Gaza War

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The only reason I can think of for them to do something like this, is that they are following the left’s hatred of Israel.

The Washington Free Beacon reports:

Largest Teachers’ Union in United States Erases Jews From the Holocaust

The nation’s largest teachers’ union plans to promote a version of Holocaust remembrance that does not mention Jews, according to its 2025 handbook, which references “victims of the Holocaust from different faiths” and teaches that Israel was founded through “forced, violent displacement and dispossession,” its most recent guide for members shows.

The National Education Association, which represents nearly three million public school teachers and education workers, outlined the priorities in its 2025 handbook. The NEA publishes the document each year as a guide on the group’s priorities and strategic goals for the association’s national and state leaders, staff, and members. It includes the NEA’s bylaws and is updated with any new resolutions and policy positions the union has endorsed.

The news comes amid a surge in both anti-Semitism and anti-Israel extremism at public schools and within teachers’ unions themselves. The NEA Representative Assembly—the union’s parliamentary body—passed a resolution to boycott the Anti-Defamation League’s Holocaust education materials earlier this month, a vote the union’s leadership rejected.

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Most mainstream media outlets have made it clear in recent years where their loyalties lie regarding the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict.

But while rational observers can disagree about how both sides have reacted in the wake of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack, the use of misleading photos to manipulate the narrative should never be deemed acceptable.

That’s what the New York Times essentially admitted it did with a photo originally presented as a severely malnourished child in Gaza.

A little legwork by a watchdog group called Honest Reporting helped expose the misrepresentation, as Breitbart reported:

The New York Times admitted Tuesday that an emaciated Palestinian child it featured on the the front page suffered from “pre-existing health problems” that it had presented, inaccurately, as the result of starvation.

There is an ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza — the result of poor food distribution, not low supply, as Hamas and armed gangs loot aid convoys. Hamas also refuses to release Israeli hostages and end the war.

As Breitbart News reported, the child, photographed by Ahmed Jihad Ibrahim Al-arini of the Turkish Anadolu agency, had a muscular disorder. Few outlets that ran the photo disclosed that fact to readers.

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The Trump administration is set to boycott a high-level summit on Palestinian statehood, co-sponsored by France and Saudi Arabia, scheduled to take place at United Nations headquarters in New York City on Monday.

The event was originally planned for June with French President Emmanuel Macron in attendance but was postponed due to the 12-day war between Israel and Iran. Representatives from more than 50 nations are expected to speak at the High-level International Conference for the Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine, with dozens of additional countries listed as participants.

Reuters reported last month that a U.S. diplomatic cable had urged governments to skip the “counterproductive” U.N. event, which Washington described as an obstacle to efforts to end the war in Gaza.

“The fact that the French and the Saudis could not be dissuaded from manufacturing this latest stumbling block to peace is a finger in the eye to President Trump,” Anne Bayefsky, president of Human Rights Voices and director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust, told Fox News Digital.

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Columbia University’s famed pro-Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil said it is “absurd” and “disingenuous” to ask him if he condemns the terrorist group Hamas.

Khalil repeatedly avoided answering the direct question during a recent interview on CNN. The Trump administration tried to deport Khalil and accused him of lying on his visa application after he omitted his work with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency.

The Trump administration is also seeking to deport Khalil, an Algerian national, on the grounds he is sympathetic to Hamas and is promoting antisemitism.

“Just to be clear here, do you specifically condemn Hamas, a designated terrorist organization in the United States, not just for their action on Oct. 7?” CNN’s Pamela Brown asked Khalil on Tuesday.

“I condemn the killing of all civilians, full stop,” Khalil said. Brown asked again, but Khalil kept talking.

“To me, it‘s always, as I said, disingenuous and absurd to ask such questions when literally 62,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel,” he said. “And that‘s why I wouldn‘t really engage much into such questions on condemnation or not. Because selective condemnation wouldn‘t get us anywhere. It’s just like [hypocritical] to be honest.”

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President Donald Trump on Friday dismissed French President Emmanuel Macron’s plan to recognize a Palestinian state — a notably gentler response than the sharp condemnation from Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other top Republicans, who blasted the move a day earlier.

“What he says doesn’t matter,” Trump told reporters at the White House. “He’s a very good guy. I like him, but that statement doesn’t carry weight.”

Macron took to X on Thursday to announce his intention for France to recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly next September.

Macron took to X on Thursday to announce France’s formal recognition of the Palestinian State at the United Nations General Assembly in September.

