EL PASO, Texas (AP) — A Texas grand jury indicted more than 140 migrants on misdemeanor rioting charges Tuesday over an alleged mass attempt to breach the U.S.-Mexico border, a day after a judge threw out the cases.
No injuries were reported during the alleged breach on April 12 in El Paso, which authorities say began when someone in the group cut through a razor wire barrier. Mass arrests also followed a separate episode in the Texas border city in March.
On Monday, a county judge had thrown out the charges against those who were arrested this month, ruling there was insufficient probable cause. A public defender representing the migrants had argued there was not enough evidence and accused authorities of trying to make headlines.
"The citizens of El Paso, through the grand jury, essentially overruled the judge’s ruling and found probable cause to believe that the riots did occur,” El Paso County District Attorney Bill Hicks told reporters Tuesday.
Kelli Childress-Diaz, the El Paso Public Defender who is representing the 141 defendants, said she wasn't surprised.
“I imagine they had that already prepared before the hearing even started yesterday," she said.
The arrests have drawn more attention to Texas' expanding operations along the border, where Republican Gov. Greg Abbott has rolled out a series of aggressive measures in the name of curbing illegal crossings. Following the arrests in March, Abbott responded by saying he sent 700 additional National Guard members to El Paso.
Hicks, whom Abbott appointed to the job in 2022, said that although it is not common for a grand jury to indict misdemeanor cases, he felt it was “fair” to pose the cases before them. In all, Hicks estimated they had arrested over 350 people on rioting charges since March.
If convicted, those charged could each face up to 180 days in county jail and a fine of up to $2,000. Those in jail still face federal charges, and Hicks said U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents could still pick them up from jail to process them on an illegal entry offense.
“It turns my stomach that these people are nothing more than than, you know, political coins in a bet that some of our government officials have hedged,” Childress-Diaz told The Associated Press.
FILE - Texas National Guard watch migrants after beaching barriers set up on the Rio Grande in El Paso, Texas, March 21, 2024. A Texas grand jury on Tuesday, April 23, indicted more than 140 migrants on misdemeanor rioting charges over an alleged mass attempt to breach the U.S.-Mexico border, a day after a judge threw out the cases. (Omar Ornelas/El Paso Times via AP, File)
Israel's military has ordered tens of thousands of people in the southern Gaza city of Rafah to begin evacuating, signaling that a long-promised ground invasion could be imminent.
The announcement on Monday complicated last-ditch efforts by international mediators to broker a cease-fire. Hamas and Qatar, a key mediator, have warned that an invasion of Rafah could derail the talks.
Israel has described Rafah as the last significant Hamas stronghold after seven months of war, and its leaders have repeatedly said they need to carry out a ground invasion to defeat the Islamic militant group.
Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an army spokesman, said some 100,000 people were being ordered to move to a nearby Israel-declared humanitarian zone called Muwasi. He said Israel was preparing a “limited scope operation” and would not say whether this was the beginning of a broader invasion of the city.
The Israel-Hamas war has driven around 80% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million from their homes and caused vast destruction in several towns and cities. The death toll in Gaza has soared to more than 34,500 people, according to local health officials.
The war began Oct. 7 when Hamas attacked southern Israel, abducting about 250 people and killing around 1,200, mostly civilians. Israel says militants still hold around 100 hostages and the remains of more than 30 others.
Currently:
— Israeli army tells Palestinians to evacuate parts of Rafah ahead of an expected assault
— Hamas says latest cease-fire talks have ended. Israel vows military operation in ‘very near future’
— Israel orders Al Jazeera to close its local operation and seizes some of its equipment
— Netanyahu uses Holocaust ceremony to brush off international pressure against Gaza offensive
— Anti-war protesters leave USC after police arrive, while Northeastern ceremony proceeds calmly
— Israeli strike kills 4 civilians in southern Lebanon, state media says
Follow AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war
Here's the latest:
RAFAH, Gaza Strip -- The United Nations agency serving Palestinian refugees says it will not comply with an Israeli military order to evacuate parts of the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
Juliette Touma, communications director for UNRWA, says the agency has not evacuated the area and has no plans to do so. She says it has thousands of employees in the city.
