Click here for prior news from May 20th 2025
Click here to look at earlier maps (and events) over 4000 years of history for "Israel - Deep inside the plucky country".
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The US had opened a consulate in Old Jerusalem back in 1844. But like diplomatic missions of nearly every other country, from 1966 (unofficially from May 1948 when the consul-general in Jerusalem was shot dead) until 2018 the actual US Embassy had been in Tel Aviv, a result of the ambiguous legal status surrounding Jerusalem for more than a century. Under the UN Partition Plan of November 1947, Jerusalem was to have been placed under international governance, which thus precluded it from being considered under the sovereignty of any State. But while this UN plan had been accepted by the Jews and the majority of UN countries, it had been rejected by the Arabs (and all of the surrounding Arab countries) who declared war.
The US Embassy opened at its Jerusalem location on May 14, 2018, the 70th anniversary of the creation of the modern State of Israel. On March 4, 2019, the US Consulate-General was formally integrated into the US Embassy in Jerusalem.
Australia Israel relations
In Australia in October 2018, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced Australia was reviewing whether to move Australia's embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. On Friday 14 December 2018, Morrison announced Australia's recognition of West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, though there were no immediate plans to move its embassy from Tel Aviv.
This recognition of West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel was reversed by the ALP Federal Government on Tuesday 18 October 2022. Foreign Minister Penny Wong stressed that Australia remained a "steadfast friend" to Israel, however its embassy would remain in Tel Aviv.
Jerusalem's history over the past century
British forces captured the city from the Ottoman Turks during World War I and maintained control under a League of Nations mandate for 30 years. In November 1947, a United Nations plan terminated the British mandate for implementation at midnight May 14 1948, and partitioned Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state with Jerusalem to become an international zone. While accepted by the Jews, the proposed plan never was implemented as civil war erupted. The British organized their withdrawal and intervened only on an occasional basis. When a cease-fire ended the fighting in 1949, Israeli forces held Jerusalem's western precincts while Jordan occupied the city's eastern districts, including the old city with its holy sites such as the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, the al Aqsa Mosque and the Western Wall.
Click here for more details and to see a map of the UN's original proposal. The State of Israel increased their area by almost 60% of the area that had been allocated to the proposed Arab state. This included the Jaffa, Lydda and Ramle area, Galilee, some parts of the Negev, a wide strip along the Tel-Aviv to Jerusalem road, and some territories in the West Bank, placing them under military rule. With Jordan occupying the West Bank and the Egyptian military occupying Gaza, no state was created for the Palestinian Arabs.
Israel and Jordan soon annexed the portions of Jerusalem they held, with Israel in 1950 declaring the city as its capital, but this accordingly went unrecognized by other nations. In the 1967 Six-Day War, Israel captured East Jerusalem, along with the West Bank. Israel later annexed East Jerusalem and reunified the city, again an act that has gone unrecognized by the international community while Palestinian claims remain unresolved.
Six Day War June 1967
Click here for the whole article
Abraham Rabinovich
June 05, 2007
FORTY years after the Six Day War, the consequences of Israel's extraordinary victory are yet to be sorted out. Israel was a tiny Middle Eastern backwater in 1967, with a population of 2.6 million surrounded by a hostile Arab world of 80 million. This disparity seemed to defy the natural order of things and it was a virtual consensus in the Arab world that the Jewish state would fall, sooner rather than later. In Israel itself, the enthusiasm and energy that marked the founding of the state out of the ashes of the Holocaust had been dimmed by the petty problems of getting by in a country with a massive defence burden and a lame economy.
It was the Soviet Union, for reasons never adequately clarified, that lit the fuse that would transform the region. In mid-May 1967, it declared that Israel was massing troops in the north in preparation for an attack on Syria. Israeli prime minister Levi Eshkol offered to personally tour the north with the Soviet ambassador to show it wasn't true. The ambassador declined.
There had been small-scale skirmishing between Israel and Syria over the headwaters of the Jordan and Israeli leaders had issued warnings, but there was no massing of troops. Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser, the leading figure in the Arab world, felt impelled to come to Syria's aid. He moved his divisions through the Sinai desert towards Israel, ordered the removal of UN troops who had been stationed there since 1956, and closed the Straits of Tiran (which separates the Gulf of Aqaba from the Red Sea) to Israeli shipping.
