Celebrations broke out across Lebanon overnight after Israel agreed to a 10-day ceasefire, following U.S.-brokered talks to end seven weeks of attacks that have killed nearly 2,200 people in Lebanon, including 172 children. Israel continued airstrikes right up until the ceasefire took effect Thursday evening, including attacks on the city of Tyre that killed at least 13 people; elsewhere, Israel bombed a school in southern Lebanon and blew up the last bridge over the Litani River, further isolating southern Lebanon from the rest of the country. Israeli forces now occupy about 10% of Lebanon’s territory, with an estimated 1.2 million people displaced from their homes. This is Ibrahim Suwaydi, a 30-year-old living in a tent in Beirut after he fled Israeli strikes on the suburb of Dahiyeh.

Ibrahim Suwaydi: “They gave a 10-day ceasefire, but we don’t accept that. Ten days? If we want to go back to our homes 10 days and the war returns, we don’t want that. Either our land is fully returned, or we don’t want the ceasefire. We’ll continue with the war. My home in Dahiyeh in Beirut’s southern suburbs has been destroyed. Who will compensate me?”

After headlines, we’ll go to Beirut for the latest.

In Israel, hundreds of people rallied in Tel Aviv on Thursday to denounce escalating attacks on Palestinians by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank. Human rights groups say it was the largest protest of its kind yet in Israel. It came after Israel’s high court lifted a weekslong wartime ban on public gatherings. 

The U.S. House of Representatives has rejected a war powers resolution seeking to rein in President Trump’s ability to wage war on Iran. On Thursday, every House Republican voted against the resolution, except for Kentucky’s Thomas Massie. It failed on a vote of 213 to 214 after Democrat Jared Golden of Maine crossed the aisle to vote with Republicans. The Senate narrowly rejected an Iran war powers resolution one day earlier. 

Earlier today, Iran’s foreign minister declared, “passage for all commercial vessels through Strait of Hormuz is declared completely open for the remaining period of ceasefire” in Lebanon. Stock markets rallied on the news, and the price of oil plummeted by about 10 percent.

On Thursday, President Trump repeated his claim that a deal to end the war on Iran is “very close” and that direct talks with Iran could resume in Pakistan as soon as this weekend. Despite the claims, the Pentagon is surging thousands of additional troops to the Middle East, including a 6,000 sailors and aviators joining the USS George H.W. Bush aircraft carrier battle group. The ships were recently spotted steaming around the southern tip of Africa — avoiding a much shorter passage through the Red Sea, where they would be in range of the missiles and drones of Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi movement. 

In Ukraine, at least 17 people were killed as Russia launched its deadliest drone and missile attacks of the year on Kyiv and other cities. Among the dead was a 12-year-old child; dozens more were wounded. This is Valerii Shashkov, an 84-year-old who had to have glass shards removed from his face after Russian strikes shattered the windows of his home.

Valerii Shashkov: “It hit me like a smash. I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t figure out what had happened, that blood was flowing all around me, you see. I looked up, and then there was another strike.”

The violence came at the end of a 32-hour Orthodox Easter truce that each side accused the other of violating. On Thursday, Russian officials said a Ukrainian drone attack on the Black Sea port of Tuapse killed two people, including a teenage girl. The strikes also triggered a massive fire at one of Russia’s largest oil refineries.

In New Jersey, progressive Democrat Analilia Mejía has won a special election to fill the House seat left vacant by New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill. Mejía’s victory further narrows Republicans’ razor-thin majority: Once she’s sworn in, House Speaker Mike Johnson will only be able to afford a defection by a single Republican in order to pass legislation on a party-line vote. Mejía is the daughter of a Colombian garment worker and a Dominican laborer, and a former union organizer who served as national political director for Bernie Sanders in 2020. On the campaign trail, she called for the abolition of ICE and was the only candidate to say that she believed that Israel committed genocide in Gaza.

Analilia Mejía: “Eighty percent of Gaza is in rubble. Can we agree that that is wrong? Can we agree that cutting the electricity to water desalinization plants is not only wrong, but it goes against the Geneva Convention and it is a war crime?”

The House of Representatives has approved a short-term extension of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act over the objections of privacy advocates who warn it allows the government to conduct warrantless domestic surveillance on a massive scale. Without congressional action, the program was due to expire in three days. The White House and House Speaker Mike Johnson were seeking an 18-month extension, but those plans were thwarted when a bloc of conservatives revolted against the bill. It also faces opposition from some Democrats, including California’s Ro Khanna, who said in a social media post that Republicans called lawmakers back at midnight for a “secret vote to reauthorize FISA while America sleeps.”

Rep. Ro Khanna: “This would give Donald Trump the power to surveil or collect data on Americans through a back door. There really is not a philosophical debate here. A 'yes' vote is a vote to give Donald Trump more power over American citizens. A 'no' vote is a vote to stand up to Donald Trump. Every Democrat should be a 'no' on the reauthorization of FISA.”