<b>Netanyahu says Israel considering alternatives to ceasefire talks with Hamas</b>- <i> www.euronews.com</i>

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Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Friday that his government is considering “alternative options” to ceasefire talks with Hamas after Israel and the US recalled their negotiating teams from Qatar, throwing the future of the negotiations into further uncertainty.

Netanyahu’s statement came as a Hamas official said negotiations were expected to resume next week and portrayed the recall of the Israeli and American delegations as a pressure tactic.

The teams left Doha on Thursday as President Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, said Hamas’ latest response to proposals for a deal showed a “lack of desire” to reach a truce.

Witkoff said the US would look at “alternative options,” without elaborating.

In a statement released by his office, Netanyahu echoed Witkoff, saying, “Hamas is the obstacle to a hostage release deal.”

“Together with our US allies, we are now considering alternative options to bring our hostages home, end Hamas’s terror rule, and secure lasting peace for Israel and our region,” he said.

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France will officially recognise a Palestinian state in September, President Emmanuel Macron has said, which will make it the first G7 nation to do so.

In a post on X, Macron said the formal announcement would be made at a session of the UN General Assembly in New York.

“The urgent need today is for the war in Gaza to end and for the civilian population to be rescued. Peace is possible. We need an immediate ceasefire, the release of all hostages, and massive humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza,” he wrote.

Palestinian officials welcomed Macron’s decision, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the move “rewards terror” following Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack in Israel.

The US “strongly rejects” Macron’s announcement, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, calling the decision “reckless”.

The G7 is a group of major industrialised nations, which alongside France includes the US, the UK, Italy, Germany, Canada and Japan.

In his Thursday post on X, Macron wrote: “True to its historic commitment to a just and lasting peace in the Middle East, I have decided that France will recognise the State of Palestine.

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The United States recalled its diplomatic team from Qatar on Thursday, ending two weeks of intense ceasefire negotiations with Hamas after the terror group rejected the Trump administration’s latest offer.

“We have decided to bring our team home from Doha for consultations after the latest response from Hamas, which clearly shows a lack of desire to reach a ceasefire in Gaza,” special envoy Steve Witkoff said in a statement. “While the mediators have made a great effort, Hamas does not appear to be coordinated or acting in good faith.”

The Trump administration is now considering “alternative options to bring the hostages home and try to create a more stable environment for the people of Gaza.” Witkoff accused Hamas of acting in a “selfish way” and stressed that he and his team remain “resolute in seeking an end to this conflict and a permanent peace in Gaza.”

The talks, which Egypt and Qatar have mediated, reportedly stretched into the early morning hours on Thursday but failed to adequately address “significant gaps,” according to Israeli officials. Hamas reportedly desires guarantees that Israel will not resume its war effort even without a final deal within a 60-day ceasefire period. The terror group also wants Israel to release 200 prisoners serving life sentences and around 2,000 others who were arrested since the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks, the Jerusalem Post reported.

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“The humanitarian catastrophe that we are witnessing in Gaza must end now,” Sir Keir Starmer said in a joint statement with German chancellor Friedrich Merz and French president Emmanuel Macron.

The three leaders held discussions on the crisis in Gaza amid growing fears of mass starvation in the area.

In their statement they said: “The most basic needs of the civilian population, including access to water and food, must be met without any further delay,”

“Withholding essential humanitarian assistance to the civilian population is unacceptable.

“We call on the Israeli government to immediately lift restrictions on the flow of aid and urgently allow the UN and humanitarian NGOs to carry out their work in order to take action against starvation. Israel must uphold its obligations under international humanitarian law.”

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The leaders of Britain, France and Germany will hold an emergency call Friday about the growing hunger crisis in Gaza, after French President Emmanuel Macron announced that his country will become the first major Western power to recognize a Palestinian state.

The surprise announcement exposes differences among the European allies, known as the E3, over how to ease the worsening humanitarian crisis and end the Israel-Hamas war.

All three support a Palestinian state in principle, but Germany said it has no immediate plans to follow France’s step, which Macron plans to formalize at the United Nations General Assembly in September.

Britain has not followed suit either, though Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Thursday came closer than ever before, saying “statehood is the inalienable right of the Palestinian people.”

Starmer said he, Macron and Chancellor Friedrich Merz will speak Friday about “what we can do urgently to stop the killing and get people the food they desperately need while pulling together all the steps necessary to build a lasting peace.”

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French President Emmanuel Macron announced Thursday that France will recognize Palestine as a state at the U.N. General Assembly in September.

“Consistent with its historic commitment to a just and lasting peace in the Middle East, I have decided that France will recognize the State of Palestine,” he wrote in a statement on X.