Back in 1956, Nasser had blocked Israeli shipping from passing through the Straits. A short war followed with Israel capturing the whole of the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula. After the US pressured Israel to withdraw, Israel declared that if Egyptian forces would again blockade the entrance to the Gulf of Aqaba, it would consider this a "casus belli" - case of war. Israel mobilised its reserves.
Nothing happened for more than two weeks. But mobilisation had paralysed the Israeli economy and Jerusalem had to either stand down or strike. On the morning of June 5, Israeli planes, flying low to avoid radar, suddenly rose into the Egyptian skies. Within three hours, the Egyptian air force was destroyed. Soon after, the Jordanian, Syrian and part of the Iraqi air forces were gone, too.
On the third day of the war, the West Bank and Jordanian Jerusalem fell. Syria's Golan Heights followed. The Arab world was stunned, Israel euphoric. The war catapulted Israel into a new era. Brimful of self-confidence and renewed energy, it attracted Jewish immigrants from the West and more than a million from the Soviet Union. Since 1967, Israel's population has tripled to 7.1 million (of whom 1.4 million are Israeli Arabs), its gross national product has grown by 630 per cent and per capita income has almost tripled to $21,000.
A major result of the Six Day War was to persuade the Arab world that Israel was too strong to be defeated. Internalising that view, Nasser's successor, Anwar Sadat, became in 1970 the first Arab leader to declare readiness to make peace with Israel if it withdrew from all territory it had captured in the Six Day War. Israel insisted, however, on territorial changes.
It took the 1973 Yom Kippur War to persuade Israel to withdraw from all Egyptian territory and for Egypt to agree to peace without insisting on Israel's withdrawal on other fronts as well.
The Oslo accords in 1993, marking the beginning of a dialogue between Israel and the Palestinians, also enabled Jordan to make peace with Israel without being accused of betraying the Palestinian cause.
In 2000, Syria announced its readiness for peace. Though negotiations with Damascus broke down, virtually the entire Arab world now accepted the legitimacy, or at least the existence, of the Jewish state in its midst.
But increasing radicalisation has brought to the Palestinian leadership a movement dedicated to Israel's destruction. If there is an answer for Israel, it lies, as in 1967, in bold and imaginative leadership — but this time on the political playing field.
West Bank Fence
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Extract: Article by Amos Harel, Haaretz.com
July 14, 2009
Seven years after construction work began on the West Bank separation fence, the project seems to have run aground. Work has slowed significantly since September 2007. With fierce opposition coming from the United States, Israel has halted work on the "fingers" — enclaves east of the Green Line that were to have included large settlement blocs such as Ariel, Kedumim, Karnei Shomron and Ma'aleh Adumim, within the fence. The military has, in practice, closed up the holes that were to have led to these "fingers". But giant gaps remain in the southern part of the fence, particularly in the southern outskirts of Jerusalem, in the Etzion bloc and in the Judean Desert.
Since the cabinet under former prime minister Ariel Sharon first approved construction of the fence, in June 2002, the route has undergone some dramatic changes. The original route, which was inspired by Sharon, was to have effectively annexed about 20 percent of the territory of the West Bank to Israel.
In February 2005, the cabinet amended the route to include just nine percent of the West Bank. In April 2006 an additional one percent was shaved off by the government of Ehud Olmert.
In practice, however, the route encompasses only 4½ percent of West Bank land. The four "fingers" in the last map (and which Israel presented at Annapolis in November 2007) were never built, not at Ariel and Kedumim (where a "fingernail" was built, a short stretch of fence east of the homes of Ariel) — not at Karnei Shomron and Immanuel — not at Beit Arieh, nor south of that, at Ma'aleh Adumim. Instead, with little publicity, fences were put up to close the gaps closer to the Green Line, at Alfei Menashe instead of at Kedumim, at Elkana instead of Ariel and in the Rantis area instead of at Beit Arieh.
About 50,000 people in these settlements remain beyond the fence. West of Ma'aleh Adumim the wall built along Highway 1 blocks the gap in the barrier and leaves the city's 35,000 residents outside of the barrier, forcing them to pass through a Border Police checkpoint in order to reach Jerusalem.
