logo
Trump hails US-Israeli hostage release as ‘monumental news'

Trump hails US-Israeli hostage release as ‘monumental news'

Arab News11-05-2025

WASHINGTON: Donald Trump on Sunday celebrated an announcement by Hamas that it would release US-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander from Gaza, with the US president saying he hoped all hostages would be released and fighting ended.
'I am grateful to all those involved in making this monumental news happen,' Trump said in a post on social media, describing the release as a 'good faith gesture,' adding: 'Hopefully this is the first of those final steps necessary to end this brutal conflict.'

Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Trump is receptive to contacts with North Korean leader, White House says
Trump is receptive to contacts with North Korean leader, White House says

Arab News

time35 minutes ago

  • Arab News

Trump is receptive to contacts with North Korean leader, White House says

WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump would welcome communications with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un after having had friendly relations with Kim during his first term, the White House said on Wednesday. 'The president remains receptive to correspondence with Kim Jong Un,' White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters. She was responding to a report by Seoul-based NK News, a website that monitors North Korea, that the North's delegation at the United Nations in New York had repeatedly refused to accept a letter from Trump to Kim. Trump and Kim held three summits during Trump's 2017-2021 first term and exchanged a number of what Trump called 'beautiful' letters. In June 2019, Trump briefly stepped into North Korea from the demilitarized zone with South Korea. Little progress was made, however, at reining in North Korea's nuclear program, and Trump acknowledged in March that Pyongyang is a 'nuclear power.' Since Trump's first-term summitry with Kim ended, North Korea has shown no interest in returning to talks. The attempts at rapprochement come after the election in South Korea of a new president, Lee Jae-myung, who has pledged to reopen dialogue with North Korea. As a gesture of engagement on Wednesday Lee suspended South Korean loudspeakers blasting music and messages into the North at the Demilitarized Zone along their shared border. Analysts say, however, that engaging North Korea will likely be more difficult for both Lee and Trump than it was in the US president's first term. Since then North Korea has significantly expanded its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs, and developed close ties with Russia through direct support for Moscow's war in Ukraine, to which Pyongyang has provided both troops and weaponry. Kim said in a message to Russian President Vladimir Putin that his country will always stand with Moscow, state media reported on Thursday.

US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation says 5 members killed in Hamas attack
US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation says 5 members killed in Hamas attack

Arab News

timean hour ago

  • Arab News

US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation says 5 members killed in Hamas attack

WASHINGTON: The US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation on Wednesday accused militant group Hamas of attacking a bus carrying its staffers to an aid distribution center, saying at least five people were killed and multiple others injured. The group said in a statement that around 10 p.m. local time (1900 GMT) 'a bus carrying more than two dozen members of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation team... were brutally attacked by Hamas.' 'We are still gathering facts, but what we know is devastating: there are at least five fatalities, multiple injuries, and fear that some of our team members may have been taken hostage,' the statement read. In an email to AFP the group said all the passengers on the bus were Palestinian and all were aid workers. They were en route to GHF's distribution center in the area west of Khan Younis. 'We condemn this heinous and deliberate attack in the strongest possible terms,' the group said in its statement. 'These were aid workers. Humanitarians. Fathers, brothers, sons and friends, who were risking their lives every day to help others.' An officially private effort with opaque funding and backed by Israel, GHF began operations on May 26 after Israel completely cut off supplies into Gaza for more than two months, sparking warnings of mass famine. But GHF's first week of operations, in which it said it had distributed more than seven million meals' worth of food, has been marred by criticism. The Israeli military faces allegations of shooting into crowds of civilians rushing to pick up aid packages near GHF sites. Israeli authorities and the GHF — which uses contracted US security — denied any such incident took place. The United Nations and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the foundation over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives.

Israel to expel French nationals on Gaza aid boat by end of week
Israel to expel French nationals on Gaza aid boat by end of week

Arab News

time4 hours ago

  • Arab News

Israel to expel French nationals on Gaza aid boat by end of week

JERUSALEM: Israel is to expel by the end of the week four French nationals held after security forces intercepted their Gaza-bound aid boat, France's foreign minister said Wednesday, as an Israeli NGO said one of the French campaigners was briefly put in solitary confinement. The announcement came as France's prime minister accused activists aboard the boat — who hoped to raise awareness about the humanitarian situation in war-torn Gaza — of capitalizing on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for political attention. The four, who include Rima Hassan, a member of European Parliament from the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) party who is of Palestinian descent, will be deported on Thursday and Friday, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said on X. They were among 12 people on board the Madleen sailboat which was carrying food and supplies for Gaza before it was intercepted by Israeli forces in international waters off the besieged Palestinian territory on Monday. Four, including two French citizens and Swedish campaigner Greta Thunberg, agreed to be deported immediately. The remaining eight were taken into custody after they refused to leave Israel voluntarily, according to Adalah, an Israeli rights NGO representing most of the activists. All 12 of them have been banned from Israel for 100 years. Adalah said on Wednesday that Israeli authorities had placed French MEP Hassan and Brazilian activist Thiago Avila in solitary confinement, with Hassan later removed. 'Israeli authorities transferred two of the volunteers — the Brazilian volunteer Thiago Avila and the French-Palestinian European Parliament member Rima Hassan — to separate prison facilities, away from the others, and placed them in solitary confinement,' Adalah said in a statement. The NGO later said that Hassan had been moved back to Givon prison in Ramla, near Tel Aviv, while Avila remained in isolation. When asked for comment, Israel's prison authority referred AFP to the foreign ministry, which said it was checking the reports. Adalah said Hassan was put in isolation after writing 'Free Palestine' on a prison wall. The NGO said Brazilian activist Avila was placed in isolation 'due to his ongoing hunger and thirst strike, which he began two days ago.' 'He has also been treated aggressively by prison authorities, although this has not escalated to physical assault,' it added. The leader of Hassan's LFI party in parliament, Mathilde Panot, said France's prime minister Francois Bayrou had failed to condemn Israel's actions. The party's boss, Jean-Luc Melenchon, accused Bayrou of 'abandoning the French prisoners,' and called on President Emmanuel Macron to step in. 'These activists obtained the effect they wanted, but it's a form of instrumentalization to which we should not lend ourselves,' Bayrou responded in the National Assembly. It's 'through diplomatic action, and efforts to bring together several states to pressure the Israeli government, that we can obtain the only possible solution' to the conflict, he added. Foreign Minister Barrot also rejected Panot's criticism, saying 'the admirable mobilization' of French officials had made a rapid resolution of the situation possible 'despite the harassment and defamation that they have been subjected to.' France and Saudi Arabia are co-hosting a UN meeting later this month in New York on steps toward recognizing a Palestinian state and reaching a so-called two-state solution to the conflict. Israel is facing mounting pressure to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza, whose entire population the United Nations has warned is at risk of famine. Israel's defense minister Israel Katz on Wednesday called on Egypt to block a hundreds-strong pro-Palestinian activist convoy from reaching Gaza, as the group arrived in the Libyan capital of Tripoli. Palestinian militant group Hamas on October 7, 2023 attacked Israel, resulting in the deaths of 1,219 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official figures. The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza says the retaliatory Israeli military offensive has killed at least 55,104 people, the majority civilians. The United Nations considers these figures to be reliable. Out of 251 taken hostage during the Hamas attack, 54 are still held in Gaza including 32 the Israeli military says are dead.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into the world of global news and events? Download our app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store