“The urgent priority today is to end the war in Gaza and to bring relief to the civilian population,” Macron continued. “Peace is possible. We need an immediate ceasefire, the release of all hostages, and massive humanitarian aid for the people of Gaza. We must also ensure the demilitarization of Hamas, secure and rebuild Gaza. And finally, we must build the State of Palestine, guarantee its viability, and ensure that by accepting its demilitarization and fully recognizing Israel, it contributes to the security of all in the region.”

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Senate passes Labor motion expressing ‘extreme disapproval’ against Mehreen Faruqi for Gaza sign protest

While the Coalition amendment failed, Labor’s original motion to sanction Mehreen Faruqi passes the Senate.

The Greens opposed the motion along with independent senator Fatima Payman while One Nation and independent senator Tammy Tyrrell teamed up with the two major parties to sanction Faruqi.

While we have been calling it a censure motion, it’s technically a motion to express “profound disapproval” against the senator but also includes that the Senate voted it not “appropriate for Senator Faruqi to represent the Senate as a member of any delegation during the life of this parliament”.

<b>Mass starvation spreading across Gaza, aid agencies warn, as pressure on Israel grows – Middle East crisis live | Middle East and north Africa</b>- <i> www.theguardian.com</i>

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More than 100 aid organisations warned on Wednesday that “mass starvation“ was spreading in Gaza, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports.

Israel is facing mounting international pressure over the catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Palestinian territory, where more than 2 million people face severe shortages of food and other essentials after 21 months of conflict, triggered by Hamas’s attack on Israel.

The UN said on Tuesday that Israeli forces had killed more than 1,000 Palestinians trying to get food aid since the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation started operations in late May – in effect sidelining the existing UN-led system.

A statement with 111 signatories, including Doctors Without Borders (MSF), Save the Children and Oxfam, warned that “our colleagues and those we serve are wasting away”.

<b>Britain joins 24 nations demanding Israel end war in Gaza claiming bloody conflict has plumbed 'new depths'</b>- <i> www.thesun.co.uk</i>

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BRITAIN joined 24 other nations demanding Israel end its war in Gaza yesterday claiming the bloody conflict had plumbed “new depths.”

The joint statement said it was “horrifying” that more than 800 Palestinians in the strife-torn Hamas terror stronghold have been killed seeking food – including dozens yesterday.

But Israeli forces stepped up action in the central Gazan city of Deir al-Balah yesterday – despite fears October 7 hostages are being held there.

An unprecedented joint statement condemning the war was signed by the foreign ministers of Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.

It said: “We come together with a simple, urgent message: the war in Gaza must end now. The suffering of civilians in Gaza has reached new depths.

<b>Israeli military launches first ground operation into central Gaza city of Deir al-Balah</b>- <i> www.euronews.com</i>

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The Israeli military has launched a ground operation on Monday in the central Gaza city of Deir al-Balah, sending in tanks a day after dropping leaflets on neighbourhoods advising people to evacuate.

The ground operation, the first to take place in the city since the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza erupted in 2023, is being accompanied by aerial strikes by Israel’s air force.

Eyewitnesses said massive air strikes took place on the city overnight into Monday, one of the last remaining areas of the Strip not to suffer significant damage from the war.

The city is hosting thousands of Palestinians displaced from southern Gaza and is also the main hub for erratic aid deliveries due to its central location.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) cautioned against a military operation in Deir al-Balah after the IDF dropped evacuation orders on the city on Sunday.

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Georgetown University’s interim president, Robert Groves, told Congress he is “very proud” of the school’s financial relationship with Qatar and defended his decision to award a presidential medal to a Qatari royal who openly celebrated Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre.

“I’m very proud of our mission in Qatar,” Groves said Tuesday during a House Committee on Education and Workforce hearing. “It’s completely consistent with the Jesuit animation of working at the frontiers of serving groups that are not served easily in Washington.”

Republican lawmakers at the hearing—which also featured University of California, Berkeley, chancellor Rich Lyons and City University of New York chancellor Félix Matos Rodríguez—focused much of their attention on Georgetown’s financial relationship with Qatar, through which the university has received approximately $1 billion from the Gulf state since 2005.

One project the university built with its influx of Qatari cash is the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding (ACMCU), situated within Georgetown’s prestigious School of Foreign Service. Groves pointed to the ACMCU as one example of the school’s efforts to address “interfaith conflict.”

<b>20 Palestinians killed in Gaza aid site stampede, Israel-backed group says - National</b>- <i> globalnews.ca</i>

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Twenty Palestinians were killed Wednesday in the crush of a crowd at a food distribution site run by an Israeli-backed American organization in the Gaza Strip, the group said, the first time it has acknowledged deadly violence at its operations. The deaths came as Israeli strikes killed 41 others, including 11 children, according to hospital officials.