Large gaps remain in the southern West Bank. Between Gilo in south Jerusalem and Gush Etzion are tens of kilometres of barrier, work on which was suspended due to High Court petitions. As a result access to Jerusalem from the direction of Bethlehem (now a part of the Palestinian Territories) is relatively easy — for commuters and terrorists both.
Click here for some news in Sep 2014.
A second, 30-kilometre gap in the fence, stretches from Metzudat Yehuda (Yatir) in the west to the Dead Sea in the east. The state announced during a recent High Court deliberation of a petition submitted by area Bedouin that work on the barrier there was suspended.
Defence Minister Ehud Barak is "determined to complete the security fence, despite the delays", his office said in a statement. "The minister and the military establishment are working to solve the problems delaying its completion".
Defence Ministry officials pointed out that Barak was "among the first supporters of the fence and did much to advance its construction".
Security officials claim the rate of construction depends on finding a solution to the legal issues and point out proudly that there is an unbroken barrier from Tirat Zvi in the Beit She'an Valley (in Northern Israel, just west of the Jordan River) to the southern entrance to Jerusalem, and from southern Gush Etzion (south west of Jerusalem) to Metzudat Yehuda (south east of Hebron).
East of East Jerusalem — E1 and Ma'ale Adumim
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Click here for a recent article in 2023 on E1 and Ma'ale Adumim delayed but not abandoned
Unilateral Thinking (an article in April 2006)
Click here for the full article
Finally, after years in the planning prior to 2006, construction of an Israeli police station is under way in the now infamous E1 area, 12 square kilometers, a patch of empty West Bank land that stretches from the eastern municipal boundary of Jerusalem to the settlement-city of Ma'ale Adumim, which sits across the Jerusalem-Dead Sea highway some five kilometers (three miles) to the east.
Infamous, because every prime minister of Israel for the past decade has wanted to develop E1 in order to fill in the space between Ma'ale Adumim and Jerusalem, with the intention of securing Israel's hold over the settlement and its smaller satellite communities, which together constitute the Ma'ale Adumim settlement bloc. And every US administration up until now has nixed Israeli development here, on the grounds that it would seriously hamper Palestinian territorial contiguity between the north and south of the West Bank, as well as access from the West Bank to Jerusalem, thereby undermining the viability of a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital, the only realistic formula on the table for Israeli- Palestinian peace.
Ma'ale Adumim, a settlement of 33,000 residents, has for all intents and purposes become a suburb of Jerusalem, even the Palestinians have tacitly accepted the demographic reality. The Geneva Accord, the unofficial 2003 draft of an Israeli- Palestinian final-status agreement, envisaged the settlement remaining under Israeli control. The competition is over who controls the space in between. The Palestinians reject the notion of a permanent Israeli presence in E1, and consecutive US administrations have viewed this as the red line that Israel should not cross.
Building first started in Ma'ale Adumim itself in 1975, during Yitzhak Rabin's first term as prime minister. And it was Rabin, during his second term in office, in August 1994, who formally included E1 within Ma'ale Adumim's city limits, "or order to create territorial contiguity" between the fast-growing settlement and Jerusalem, according to Benny Kashriel, Ma'ale Adumim's mayor for the past 14 years. That Rabin term produced a general master plan for the area (the term E1 is short for East 1, as the parcel of land was marked on old Jerusalem area zoning maps). In 1997, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's cabinet commenced procedures to authorize the allocation of the land to built on, and the Housing Ministry started work on detailed plans. Netanyahu's successor, Ehud Barak, supported the project, according to Kashriel, and the bureaucratic process for the approval of the plans got underway.
Gaza Strip
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Israeli Gaza Strip Barrier
Wikipedia
The Israel and Egypt — Gaza Strip barrier is a separation barrier first constructed by Israel in 1994 between the Gaza Strip and Israel. An addition to the barrier was finished in 2005 to separate the Gaza Strip and Egypt. The fence runs along the entire land border of the Gaza Strip. It is made up of wire fencing with posts, sensors and buffer zones on lands bordering Israel, and concrete and steel walls on lands bordering Egypt.
