'They want America to fall': Witnesses describe chaos of shooting at Trump rally


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Witnesses described a chaotic scene on Saturday evening after an assassination attempt against Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump.

Trump was speaking at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, when several shots rang out. He reported having been shot in the ear.

“Former president Trump got up and he had some blood on his face,” a witness told reporters. At first it was unknown if the blood on Trump's face was due to a bullet, glass from the teleprompter or if it was the result of US Secret Service agents tackling him.

One person was reported dead and two others were critically injured, law enforcement reported. The gunman was also killed.

A witness spoke to the media about how he and others nearby had observed the gunman crawling towards the edge of the roof of a building, holding a rifle.

“I'm standing there pointing at him for, you know, two three minutes, Secret Service is looking at us from the top of the barn,” the man told the BBC.

“I'm pointing at that roof … And next thing you know, five shots.”

An emergency physician was in the audience when the shooting began and described finding the person who had been killed.

“I heard the shots. I thought it was firecrackers to begin with,” the man told reporters. “Somebody over there was screaming, 'He's been shot. He's been shot.' So I made my way over. I said, I'm an emergency department, physician, let me help you.”

Another witness said the shooting would only cause more division in an already divided country.

“It's only going to cause more division in this country because of the people who support President Trump, and it's only going to make people hate Joe Biden even more, whether he had anything to do with it or not, and whether the Democratic Party had anything to do with it or not,” the witness told Fox News.

“It seems that they'll do anything to remain in power.”

“They don't want this man to be president because he's trying his hardest to save America, and that's not what they want,” another witness told Fox. “They want America to fall. Yeah, they're scared.”

As police were evacuating people from the area, some people shouted at members of the media, saying: “This is your fault!”

Trump has been a frequent critic of the media, often calling reports he did not agree with "fake news".

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Basquiat in Abu Dhabi

One of Basquiat’s paintings, the vibrant Cabra (1981–82), now hangs in Louvre Abu Dhabi temporarily, on loan from the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi. 

The latter museum is not open physically, but has assembled a collection and puts together a series of events called Talking Art, such as this discussion, moderated by writer Chaedria LaBouvier. 

It's something of a Basquiat season in Abu Dhabi at the moment. Last week, The Radiant Child, a documentary on Basquiat was shown at Manarat Al Saadiyat, and tonight (April 18) the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi is throwing the re-creation of a party tonight, of the legendary Canal Zone party thrown in 1979, which epitomised the collaborative scene of the time. It was at Canal Zone that Basquiat met prominent members of the art world and moved from unknown graffiti artist into someone in the spotlight.  

“We’ve invited local resident arists, we’ll have spray cans at the ready,” says curator Maisa Al Qassemi of the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi. 

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Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
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Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.

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Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
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Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.

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1. Fasting

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How to wear a kandura

Dos

  • Wear the right fabric for the right season and occasion 
  • Always ask for the dress code if you don’t know
  • Wear a white kandura, white ghutra / shemagh (headwear) and black shoes for work 
  • Wear 100 per cent cotton under the kandura as most fabrics are polyester

Don’ts 

  • Wear hamdania for work, always wear a ghutra and agal 
  • Buy a kandura only based on how it feels; ask questions about the fabric and understand what you are buying
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Our legal columnist

Name: Yousef Al Bahar

Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994

Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers

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Updated: July 14, 2024, 3:18 AM`