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TODAY'S HEADLINES:

Israeli forces continue to escalate violence against Palestinian civilians in Gaza, destroying a 13-story residential building with airstrikes, prompting a fresh wave of rocket fire from Hamas.

Meanwhile, a federal judge dismissed the NRA’s bankruptcy plea in court, dealing another blow to the corrupt gun-rights lobbying group.

And lastly, prosecutors rule that the Atlanta spa shootings in March were hate crimes, and that they will seek the death penalty for the perpetrator.

THESE ARE THE STORIES YOU NEED TO KNOW:

The violence in Israel’s Gaza strip continued this week, as Israeli forces destroyed at least one 13-story residential apartment building in an airstrike. Widespread protests continued across the country, and Hamas launched a retaliatory wave of rocket attacks against the city of Tel Aviv.

The country appears to be on the brink of war.

With all the chaos, it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that the power dynamics between the two sides have not changed.

Hamas’s rocket attacks forced many Israeli residents into bomb shelters and killed at least three people.

But the Palestinian residents of Gaza and the West Bank, by and large, don’t have the luxury of bomb shelters. Instead, they’ve been subjected to airstrike after airstrike, on top of the heavy police persecution at protests elsewhere in the country.

The Palestinian Authority said Israel’s airstrikes had killed at least 30 people, including 10 children, and injured over 200 others.

What this shows us is that the violence is very clearly not the same on both sides. The conflict began over a legal effort by Israeli settlers to evict Palestinians from their homes, inspiring protests at a holy mosque during the end of Ramadan. In response, Israeli police attacked the mosque, firing tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters and worshipers alike.

But the status quo in Israel is backed by the most powerful government on Earth.

Joe Biden’s press secretary Jen Psaki noted her “serious concern” for the situation on Tuesday, but mentioned that the U.S. thought Hamas’s rocket attacks were “unacceptable.”

She didn’t have much to say about the airstrikes. And so it goes.

Judge Tosses NRA's Bankruptcy Filing

It’s always refreshing to hear bad news about the NRA, and the past few months have been bountiful on that front.

On Tuesday, a federal judge threw out the gun rights organization’s petition for bankruptcy, which it filed in January in an attempt to circumvent a massive corruption investigation.

New York AG Tish James is leading that investigation, which could essentially shut down the group due to a whole bunch of fishy spending and shadiness. NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre is at the center of most of that mess, and clearly thought that declaring bankruptcy would help him skate away from some of the things James is going to try to nail him on, and protect his ass from the group’s board of directors.

In short, it didn’t work.

Dallas federal court judge Harlin D. Hale, in his decision, agreed with James’s office that this wasn’t how bankruptcy courts were meant to be used. It looks likely that the NRA’s board of directors won’t be pleased either, considering LaPierre has spent $5 million on bankruptcy-related expenses and a whopping $72.6 million in outside legal fees over the past three years.

But really, this all couldn’t have happened to a nicer group of bloodthirst amoral people. We wish LaPierre all the best in wriggling out of this jam.

GA Prosecutors Call Atlanta Shooting Hate Crime

Prosecutors will seek hate crime charges in the case against the Atlanta Spa shooter, who killed eight people, the majority of whom were Asian women. They will also seek the death penalty for the shooter’s crimes.

The death penalty doesn’t bring justice, only more death, but the shooter’s case will still be a test of how Georgia’s new hate crime legislation will be applied.

The Atlanta attacks came during a time of increased fear among the Asian-American community after many people of Asian descent were targeted with beatings and other violence across the country.

Prosecutors on Tuesday said that the shooter, Robert Aaron Long, chose his victims because of their quote “actual or perceived race, national origin, sex, and gender.” endquote. Hate crime penalties would add to Long’s sentence if the jury convicts him of murder.

At the time, there was fierce debate over the shooter’s motive, and his lawyers will surely try to argue that the crimes were not racially motivated.

Still, it’s hard to make that case when so many of his victims came from the same demographic: women who came to this country to make a better life, and died to a uniquely American form of violence.

AND NOW FOR SOME QUICKER QUICKIES:

Ghislane Maxwell, the former girlfriend of international pedophile billionaire Jeffrey Epstein, will go on trial on November 29. Maxwell is charged with sex trafficking a minor, which carries a maximum sentence of 40 years.

A group of hackers who infiltrated the Washington D.C. police department last week released more internal personnel files, in a continuing ransomware attack. The group is threatening to reveal more confidential information if it doesn’t get paid.

Liz Cheney took to the House Floor to once again defiantly stand against Trumpism, ahead of her expected ouster from the GOP leadership tomorrow. Remember, Cheney really doesn’t like this new conservatism -- she only likes the old conservatism, which was basically the same thing but less rude.

Arizona’s GOP hopped on the voter suppression bandwagon, passing a law on Tuesday that will strike people from the automatic list to receive an early voting mail-in ballot if they don’t vote every two years.

AM QUICKIE - MAY 12, 2021

HOSTS - Sam Seder & Lucie Steiner

WRITER - Jack Crosbie

PRODUCER - Dorsey Shaw

EXECUTIVE PRODUCER - Brendan Finn