Background: The Gaza Strip borders Egypt on the south-west and Israel on the south, east and north. It is about 41 kilometres long, and between 6 and 12 kilometres wide, with a population of about 2 million people. The shape of the territory was defined by the 1949 Armistice Agreement following the creation of Israel in 1948 and the subsequent war between the Israeli and Arab armies. Under the armistice agreement, Egypt administered the Strip for 19 years, to 1967, when it was occupied by Israel in the 1967 Arab-Israeli War.
In 1993, Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organisation signed the Oslo Accords establishing the Palestinian Authority with limited administrative control of the Palestinian territories. Pursuant to the Accords, Israel has continued to maintain control of the Gaza Strip's airspace, land borders and territorial waters. Israel started construction of the first 60 kilometres long barrier between the Gaza Strip and Israel in 1994, after the signing of the Oslo Accords. In the 1994 Interim Agreement on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, it was agreed that "the security fence erected by Israel around the Gaza Strip shall remain in place and that the line demarcated by the fence, as shown on the map, shall be authoritative only for the purpose of the Agreement" (ie. the barrier does not constitute the border). The barrier was completed in 1996.
The barrier was largely torn down by Palestinians at the beginning of the Al-Aqsa Intifada in September 2000. The barrier was rebuilt between December 2000 and June 2001. A one-kilometre buffer zone was added, in addition to new high technology observation posts. Soldiers were also given new rules of engagement, which, according to Ha'aretz, allow soldiers to fire at anyone seen crawling there at night. Palestinians attempting to cross the barrier into Israel by stealth have been shot and killed.
Hamas, a US-designated terrorist organisation, came to power in Gaza through elections held in 2006. It has since imposed authoritarian rule over the territory, clashing with the more moderate Fatah party — which runs the Palestinian Authority that controls parts of the West Bank — and losing much of its popularity.
October 2023
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country was at war with Hamas after the militant group’s forces poured across the border from Gaza on Saturday October 7, killing over 1,000 residents and capturing over 200 hostages.
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ULTIMATUM AND ISOLATION FOR HAMAS TERRORISTS
Peace Inc: President’s audacious Gaza start-up
The AustralianJoe Kelly - Ben Packham
Wednesday, October 1st 2025
Hamas has been given a final chance to end the war in Gaza or face annihilation, after Donald Trump unveiled an audacious peace plan requiring the Palestinian enclave to be governed by an international body he would lead. Anthony Albanese backed the plan and urged all parties to the conflict to “bring its vision into reality”, as Jewish groups demanded the Prime Minister use his new-found connections with Palestine’s factions to help get it across the line.
The US President said it was a “historic day” as he unveiled his
Mr Trump, who has relentlessly pursued a Nobel peace prize, said the announcement was aimed to bring “eternal peace to the Middle East” and marked “potentially one of the greatest days ever in civilisation”.
As he stood beside Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House, Mr Trump warned he would give the green light to Israel to “do what you would have to do” if the terrorist group refused to agree to the plan. “Israel would have my full backing to finish the job of destroying the threat of Hamas,” the President said. Mr Netanyahu said Israel was prepared to do just that, declaring: “This can be done the easy way or it can be done the hard way. But it will be done.”
Hours after the announcement, Qatari officials reportedly told Mr Trump they were “capable of persuading Hamas to agree to a deal that includes demilitarisation”. Hamas negotiators said they had received the plan and were willing to “study (it) in good faith and provide a response”.
Under the peace blueprint, none of Gaza’s residents would be forcibly removed, while the Palestinian Authority would be sidelined from any administrative role in Gaza until it finalised sweeping reforms. In the long-term, the territory would be redeveloped as a “New Gaza” that was committed to building a prosperous economy and living peacefully with its neighbours.
Speaking in Abu Dhabi, Mr Albanese welcomed the plan to “bring peace to Gaza after two years of conflict” and demanded Hamas give up its arms and accept the proposal. “Australia wants to see aid given to the desperate people of Gaza who need this peace plan,” he said. Mr Albanese, whose government last week formally recognised Palestine despite US objections, commended what he said was the plan’s “focus on Palestinian self-determination and statehood, and the Palestinian Authority taking back effective control of Gaza”.