The Gaza Humanitarian Fund accused the Hamas militant group of fomenting panic and spreading misinformation that led to the violence, though it provided no evidence to support the claim.

It said 19 people were trampled in a stampede and one person was fatally stabbed at a hub in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis. Gaza’s Health Ministry and witnesses said GHF workers used tear gas against the crowd, inciting a panic. The ministry said that it was the first time people have been killed by a stampede at the aid sites.

It was also the first time that GHF has confirmed deaths at one of its distribution sites, although Palestinian witnesses, health officials and U.N. agencies say hundreds of people have been killed while heading to the hubs to get food.

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Tucker Carlson, who seems fully dedicated to the anti-Israel movement now, provided yet another platform for the world’s biggest state sponsor of terrorism (Iran) to lie to the world. One of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian’s denials is disprovable with a simple internet search — yes, Iran has repeatedly called for Donald Trump’s assassination.

Carlson rarely seems to do any research that would enable him to call out his interviewees’ lies, allowing multiple guests in recent months to make preposterous claims that the barest journalistic prep would have warned him are false claims. In this case, he was so focused on trying to claim Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is lying to trick Americans into fighting a regime that has been at war with us for four decades that he let Pezeshkian make a mendacious semi-denial. Ignore the fact that Iran’s grand ayatollah just issued a fatwa saying Trump must receive the punishment of death.

Netanyahu said in June about Iran, “They want to kill [Trump]. He’s enemy number one.” And if Tucker weren’t an antisemite more interested in irritating other conservatives than in fact-checking foreign dictators’ claims, he’d know that Iran’s desire to see Trump dead isn’t a big secret — Iran has been posting online about it for years.

“Has Iran ever backed an assassination attempt against Donald Trump?” Carlson asked. Predictably, Pezeshhkian lied without an outright denial, while cleverly manipulating Carlson by using one of Tucker’s favorite phrases: “This is actually what Netanyahu is trying to insinuate and to make your people or the president of your country to believe. But this is wrong because Netanyahu, who has his own agenda, wants to drag the U.S. into forever wars as I said and to bring insecurity and instability and onwards to the whole region.” Pezeshkian also denied Iranian sleeper cells in America, about which the Department of Homeland Security is raising alarms.

<b>Iran’s supreme leader makes first public appearance since Iran-Israel war started</b>- <i> www.washingtonexaminer.com</i>

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Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday made his first public appearance since the 12-day war between Israel and Iran began, attending a mourning ceremony on the eve of Ashoura.

Khamenei’s absence during the war suggested the Iranian leader, who has final say on all state matters, had been in seclusion in a bunker — something not acknowledged by state media. State TV in Iran showed him waving and nodding to the chanting crowd, which rose to its feet as he entered and sat at a mosque next to his office and residence in the capital, Tehran.

There was no immediate report on any public statement made. Iranian officials such as the parliament speaker were present. Such events are always held under heavy security.

After the United States inserted itself into the war by bombing three key nuclear sites in Iran, U.S. President Donald Trump sent warnings via social media to the 86-year-old Khamenei that the U.S. knew where he was but had no plans to kill him, “at least for now.”

On June 26, shortly after a ceasefire began, Khamenei made his first public statement in days, saying in a prerecorded statement that Tehran had delivered a “slap to America’s face” by striking a U.S. air base in Qatar, and warning against further attacks by the U.S. or Israel on Iran.

Trump replied, in remarks to reporters and on social media: “Look, you’re a man of great faith. A man who’s highly respected in his country. You have to tell the truth. You got beat to hell.”

<b>Why didn't Hezbollah join Iran in the war against Israel?</b>- <i> www.yahoo.com</i>

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Expert Tal Beeri discussed how it is unknown why the religious directive had not been given, but if it were, Hezbollah would have joined the war against Israel on Iran’s side.

Hezbollah refrained from entering the war between Israel and Iran on Iran’s side due to a lack of religious directive, expert Tal Beeri said.

Beeri is the head of the Research Department at the Alma Center for the Study of Security Challenges in the North. He has published a detailed analysis titled “Why Didn’t Hezbollah Join Iran in the War against Israel?” In it, the Middle East expert challenged prevailing explanations for Hezbollah’s decision to refrain from entering the war on Iran’s side and also discussed the perceived gap between Hezbollah’s weakness and the actual reality.

Beeri noted: “There is a significant gap between the existing portrayal of Hezbollah’s supposed weakness and the actual reality.”

