5 Things podcast: Israeli troops near Gaza City, Donald Trump Jr. took the witness stand

On today's episode of the 5 Things podcast: Israel reaches 'gates of Gaza City'

Israeli ground troops have neared Gaza City. Plus, USA TODAY Domestic Security Correspondent Josh Meyer explains the drug Captagon, and its reported link to Hamas militants, Donald Trump Jr. took the witness stand in his father's real estate fraud trial, USA TODAY Justice Department Correspondent Aysha Bagchi breaks down the Justice Department's expanded efforts against foreign agents, and the Federal Reserve leaves rates unchanged.

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Hit play on the player above to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript below.This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.  

Taylor Wilson:

Good morning. I'm Taylor Wilson, and this is 5 Things You Need to Know Thursday, the 2nd of November, 2023. Today, Israeli ground troops move toward Gaza City. Plus we take a look at the drug Captagon, and its reported link to Hamas and the Justice Department expands its work against foreign agent activity.

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Israeli troops approached Gaza City yesterday less than a week after launching a ground incursion into Gaza. Israeli airstrikes also continued pounding the Jabalia refugee camp and killed a key Hamas figure for a second day in a row. That's as Egypt allowed hundreds of foreign passport holders and dozens of seriously injured Palestinians to flee the Gaza Strip yesterday. The US State Department said the group included Americans and that hundreds of US citizens are seeking to leave the territory. The limited opening of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt came after weeks of talks between Egypt, Israel, the US, and Qatar, which mediates with Hamas.

President Joe Biden again called for a humanitarian pause in the war. The Biden administration meanwhile is developing a national strategy to combat Islamophobia. The launch has been anticipated since the administration in May released a national strategy to combat antisemitism, which made reference to also countering hatred against Muslims. The Israel Hamas War has left a brutal death toll. According to the global charity Save the Children, more children have been killed in just over three weeks in Gaza than in all of the world's conflicts combined in each of the past three years. And during Hamas' October 7th rampage in Southern Israel, Israeli officials said babies and small children were among the more than 1,400 killed. About 30 children were also taken among the roughly 240 hostages taken by Hamas. Gaza's Hamas run Health Ministry says more than 3,600 Palestinian children have been killed. Part of more than 8,800 people killed in all in the territory.

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Israeli security forces told USA TODAY that they found Captagon, a powerful stimulant used by ISIS fighters on killed and captured Hamas militants. I spoke with USA TODAY Domestic Security Correspondent Josh Meyer to learn more. Josh, thanks for hopping on.

John Meyer:

Always a pleasure, Taylor.

Taylor Wilson:

So Josh, let's start here. What exactly is Captagon?

John Meyer:

You know it's called by many names, the Jihadi drug, Captain Courage, the Poor Man's Cocaine but essentially it's a synthetic stimulant, very much like methamphetamine, and it's been made on the black market for many years now and made very popular by ISIS terrorists, or at least common by ISIS terrorists. And it is now believed to have been used by the Hamas terrorists in the October 7th brutal attacks on Israel that killed more than 1,400 people and in which more than 220 people were kidnapped.

Taylor Wilson:

Yeah. And Josh, what did these anonymous Israeli officials say about the drug being found on some of the Hamas fighters who raided Israel last month?

John Meyer:

Well, I've been trying for weeks now to get the Israeli government to confirm that they were found after there was a report by an Israeli TV show, but nobody was talking. But my partner Kim, found two Israeli security officials with direct knowledge of the matter and they confirmed to us that this substance was found on at least some of the Hamas fighters that were killed during or after the raids on Israel and also on some of the ones that were captured. So interrogations of them may provide more information about whether and how widespread the use of Captagon was by the people doing the attacks.

Taylor Wilson:

Josh, one expert you spoke with said this October 7th series of Hamas attacks seemed to really differ from their usual playbook. How might Captagon have influenced militants to carry out these brutal atrocities?

John Meyer:

I mean, so when ISIS was using it, ISIS became notorious for being really, really brutal, public beheadings, torture and so forth, burning people alive. That is different than Hamas had been before. Hamas was considered a US designated terrorist organization for many years, but according to Anne Speckhard, who I talked to, this is not the kind of viciousness and brutality that she knew Hamas to be engaged in 20 years of studying the group and interviewing Hamas fighters. So she said that this is sort of something different. She wasn't sure if it could be linked to Captagon, but she said it makes sense that this could have been what made them so violent and so brutal.

Taylor Wilson:

And Josh, does the US have any strategy for disrupting Captagon supply flows in the Middle East or elsewhere?

John Meyer:

It does actually. So the US is very concerned about it. A lot of the terrorists and militants that have been fighting US troops in the Middle East, the US is concerned that they've been consuming a lot of Captagon. The annual sales and production of the drug is now in the billions of dollars. Earlier this year, the US government developed an inter-agency strategy for disrupting the global Captagon trafficking networks. And it's a very expansive program, it's multi agency and it's trying to shut down the network, which is operating right now from Italy to Malaysia, all across Europe and so forth. And the big concern, of course, is that the Assad regime in Syria is believed to be producing much or most of the Captagon worldwide.

Taylor Wilson:

Josh Meyer, fantastic insight for us as always. Thank you, Josh.

John Meyer:

My pleasure. Thanks.