Yet the deal offers no support for an immediate two-state solution, saying instead that Palestinian self-determination would hinge on the redevelopment of Gaza and the faithful execution of the Palestinian Authority’s reform program. Mr Trump used his appearance with Mr Netanyahu to take aim at America’s allies which had “foolishly” recognised the state of Palestine, and made clear that “we can never forget October 7”.
The Foreign Ministers of Arab and Muslim nations – including Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Indonesia, Pakistan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Egypt – issued a joint statement welcoming Mr Trump’s “sincere efforts to end the war in Gaza and ... their confidence in his ability to find a path to peace”. The grouping said the plan provided a “mechanism that guarantees the security of all sides” as well as the delivery of aid, no displacement of Palestinians, an Israeli withdrawal, the rebuilding of Gaza and a “path for a just peace on the basis of the two-state solution.”
Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chief executive Alex Ryvchin said: “While western governments were engaged in gesture politics and theatrics at the UN, the US administration has developed a mechanism to immediately and permanently end this war, free the hostages, and guarantee the peaceful reconstruction of Gaza and a pathway to permanent Israeli-Palestinian peace”. Writing in The Australian, he challenged Mr Albanese to do his part “to ensure the Palestinians uphold their side of the bargain”. “For starters, our government can’t simply say it endorses this peace plan, it needs to work with the UK, Canada and France in applying maximum pressure on all Palestinian factions to accept and implement it without delay,” Mr Ryvchin said.
The Australian Palestinian Advocacy Network condemned the peace proposal as a “plan for entrenched colonisation by a war criminal”, arguing that it was illegal under international law and failed to guarantee sovereignty for Palestinians. APAN president Nasser Mashni said it instead cemented external control rather than empowering Palestinians to govern themselves and “imagines a future for Palestinians decided entirely by outsiders.”
If both sides agree to the US proposal “the war will immediately end”, and Israeli forces would withdraw to an “agreed upon line to prepare for a hostage release”. During this time, military operations, including aerial and artillery bombardment, would be suspended, and battle lines would be frozen until conditions were met for a complete staged withdrawal. The plan would require the US to work with Arab and inter national partners to develop a temporary “International Stabilisation Force” that would “immediately deploy” in Gaza. It would be charged with training and providing support to “vetted Palestinian police forces in Gaza” and, as it established greater control and stability, the Israel Defence Forces would withdraw based on the meeting of agreed milestones.
Mr Netanyahu’s acceptance of the proposal marked the start of the 72-hour window for the release of all hostages, alive or dead. Following this, Israel would release 250 life sentence prisoners plus 1700 Gazans who were detained after October 7, 2023 including all women and children detained in that context. For every Israeli hostage whose remains were released, Israel would need to release the remains of 15 deceased Gazans.
Following the return of all hostages, Hamas members who committed themselves to “peaceful coexistence” with Israel would be given amnesty while those that wished to leave Gaza would be provided safe passage to countries willing to receive them.
Upon the agreement of the proposal by Hamas, aid would be immediately sent into Gaza and its entry and distribution would be guaranteed by the UN, its agencies, the Red Crescent and other international bodies. Gaza would be governed on a temporary, transitional basis by a “technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee,” responsible for delivering the day-to-day running of public services and municipalities for the people in Gaza. This committee would be made up of qualified Palestinians and inter national experts, with oversight and supervision by the new “Board of Peace”.
In addition, Mr Trump has proposed an “economic development plan” to rebuild and re-energise Gaza through the convening of a panel of experts “who have helped birth some of the thriving modern miracle cities in the Middle East”. A special economic zone would be established with “preferred tariff and access rates to be negotiated with participating countries”. Hamas would have no role in the governance of Gaza, “directly, indirectly, or in any form. All military, terror and offensive infrastructure, including tunnels and weapon production facilities, will be destroyed and not rebuilt”. The demilitarisation of Gaza would proceed under the supervision of independent monitors.
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‘Stop bombing Gaza’ Trump orders as Hamas agrees to free hostages under peace plan
Alexander Ward and Summer Said
The Wall Street Journal
Saturday, October 4th 2025
Hamas said Friday it was ready to release the remaining hostages in Gaza as long as certain conditions of a broader peace agreement were met, offering no clear position on other elements of President Donald Trump’s
Trump responded positively to Hamas’s message and urged Israel to stop the bombing as all sides hash out details of a finalised deal, a negotiation that could extend beyond his Sunday evening deadline for the group’s agreement to a peace deal. “I believe they are ready for a lasting PEACE,” Trump posted on social media. In order to end the war and ensure the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza, Hamas announced “its agreement to release all occupation prisoners – both living and the remains of the deceased – according to the exchange formula set forth in President Trump’s proposal,” the group said in a statement.
