Iran and Israel

• Israeli officials told the NYT they contemplated a broader strike on Iran in return for Iran's (mostly harmlessly intercepted) attempted strikes inside Israel, but settled for a limited strike on Isfahan because of diplomatic pressure from allies to avoid further escalation.
• Iran's Ayatollah Khamenei seemed happy to let Israel have the last word with the Isfahan strike: at a meeting of senior officials, Khamenei brushed off the damage it did: "Debates by the other party about how many missiles were fired, how many of them hit the target and how many didn’t, these are of secondary importance."
• Meanwhile, Iran's proxy in Lebanon, Hezbollah, launched drone attacks into northern Israel yesterday as Jewish families began the Passover holiday. All drones were intercepted.
• Hezbollah's attempted Passover attack was probably a reprisal for an Israeli strike in southern Lebanon that killed Hussein Ali Azkul - who Israel called "a significant terrorist operative" - on Monday.

Ukraine

• Pres. Biden promised Pres. Zelensky that the U.S. weapons funded in the Ukraine/Israel/Taiwan support bill the Senate approved late last night will arrive "quickly." Ukraine will be eager to get them: its military is already suffering setbacks due to delays in U.S. funding.

China

• The Senate's foreign aid package for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan also included a provision obligating ByteDance - the Chinese company that owns TikTok - to sell the app to a non-Chinese owner or shut it down in the U.S.
• ByteDance's shareholders - which include the Chinese government - seem averse to divesting the app, so it will likely face a ban.

Russia

• Russian investigators detained former deputy defense minister Timur Ivanov on suspicion of taking bribes "on a particularly large scale" in connection with construction projects he managed in Mariupol, Ukraine.
• Russia doesn't usually censure senior officials for corruption [perhaps because bribery is so endemic among senior ranks that no hands are clean enough to throw the first stone] and Ivanov is a close ally of powerful defense minister Sergey Shoigu, who should have been able to shield him from scrutiny.
• The fact that Shoigu didn't step in led some to speculate that Ivanov's real offense was something much more grave than graft - like treason (though the Kremlin denied it).

Venezuela

• Venezuela's oil minister, Pedro Tellechea, told Reuters that his ministry is exploring cryptocurrencies as a way to receive payments for oil sales once U.S. sanctions sink back in.
• One cryptocurrency that Venezuela won't be accepting is the Petro (PTR): Pres. Maduro's Patria Platform gave up on that idea earlier this year after a corruption scandal.

North Korea

• North Korea launched more short-range ballistic missiles into the sea on Monday, and analysts are guessing it could try to launch a satellite into orbit tomorrow on the anniversary of the founding of the Korean People's Army.

Other News

• After two years of heated debate, the UK's parliament finally passed a bill that allows asylum-seekers to be deported to Rwanda. Human rights activists are united with some fiscal conservatives against the program, which would cost an estimated £1.8 million ($2.2 million) per deportee for the first 300 people expelled. Flights would start in July, but will probably be delayed or blocked by legal challenges.
• Voters in Ecuador approved a referendum that gives Pres. Noboa even more authority to fight drug gangs. Noboa has already taken a hard stance against the gangs - he deployed the military against them in January - and voters apparently support it: nine of its 11 proposals look likely to pass once all votes are counted.