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Taylor Wilson:

Donald Trump Jr. took the witness stand yesterday in his father's real estate fraud trial. He became the first of the former President's children to testify in a case where $250 million in damages and a New York ban on the entire Trump organization is at stake. Donald Jr. Said he did not recall whether he worked on financial statements concerning his father's assets and liabilities. The New York Attorney General's office has described the statements from 2011 to 2021 as fraudulent and misleading and said they included highly inflated asset valuations. Don Jr. Said he was a point person on getting Trump hotel management deals done during that period, but he said when it came to various accounting issues, he relied on the expertise of others. Eric Trump is also expected to testify this week, followed by Ivanka Trump and their father next week.

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Senator Bob Menendez pleaded not guilty last week to conspiring to act as a foreign agent while serving as a public official. The latest criminal charge against him marks an expansion of the justice department's work against foreign agent activity. I spoke with USA TODAY, Justice Department correspondent Aysha Bagchi for more. Aysha, thanks for hopping on 5 Things.

Aysha Bagchi:

Thanks. I'm glad to be here.

Taylor Wilson:

So Senator Bob Menendez pleaded not guilty this week to conspiring to act as a foreign agent while serving as a public official. Those charges were added to an already existing indictment. Aysha, what exactly is at issue in this case?

Aysha Bagchi:

Well, the new charge is a charge that, based on my reporting with my colleague Josh Meyer, hasn't actually been brought very often, if at all. It has to do with the prohibition in the law against public officials acting as foreign agents of foreign governments. And what the Justice Department is saying here is that Senator Bob Menendez was acting as a foreign agent on behalf of the Egyptian government, and the charges really have to do with Bob Menendez's role in foreign policy. He was the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee during the years that are really the focus of the indictment from 2018 to 2022. And according to prosecutors, that money had a lot of influence over military sales and military aid to Egypt. And the senator has denied the allegations. He pleaded not guilty and said he looks forward to being exonerated in court.

Taylor Wilson:

And Aysha, this Menendez foreign agent charge builds on the justice department's work more broadly against foreign agent activity. Why have they upped their focus on this and what are some other cases they've honed in on?

Aysha Bagchi:

As part of our reporting we have basically learned that the Justice Department started taking a particular law, that has been on the books for decades, much more seriously following the 2016 presidential election. The law is called the Foreign Agents Registration Act or FARA. There actually has been a unit within the Justice Department going back a long time that is dedicated to dealing with this law. But that unit did not bring many prosecutions until after the 2016 election. And it seems like the big driver between the change in behavior and the more aggressive stance from the Justice Department had to do with concerns about foreign interference, especially Russian interference in the 2016 election.

But then those prosecutions took on a life of their own. You can see the Justice Department bringing prosecutions, not just having to do with issues about election interference, but even more broadly with this law that has to do with people who are acting on behalf of foreign governments needing to register and identify themselves, basically to prevent covert foreign influence in the American process. Here they have brought a charge that is tied back to that registration law, but it actually has to do with public officials being prohibited from ever acting as an agent on behalf of a foreign government as defined by whether they needed to register under the law. But even if they registered, they're just not allowed to do it.

Taylor Wilson:

And what are the concerns about possible government overreach with this expansion of foreign agent related prosecutions?

Aysha Bagchi:

Because the government has been bringing prosecutions under this law, FARA, recently and there hadn't been a big track record before of what those prosecutions look like and what the government would go after, there are big question marks about the line between acting on behalf of a foreign government and just using your normal speech rights. As part of our reporting, we talked to people who are concerned about prosecutors using the law to go after nonprofits, maybe partisans and Congress pushing for FARA to be a means of prosecuting people who just advocate for things that you don't like. And the question about when you're lobbying for a foreign government can be kind of a tricky line to draw.

And some people told us that they are concerned that the point of these prosecutions is supposed to be or should be about espionage, really preventing foreign influence, spying, those types of things within the United States, but that there's a risk of this going further and you can actually see a series of letters from people in Congress today that have encouraged the Justice Department to look into the activities of nonprofits. Of course, there are two sides to this debate. There is a law that says you're supposed to register if you are acting on behalf of a foreign government seeking to influence our policy. But we have definitely heard concerns about this being used as a kind of political football to just go after people who say things that you don't like.

Taylor Wilson:

All right, Aysha Bagchi covers the Justice Department for USA today. Aysha, thank you so much for your time on this. Really appreciate it.

Aysha Bagchi:

Thanks, Taylor. Happy to be here.

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Taylor Wilson:

The Federal Reserve held its key interest rates steady yesterday, but left the door open to another hike possibly as soon as next month. That's amid a strong economy and job market. The decision leaves the Fed's benchmark short-term rate at a 22-year high of 5.25 to 5.5% after an aggressive campaign of rate increases aimed at taming the nation's most severe inflation surge in four decades. This marks the first time the Fed has left its federal funds rate unchanged at consecutive meetings in nearly two years.

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Be sure to stay tuned to the 5 Things channel this afternoon for another special, this time on how climate change is upending our fishing industry. My colleague Dana Taylor speaks with National correspondent Trevor Hughes about how the workers facing these challenges are adapting. And the Texas Rangers are World series champions. They beat the Arizona Diamondbacks 5 to nothing last night for their first championship in a more than 60 year long franchise history. Thanks for listening to Five Things. You can find us seven mornings a week on Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Spotify, or wherever you get your audio. If you have any comments, you can reach us at [email protected]. I'm Taylor Wilson, back tomorrow with more of 5 Things from USA TODAY.