“As for the other issues in President Trump’s proposal relating to the future of Gaza and the fundamental rights of the Palestinian people, these are tied to a comprehensive national position, rooted in relevant international laws and resolutions, to be discussed within an inclusive Palestinian national framework – of which Hamas will be part and to which it will contribute with full responsibility.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said on Saturday that Israel was seeking the “immediate implementation” of President Trump’s plan to free Israeli hostages in Gaza, after Hamas said it was ready for peace talks. Israeli army radio was reporting that the IDF had stopped offensive action in Gaza City and the IDF has been told to start preparations for the release of hostages.
“In light of Hamas’s response, Israel is preparing for the immediate implementation of the first stage of the Trump plan for the release of all the hostages,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement. “We will continue to work in full cooperation with the President and his team to end the war in accordance with the principles set out by Israel, which align with President Trump’s vision.”
As many as 20 of the 48 remaining hostages are believed to still be alive. Mousa Abu Marzouk, a senior Hamas official, told Al Jazeera on Friday that “we agreed to the plan’s main outlines in principle, but its implementation requires negotiations” – a sign that the group wants more talks before fully signing off on Trump’s deal. “The plan cannot be implemented without negotiations.” Releasing the hostages within 72 hours, he added, would be unrealistic under current conditions. Hamas has lost contact in recent weeks with some other militant groups holding a number of them, mediators have said.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on social media posted a picture of Trump filming a video about Hamas’s “acceptance of his Peace Plan.” A senior administration official said that in recent days, US intelligence indicated Hamas was going to reject the deal and that Trump’s plan was unlikely to succeed.
The chain of dramatic events was set in motion earlier Friday, when Trump said Hamas had until 6pm on Sunday to support a 20-point peace plan the US and Israel agreed to on Monday. If Hamas blew through his deadline, “all HELL, like no one has ever seen before, will break out.” “THERE WILL BE PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST ONE WAY OR THE OTHER,” Trump further wrote. Some Hamas fighters are trapped, the president continued, “waiting for me to give the word, ‘GO,’ for their lives to be quickly extinguished.”
Hamas officials in Doha have indicated they are willing to accept Trump’s peace plan but are pushing to modify some of its terms, according to Arab mediators who have been in talks with the group this week. The mediators said the militant group is asking for a number of changes, including the stipulation that it disarm and destroy its weapons, a demand Hamas has previously rejected. Hamas is willing to hand over its offensive weapons to Egypt and the United Nations for storage, but wants to retain what it considers defence systems, the mediators said. Hamas has also renewed its demand for a timeline for Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza and is seeking clarification regarding the formation of an international peacekeeping force for the enclave, including its mandate and deployment plan. Importantly, Hamas has told mediators that releasing all 48 living and dead Israeli hostages within 72 hours, as laid out in the Trump plan, would be difficult, because it has lost contact in recent weeks with other militant groups that hold some of them.
Divisions between the top leaders of Hamas over key elements of Trump’s peace plan are complicating the militant group’s response, the mediators said. The discussions with officials from Qatar, Egypt and Turkey, the countries with which Hamas has the closest ties, shows the challenge in implementing a plan that requires the group to capitulate.
International reactions have been pouring in following Hamas’s positive response. Here are the main reactions from around the world:
- Australian prime minister Anthony Albanese said he welcomed progress on Mr Trump’s plan. “We have consistently been part of international calls for a ceasefire, the return of hostages, and unimpeded humanitarian aid to reach those in need,” he said.
- French President Emmanuel Macron said a ceasefire in Gaza and the freeing of hostages held in the Palestinian territory were “within reach”. “The release of all hostages and a ceasefire in Gaza are within reach!” Macron wrote on X, joining a chorus of hopeful reactions.
- British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said it was “a significant step forwards” in the effort to end the war in Gaza. President Donald Trump’s proposal has “brought us closer to peace than ever before”, Starmer said in a statement, adding: “We call on all sides to implement the agreement without delay.”
