News Wrap: Senate advances bill to send billions in aid to Ukraine

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• Geoff Bennett:

  In the day's other headlines: The U.S. Senate advanced a bill this afternoon to send billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan.

  Final passage is expected later tonight or tomorrow. In all, it contains $95 billion in support, with $61 billion dedicated to Ukraine. Today, the Pentagon clarified where those funds would go.

• Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder, Pentagon Press Secretary:

  This security assistance package will be based on Ukraine's most urgent needs. Again, without getting into details, I think it's a good assumption to expect that it'll include air defense capabilities, as well as artillery ammunition.

• Geoff Bennett:

  The Associated Press is reporting that Pentagon officials stand ready to send an initial $1 billion military aid package to Kyiv. That will happen as soon as the broader measure goes through.

  Israel ordered new evacuations of Northern Gaza today as it carried out a wave of strikes throughout the strip. Smoke was seen rising over central and southern areas of Gaza as residents reported nonstop bombardments. Separately, the Israeli military released footage of what it claims were strikes against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon.

  The Iran-backed group has clashed with Israel since the start of the war in Gaza. Hezbollah, in turn, says it launched a drone attack 10 miles inside Israel, its deepest incursion to date.

  Norway is calling on international donors to resume payments to UNRWA. That's the U.N. Agency for Palestinian Refugees. It comes after an independent review released yesterday found that Israel provided no evidence to support accusations that UNRWA employees were linked to terrorist groups. UNRWA officials say those findings should be enough for countries to end the freeze on funding.

  Philippe Lazzarini, Commissioner-General, United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East: I hope that, with this report and the measure we will be putting in place, that the last group of donors will get necessary confidence to come back as a donor and partner of the agency.

• Geoff Bennett:

  A separate internal U.N. investigation is still looking into Israel's allegations that UNRWA staffers were involved in the October 7 attacks. The U.S. is among those who paused funds to the agency back in January.

  A Moscow court has rejected the latest appeal from American journalist Evan Gershkovich. That means The Wall Street Journal reporter will remain in Russian detention through the end of June. Gershkovich appeared in court today with his lawyers to seek an end to his pretrial detention. He was arrested in March of last year on espionage charges.

  The 32-year-old was seen to be in good spirits, at one point making a heart-shaped gesture with his hands. Gershkovich denies the allegations against him.

  Five migrants died today as they tried to cross the English Channel from France to the U.K. Among them was a 7-year-old girl. Officials say their overcrowded boat hit a sandbank off the coast of Northern France. Their deaths came hours after the British Parliament approved a bill to deport migrants who enter the U.K. illegally to Rwanda. Aid groups warn the measure will do more harm than good.

• Kay Marsh, Samphire Migrant Aid Charity:

  We will not see the boat stop because of this. We will see more deaths. We will see more dangerous risks being taken. But, yes, it definitely won't act as a deterrent. Nothing else has. So I don't think — I don't know why people are thinking that this will.

• Geoff Bennett:

  More than 6,000 people have made the perilous journey to Britain so far this year on small, often overloaded boats.

  Police in France today cleared migrants from a makeshift camp in Paris less than 100 days before the Summer Olympics get under way there. In a predawn operation, authorities evicted dozens of teenage boys and young men from West Africa. Many of them were in the process of seeking official residency. Aid groups say officials are ramping up what they call a social cleansing campaign ahead of the Olympics.

  Elias Hufnagel, Utopia 56 Migrant Charity: All the encampments in Paris are getting evacuated by the police because they want to have a clean place for the Olympic Games, for the tourists. They don't want to see Paris as a city that is full of migrants.

• Geoff Bennett:

  Last week, police evicted hundreds of migrants from France's biggest squatter camp south of the capital.

  The Federal Trade Commission voted today to ban so-called noncompete agreements for most employees. That means companies can no longer bar workers from taking jobs with their competitors. According to the FTC, 30 million people, or one in five workers, are currently subject to such restrictions. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has said it will sue to block the measure.

  On Wall Street today, markets closed higher after some strong corporate earnings. The Dow Jones industrial average gained 263 points to close at 38503. The Nasdaq jumped 245 points. The S&P 500 added nearly 60.