The House of Representatives has passed a resolution to extend temporary protected status for 330,000 Haitian immigrants in the United States, after the Trump administration canceled the program. Ten Republicans joined House Democrats in Thursday’s 224-204 vote. The bill was sponsored by Massachusetts Democrat Ayanna Pressley. Ahead of Thursday’s vote, she told the story of Rebecca, a Haitian immigrant who moved to Massachusetts after the devastating earthquake in 2010 resulted in the deaths of an estimated 220,000 people, in what was already the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.

Rep. Ayanna Pressley: “She witnessed the rise in gangs and saw her beautiful country overtaken by political violence and instability. After surviving multiple kidnapping attempts, out of desperation, Rebecca made the same decision that any of us would make in her position: She immigrated to the United States. She quickly enrolled in school to learn English. She obtained a job to support herself and her family. Now in 2026, thanks to her legal status under TPS, Rebecca is a certified nursing assistant.”

A Senate version of the bill extending TPS for Haitians faces an uphill battle, and the White House has promised to veto any such legislation. President Trump has repeatedly used racist rhetoric to lash out against Haitians. During the 2024 campaign, he amplified the unfounded lie that Haitians were eating household pets in Springfield, Ohio.

The acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement has announced his resignation from the agency, just one year after his appointment to oversee Trump’s rapid expansion of nationwide ICE raids, immigration detention and deportations. Todd Lyons, who was never confirmed by the Senate, says he’s stepping down in May. During his tenure, he repeatedly defended ICE’s tactics as the agency faced mounting scrutiny over its agents’ violent crackdown on protesters and dehumanizing treatment of immigrants.

In Minnesota, Hennepin County prosecutors have charged an ICE agent with felony assault for allegedly pointing his gun at the heads of two people who were in a car beside him. Earlier this year, the agent, Gregory Donnell Morgan Jr., reportedly had tried to pass their vehicle while illegally driving his unmarked SUV on a Minneapolis highway. Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty announced the charges Thursday.

Mary Moriarty: “Mr. Morgan’s conduct was extremely dangerous. Driving while pointing a weapon out of your moving vehicle at the victims who were in another moving vehicle could have led to yet another disastrous incident in a community that has already suffered too many.”

This is the first criminal case against an ICE agent involved in Trump’s so-called Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota. During the crackdown earlier this year, federal agents deployed to the Twin Cities shot and killed two U.S. citizens: Renee Good and Alex Pretti.

In related news, Minneapolis resident Aliya Rahman has filed a personal injury claim against DHS after ICE agents in Minneapolis smashed her car window, dragged her out and detained her while she was heading to a doctor’s appointment in January. Aliya Rahman will join us from Minneapolis later in the broadcast.

Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott has threatened to cut about $200 million in public safety funding to Houston, Dallas and Austin if their local law enforcement agencies refuse to collaborate with ICE in the arrest and detention of immigrants over minor infractions such as traffic stops. This week, Abbott’s office reportedly notified Houston officials the state would be withdrawing some $110 million in public safety grants after the city adopted an ordinance that limits police’s cooperation with ICE.

The FBI has arrested a man who was shot by ICE agents in Patterson, California, last week and charged him with assaulting a federal officer. Carlos Ivan Mendoza Hernandez was taken into custody after being discharged from the hospital Monday, where he underwent several surgeries for multiple gunshot wounds, including to the jaw. Hernandez reportedly attempted to drive away when federal officers surrounded his car during a traffic stop while he was on his way to work. He later said he feared the officers were going to shoot him.

In Texas, advocates are demanding the release of a longtime court interpreter and the only licensed Punjabi, Hindi and Urdu interpreter in the state, who was detained by ICE last month. Meenu Batra has lived in the U.S. for over 35 years. She fled India following pogroms against Sikhs in Punjab and arrived in the U.S. in 1991. Her attorneys fear Batra could be deported to a country she has no ties to, under Trump’s so-called third country agreements. Batra has spoken out against the inhumane conditions of her detention at the El Valle ICE jail in Raymondville, Texas.

In Virginia, police say former Lieutenant Governor Justin Fairfax fatally shot his estranged wife Cerina Fairfax before taking his own life. The couple’s teenage children were home at the time of the murder-suicide, which took place two weeks before Fairfax faced a court-ordered deadline to move out of their home. In 2019, two women publicly accused Fairfax of sexual assault. 

Hampshire College, a private liberal arts college in Amherst, Massachusetts, has announced it will close by the end of 2026 following years of financial struggles. The Huron Consulting Group has warned that over 400 of the nation’s 1,700 private, nonprofit four-year colleges and universities are at risk of closing or having to merge within the next 10 years. This comes amid growing attacks on education by the Trump administration and decades of skyrocketing tuition costs, declining student enrollment and a student debt crisis.