- German Chancellor Friedrich Merz added in posts on the X platform that the plan represented “the best chance for peace” in the conflict and that Germany “fully supports” Trump’s “call upon both sides”.
- Mediator Egypt welcomed Hamas’s response to Trump’s Gaza plan, labelling it a “positive development” and urged both sides to seize the opportunity to end the war. “Egypt expresses its hope that this positive development will lead all parties to rise to the level of responsibility by committing to implementing President Trump’s plan on the ground and end the war,” Egypt’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Facebook.
- Qatar also welcomed the news. “The State of Qatar welcomes the announcement by Hamas of its agreement to President Trump’s plan,” said Qatari foreign ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari, who also expressed support for Trump’s statements calling for an immediate ceasefire.
Doha and mediator Egypt had begun working, in coordination with the United States, “to continue discussions on the plan in order to ensure a path toward ending the war.
- A spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was “encouraged by the statement issued by Hamas announcing its readiness to release hostages and to engage”. “He urges all parties to seize the opportunity to bring the tragic conflict in Gaza to an end.”
- And Turkey’s foreign ministry said the Palestinian group’s response “provides an opportunity for the immediate establishment of a ceasefire in Gaza”.
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‘Blessed are the peacemakers’: Israel, Hamas sign ceasefire deal
Brian Schwartz, Summer Said and Michael R. Gordon
The Wall Street Journal
Thursday, October 9th 2025
Israel and Hamas have officially signed a ceasefire deal in Egypt, after President Trump announced the two sides had agreed to the deal that would release all Israeli hostages in the first step toward what he called “a Strong, Durable, and Everlasting Peace.” According to the agreement, Israel will remain in 53 per cent of the Gaza Strip until the last of the hostages is released, Israel’s Channel 12 reports. The surviving hostages will be freed on Sunday (local time), with the dead hostages handed over on Monday.
As happened in the last ceasefire, 600 aid trucks a day will also be allowed into Gaza.
Hamas earlier confirmed a broad deal had been reached to end the war, allow more humanitarian aid, and facilitate “a prisoner exchange” – a reference to the release of Israeli hostages for Palestinians in Israeli prisons. Arab government officials who mediated the talks said Hamas would let the remaining living hostages go as soon as Sunday morning.
“This is a GREAT Day for the Arab and Muslim World, Israel, all surrounding Nations, and the United States of America,” Mr Trump said in a post on his Truth Social site.
The president’s announcement marks a breakthrough in what had been eight months of stalled negotiations after he took office, bringing Mr Trump closer to a top foreign-policy goal of ending the war in Gaza. It came together in less than a month after an Israeli strike on Qatar, a US ally that harbours Hamas officials, heightened fears the war was spinning out of control and brought new pressure on Israel from Mr Trump and on Hamas from leaders in the Muslim world.
Mr Trump employed some of his most trusted advisers – his friend, real-estate investor Steve Witkoff, and his son-in-law Jared Kushner – to bridge the gaps leading to Wednesday’s announcement. It is believed there are 20 living hostages of about 250 people kidnapped on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas and other Palestinian factions launched a surprise assault that killed 1,200 Israelis.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would hold a vote with his government to ratify the deal on Thursday. “A great day for Israel,” he said. “With God’s help, together we will continue to achieve all of our goals and expand peace with our neighbours.”
Earlier in the day at the White House, Mr Trump was interrupted while speaking to reporters at the White House and handed a note by Secretary of State Marco Rubio. After reading it, the president said: “We’re very close to a deal in the Middle East.” The note encouraged the president to approve a Truth Social post so he would be the first to announce a deal, according to a photograph. “I may go there sometime toward the end of the week,” Mr Trump said from the White House when discussing his potential trip to the region. “Maybe on Sunday actually.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a follow-up statement that Mr Trump is considering going to Egypt, where the talks are being hosted, after his annual check-up at Walter Reed Medical Center on Friday. He didn’t rule out visiting Gaza during his trip.
