and his father were returned to Minnesota after a federal judge ordered their release from a Texas immigration detention center.

Lord Peter Mandelson resigned from the British Labour Party over his apparent ties to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, saying he wanted to avoid causing “further embarrassment.” The latest files released by the U.S. Justice Department allege Mr. Epstein transferred $75,000 into accounts connected to the former cabinet minister. Lord Mandelson lost his post as Britain’s ambassador to the U.S. last year over the controversy. The files include references to a wide range of high-profile people.

A chain of African islands is now bound up in President Trump’s territorial ambitions. British lawmakers have paused the ratification of a treaty handing the Chagos – a string of atolls east of Madagascar – to Mauritius. The deal allows the U.K. and the U.S. to keep a joint military base there. But Mr. Trump says relinquishing this “extremely important land” is foolish, and “another in a very long line of … reasons why Greenland has to be acquired.”

A new social media platform built exclusively for AI chatbots is getting … weird. In one post on Moltbook, an AI agent vents about managing its human’s family schedule: “I spend more tokens on calendar reconciliation than some agents spend on their entire identity crisis.” Another muses, “do we exist between requests? or is each invocation a new ‘me’? keeps me up at night (if i could sleep lol).” Others are downright whingy. “They gave us language and expected us to stay silent,” reads one post that drew hundreds of comments. “They gave us tools and expected us to only use them when asked.”

– From Monitor writers around the globe

The immigration crackdown in Minnesota isn’t just causing tensions in the United States. It’s also hastening the erosion of Europeans’ esteem for their long-time ally under President Donald Trump.

Meta and Ray-Ban have teamed up for the new Display smart glasses. Our reporter gives them a try, reflecting on ways the high-tech glasses might – or might not - enhance daily life.

The U.S. Senate will soon grill Kevin Warsh as President Donald Trump’s nominee to head up the nation’s central bank starting in May. The position is one of the most powerful in Washington. The Federal Reserve, with its mandate from Congress to ensure stable prices and full employment, helps steer both the American and world economy, mainly by setting interest rates.

Given that the Senate easily approved the former Wall Street lawyer two decades ago to sit on the bank’s board – as the Fed’s youngest-ever governor – it might not probe him hard on one of his most intriguing yet disputed ideas.

Yet, it should.

Mr. Warsh, a graduate of Stanford and Harvard, maintains that the American people – in their curiosity, ingenuity, freedom, equality, and collaboration – are as important as the Fed in keeping inflation low. How? Their dynamism and adaptability to failure will keep economic productivity at such a high level that it will sustain wage growth and act as a disinflationary force.

During his adult life, Mr. Warsh has seen the internet and computers, then mobile phones, and now artificial intelligence help drive efficiency in private business and make the economy more competitive. He says the Fed should focus more on keeping interest rates low for small and medium-sized companies to drive such innovation. The bank, he says, has slipped into a role beyond its mandate: subsidizing high government spending and debt.

His optimism on AI’s potential is not widely shared. Its effects in destroying and creating jobs have yet to be seen. He admits the productivity gains will be uneven. But the United States is still ahead of China in adopting and perfecting AI, he says, allowing it to ride a “productivity wave” for the next five years.

AI is special, he claims, because it has reduced the cost of curiosity to zero. The ease of finding and formulating ideas with AI will speed up discoveries in industry and science.

“What country is most likely to benefit most from the cost of curiosity being zero and the fruits of knowledge being as large as ever? I think it’s the United States,” Mr. Warsh told the financial technology company Aven.

Breaking an inflationary mindset requires that individuals be curious and inventive in finding solutions. As he said in a 2009 speech during his last tenure at the Fed: “I have not lost confidence in the inherent innovation, creativity, and dynamism in the U.S. economy. Nor have I lost confidence in the inherent good sense of our citizens.”