Rutgers University has canceled a planned graduation speech by business leader Rami Elghandour after some students raised concerns about his criticism of Israel on social media. Elghandour, the CEO of biotech company Arcellx, had been set to give the May 15 convocation address at the Rutgers School of Engineering, his alma mater. That invitation was rescinded last week by the school’s dean, Alberto Cuitiño, after the university learned that “some graduating students would not attend their graduation ceremony due to concerns about the invited speaker’s social media posts,” a Rutgers spokesperson said in a statement. The spokesperson declined to specify...

Iran has said it is reviewing the latest American proposals on ending the war, as U.S. President Donald Trump threatened the country with a new wave of bombing unless a deal is reached that includes reopening the crucial Strait of Hormuz to international shipping. Hope that the two-month conflict could soon end buoyed international markets on Thursday, despite the U.S. military firing on an Iranian oil tanker attempting to breach an American blockade of Iran’s ports Wednesday. The price of Brent crude oil stabilized at around $100 a barrel as investors waited to see whether the strait would reopen, allowing...

Central African Republic’s former prime minister and major opposition figure, Anicet Georges Dologuélé, criticized the confiscation of his diplomatic passport as an abuse of power on Wednesday. Dologuélé, who served as prime minister between 1999 and 2001, said he was not allowed to board a flight to an African Union meeting in Addis Ababa on Wednesday. “It was at the airport that I learned I was forbidden from leaving the country after being declared stateless in my own country,” he told a news conference in capital Bangui. He is on the board of directors for the African Union Peace Fund,...

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will discuss cooperation in the fight against organized crime and tariffs with U.S. President Donald Trump, Brazil’s finance minister Dario Durigan said Wednesday, one day ahead of the scheduled meeting between the presidents. “The goal is to protect Brazil’s population, prioritize the country and maintain constructive dialogue,” Durigan told state broadcaster EBC. “Expectations for the trip are very positive.” The encounter at the White House follows a crisis in bilateral relations last year, after the Trump administration imposed a 50% tariff on Brazilian goods and tied the measure to the prosecution of former...

Airliners carrying Australian women and children with alleged ties to the Islamic State group landed in Australia on Thursday. An airliner reportedly carrying three Australian women and eight children landed in Melbourne, while a separate plane carrying a woman and her son arrived in Sydney soon after. The Australian government announced on Wednesday that the 13 — who have spent years in a Syrian desert camp — planned to return to Australia. Police said the women face potential criminal charges relating to their alleged time in the Islamic State group’s so-called caliphate that spanned Syrian and Iraq. Both Qatar Airways...

Over 600 military personnel from multiple countries are searching for two U.S. soldiers who went missing in Morocco during U.S.-African military exercises, scouring underwater caves and the Atlantic coast, authorities said Wednesday. As the search entered its fifth day, the African Lion military drills neared their end. The two U.S. Army members went missing last week near the Cap Draa training area outside Tan-Tan, a coastal city in southwestern Morocco, the Moroccan military said. They are believed to have been on a recreational hike and may have fallen into the ocean. More than 600 personnel from the U.S., Morocco and...

A 28-year-old woman impersonated a student at a New York City high school for two weeks until educators became suspicious and police arrested her, according to a criminal complaint. Kacy Claassen enrolled at the Westchester Square Academy in the Bronx on April 13, claiming she was a 16-year-old girl named Shamara Rashad, according to the complaint prepared by a city police officer. But the school principal found her Facebook page and learned her real name and age, police said. When the principal confronted her, she maintained that she was Rashad and had come to New York from Ohio with her...

Barack Obama: “Michelle and I can’t wait for you to visit the Obama Presidential Center! “Starting on June 19, the Center will be open to the public, and you’ll be able to check out the Museum along with public spaces like a new branch of the Chicago Public Library with a reading room, a two-acre playground, a fruit and vegetable garden, and more.”

mprisoned Nobel Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi was being examined by Iranian government-appointed medical experts Wednesday for the second time since she was hospitalized last week, a move her brother said he hopes would lead to her transfer to a hospital in Tehran. Mohammadi was rushed on Friday from prison to a local hospital in the northwest Iranian town of Zanjan after she fell unconscious. She remains in critical condition, and her family says security officials have so far prevented her transfer to the capital where she could get better treatment. Her brother Hamidreza Mohammadi, who is based in Oslo, said...