Trump heads to Middle East to mark ceasefire deal and push for peace
Global News
President Donald Trump thinks there is a narrow window to reshape the Mideast and reset long-fraught relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors.
President Donald Trump is setting off for Israel and Egypt on Sunday to celebrate the U.S.-brokered ceasefire and hostage deal between Israel and Hamas and urge Middle East allies to seize the opportunity to build a durable peace in the volatile region.
It’s a fragile moment with Israel and Hamas only in the early stages of implementing the first phase of the Trump agreement designed to bring a permanent end to the conflict sparked by the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas-led militants.
Trump thinks there is a narrow window to reshape the Mideast and reset long-fraught relations between Israel and its Arab neighbors.
It is a moment, the Republican president says, that has been helped along by his administration’s support of Israel’s decimation of Iranian proxies, including Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The White House says momentum is also building because Arab and Muslim states are demonstrating a renewed focus on resolving the broader, decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict and, in some cases, deepening relations with the United States
“I think you are going to have tremendous success and Gaza is going to be rebuilt,” Trump said Friday. “And you have some very wealthy countries, as you know, over there. It would take a small fraction of their wealth to do that. And I think they want to do it.”
The first phase of the ceasefire agreement calls for the release of the final 48 hostages held by Hamas, including about 20 believed to be alive; the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel; a surge of humanitarian aid to Gaza; and a partial pullback by Israeli forces from Gaza’s main cities.
Israeli troops on Friday finished withdrawing from parts of Gaza, triggering a 72-hour countdown under the deal for Hamas to release the Israeli hostages, potentially while Trump is on the ground there. He said he expected their return to be completed on Monday or Tuesday.
Lawmakers from both parties said Sunday they support congressional reviews of recent U.S. military strikes against vessels suspected of smuggling drugs.
Hundreds more are missing following flooding and landslides in the past week, which killed at least 604 people in Indonesia, 366 in Sri Lanka and 176 in Thailand, authorities said.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other U.S. officials held talks with a Ukrainian delegation to further hash out the details of a proposed peace framework.