“UNRWA will not take part in any forced evacuation of the population in Rafah or elsewhere in Gaza,” she said. “We are committed to staying and delivering humanitarian assistance.” She called for a cease-fire.
Relations between Israel and UNRWA have long been strained and further deteriorated during the seven-month war.
Israel has accused UNRWA of collaborating with the Hamas militant group and called for the agency’s closure.
UNRWA, the largest international provider of aid and services in Gaza, denies the accusations.
BERLIN — Germany’s Foreign Office on Monday condemned the shutdown of Qatar’s Al Jazeera satellite news network in Israel.
The Foreign Office wrote on X that “a free and diverse press landscape is the cornerstone of every liberal democracy. In times of conflict especially, it is of crucial importance to protect the freedom of the press.”
“The decision of the Israeli authorities to shut down Al Jazeera in Israel is the wrong signal,” the ministry said.
Germany has for decades been a staunch supporter of Israel. Berlin, however, has gradually shifted its tone as civilian casualties in Gaza have soared, becoming increasingly critical of the humanitarian situation in Gaza and speaking out against a ground offensive in Rafah.
JERUSALEM — The Israeli army has ordered tens of thousands of people in the southern Gaza city of Rafah to begin evacuating, signaling that a long-promised ground invasion could be imminent.
The announcement on Monday complicated last-ditch efforts by international mediators, including the director of the CIA, to broker a cease-fire. Hamas and Qatar, a key mediator, have warned that an invasion of Rafah could derail the talks.
Israel has described Rafah as the last significant Hamas stronghold after seven months of war, and its leaders have repeatedly said they need to carry out a ground invasion to defeat the Islamic militant group.
Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an army spokesman, said some 100,000 people were being ordered to move to a nearby Israel-declared humanitarian zone called Muwasi. He said Israel was preparing a “limited scope operation” and would not say whether this was the beginning of a broader invasion of the city. But last October, Israel did not formally announce the launch of a ground invasion that continues to this day.
BEIRUT — An Israeli airstrike on northeastern Lebanon wounded three people and destroyed a building, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency says.
The strike on the village of Safri early Monday targeted a factory in the eastern Bekaa Valley, the agency said without giving further details.
The Israeli military said its fighter jets struck a Hezbollah military structure in Safri.
Monday’s strike came after a tense day along the Lebanon-Israel border during which an Israeli airstrike on a village near the border killed four Lebanese civilians.
The militant Hezbollah group said it fired dozens of rockets in retaliation toward northern Israel.
The Lebanon-Israel border has seen almost daily exchange of fire since a day after the Israel-Hamas war started on Oct. 7.
Israeli strikes have killed more than 350 people in Lebanon, most of them fighters with Hezbollah and allied groups but also including more than 50 civilians. In Israel, strikes from Lebanon have killed at least 10 civilians and 12 soldiers.
The office of late Al Jazeera network journalist Shireen Abu Akleh is decorated with memorial items, inside the network's office, in the West Bank city of Ramallah Sunday, May 5, 2024. Israel ordered the local offices of Qatar's Al Jazeera satellite news network to close Sunday, escalating a long-running feud between the broadcaster and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-line government as Doha-mediated cease-fire negotiations with Hamas hang in the balance. (AP Photo/Nasser Nasser)
Palestinians react next to the bodies of their relatives who were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza Stirp, at the Al Aqsa hospital in Deir al Balah, Gaza, Sunday, May 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Palestinians react next to the bodies of their relatives who were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza Stirp, at the Al Aqsa hospital in Deir al Balah, Gaza, Sunday, May 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
A Palestinian woman mourns her relative, 7-month old baby Hani Qeshta, who was killed in an Israeli bombardment on a residential building with Qeshta's family, at the morgue of Al Najjar hospital in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, Sunday, May 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Ismael Abu Dayyah)
Israeli soldiers drive a tank at a staging ground near the border with the Gaza Strip, in southern Israel, Sunday, May 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Tsafrir Abayov)
The Qeshta family is seen in body bags at the morgue of Al Najjar hospital in Rafah, southern Gaza Strip, Sunday, May 5, 2024. The family was killed in an Israeli bombardment on a residential building in Rafah. (AP Photo/Ismael Abu Dayyah)