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In the days before a return deadline set for Sunday, tens of thousands of Afghans crossed the border from Iran, creating an “emergency” situation at border crossings, according to the United Nations.Iranian authorities said that out of six million Afghans living in Iran, about four million could be affected by a late May order asking them to leave the country by July 6.Unicef’s representative in Afghanistan, Tajudeen Oyewale, called the situation an “emergency” in a country already facing a “chronic returnee crisis.” He said that 1.4 million Afghans have returned this year from long-time host countries like Iran and Pakistan.Men, women, and even entire families are crossing the border with little money or belongings. “What is concerning is that 25 percent of all these returnees are children… because the demographics have shifted,” Oyewale was quoted as saying to news agency AFP on Thursday.

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When Russia sought assistance from China, North Korea and Iran amid its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, some Western officials expressed concern about the formation of a new axis against Western countries.

But none of these countries came to Iran’s aid during the Iran-Israel war or when American forces attacked Iran’s nuclear facilities.

China and Russia, the most powerful countries in the axis, have only expressed verbal condemnation of Washington’s actions but stopped short of providing any financial, material or military assistance to Tehran.

Alexander Gaboyev, Director of the Carnegie Centre for Russian and Eurasian Affairs, told the New York Times: “Each of these countries is completely pacifist and they don’t want to get involved in each other’s wars. Unlike the US and its allies, these countries do not necessarily have the same structures, values and institutional links with each other.”

The four countries have authoritarian regimes and are hostile to the United States, which has always tried to undermine them and question their legitimacy. They also have some strategic ties with each other which seek to circumvent US-led economic sanctions by advancing trade and exchanging weapons technology.

Michael Kimge, a professor of history at The Catholic University of America and a former US State Department official, also believes that “there is probably little coordination between China, North Korea, Iran and Russia, so that they share views and have conversations around the centre of dissatisfaction with the United States, but not very meaningful coordination with each other.”

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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet US President Donald Trump in Washington on Monday for what some analysts have dubbed a “victory lap” following the US joining Israel in strikes against Iran. But as they meet for the third time this year, the outwardly triumphant visit will be dogged by Israel’s 21-month war against Hamas in Gaza and questions over how hard Trump will push for an end to the conflict.

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The talks would focus on conditions for a possible ceasefire, including hostage and prisoner releases, and Hamas would also seek the reopening of Gaza’s Rafah crossing to evacuate the wounded, the official told AFP.

Hamas’s delegation, led by its top negotiator Khalil al-Hayya, was in Doha, the official told AFP. Israel’s public broadcaster said the country’s delegation had left for the Qatari capital in the early afternoon.

Qatar’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether the indirect negotiations had begun.

‘Enough blood’

Two Palestinian sources close to the discussions told AFP the proposal included a 60-day truce, during which Hamas would release 10 living hostages and several bodies in exchange for Palestinians detained by Israel.

However, they said, the group was also demanding certain conditions for Israel’s withdrawal, guarantees against a resumption of fighting during negotiations, and the return of the UN-led aid distribution system.

On the ground, Gaza’s civil defence agency reported 26 people were killed by Israeli forces on Sunday.

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New details of the Gaza ceasefire proposal emerged on Sunday as Israel sent a negotiating team to Qatar ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ‘s White House visit for talks toward an agreement. Inside the territory, hospital officials said Israeli airstrikes killed at least 38 Palestinians.

“There are 20 hostages that are alive, 30 dead. I am determined, we are determined, to bring them all back. And we will also be determined to ensure that Gaza will no longer pose a threat to Israel,” Netanyahu said before departing, emphasizing the goal of eliminating Hamas’ military and governing power.

A person familiar with the negotiations shared with The Associated Press a copy of the latest ceasefire proposal submitted by mediators to Hamas, and its veracity was confirmed by two other people familiar with the document. All three spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the sensitive talks with the media.

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President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are set to meet at the White House on Monday. One of the most difficult questions on the table is what Gaza might look like without Hamas.

Experts tell Fox News Digital that while the need for an alternative is clear, almost every proposed solution comes with serious structural, political and security limitations.

John Hannah, a senior fellow at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA) and veteran of both Republican and Democratic administrations, said building an alternative to Hamas must happen in parallel with dismantling it.

Hamas terrorists emerge from the shadows as they surround Red Cross vehicles. (TPS-IL)

“Part of how you win is by showing there’s a viable alternative,” Hannah said. “People need to see there’s a future beyond Hamas”

That future, experts believe, lies in a non-Hamas technocratic government – comprised of Palestinians unaffiliated with either Hamas or the PLO – backed by a coalition of key Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and the UAE.