Mr Kushner and special envoy Mr Witkoff arrived in Egypt Wednesday along with Qatar’s prime minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, and Ron Dermer, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s top adviser. While Hamas had tentatively accepted the 20-point peace plan announced by Mr Trump last week, it had signalled it had reservations, including over how far and precisely when Israeli troops in Gaza will pull back. It also said it would need at least 10 days to locate bodies of dead hostages, according to people close to the talks. Israeli officials believe it will be very difficult for Hamas to locate all the remaining bodies of hostages.
Representatives for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and from Palestinian Islamic Jihad, groups that hold some of the Israeli hostages, were also in Egypt for the talks.
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Gaza ceasefire starts as Israel approves deal to free hostages
Joe Kelly, Anne Barrowclough and Lydia Lynch
The Australian
Saturday, October 11th 2025
Thousands of displaced Palestinians have begun walking back to northern Gaza after Israel declared a ceasefire and started withdrawing troops on Friday. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who toured a medical centre on Friday to oversee preparations for the return of hostages, confirmed in a televised address that IDF troops would remain in parts of Gaza until Hamas agreed to disarm. “If this is achieved the easy way – so much the better. And if not – it will be achieved the hard way,” he said.
Under the second phase of Mr Trump’s peace plan, Hamas would give up power in Gaza and disarm, though the terror group is yet to agree to this.
The ceasefire, which began at noon Friday (8pm AEDT), set the clock running on a 72-hour deadline for Hamas to release all 20 surviving hostages. Israel has said the hostages will be freed on Monday or Tuesday, while Donald Trump will now travel to Egypt on Sunday (local time) for the official signing of the plan, which has been published in full by the state broadcaster Kan. He is then expected to travel to Jerusalem on Monday morning where he will address members of the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. Once the hostages are released, Israel will then free 250 Palestinian prisoners serving life sentences and 1700 Gazans detained since the October 7, 2023 attack.
After the ceasefire began on Friday, a steady stream of Palestinians were seen trekking north along the coast line, to their homes in Gaza City. US officials said 200 troops would be sent to Israel to help support and monitor the ceasefire deal, with US Central Command establishing a “civil-military co-ordination centre” in Israel that will help facilitate the flow of humanitarian aid as well as logistic and security assistance into the territory wracked by two years of war.
Shortly before Israel’s vote was announced on Friday morning AEDT, US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Middle East adviser Jared Kusnher joined the cabinet as they voted on the deal, with Mr Netanyahu telling his ministers Israel was “about to achieve the goal” of the hostages’ return. “We’ve fought during these two years to achieve our war aims,” Mr Netanyahu said. “A central one of these war aims is to return the hostages, all of the hostages, the living and the dead. And we are about to achieve that goal.” He said Israel “couldn’t have achieved it without the extraordinary help of President Trump and his team, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. They worked tirelessly with Ron [Dermer] and his team, our team. And that, and the courage of our soldiers, to enter Gaza, and combine military and diplomatic pressure that isolated Hamas, I think has brought us to this point.” He thanked the Americans for their long hours of work. “I think you put in your brains, and your hearts,” he added.
Mr Witkoff, Mr Kushner and Ivanka Trump were seen visiting the Western Wall in Jerusalem on Friday. Mr Witkoff credited Mr Netanyahu for getting the deal over the line, saying: “The hard job was the prime minister’s.” He said Mr Netanyahu “made some very, very difficult calls, and lesser people would not have made those calls. “He had the job of protecting this country. He had the job of making tough choices with regards of how tough to be with Hamas, when to be flexible, when not to be flexible.”
Mr Witkoff admitted that at times he thought Israeli should have been more flexible. “But the truth is, as I look back, I don’t think we get to this place without Prime Minister Netanyahu,” he said.
‘Momentous breakthrough’
Earlier, Mr Trump used a cabinet meeting in Washington to hail the agreement to end hostilities between Israel and Hamas as a “momentous breakthrough” that would lead to a “lasting peace.” He declared that the war in Gaza had ended and that the return of the remaining Israeli hostages had been secured with their release now expected on Monday or Tuesday. “Getting them is a complicated process,” he said. Mr Trump also flagged his plans to travel to the region, declaring that “I’m going to try and make a trip over. We’re going to try and get over there, and we’re working on the timing.” “We’re going to go to Egypt, where we’ll have a signing.” He said it was “amazing” that the Arab world had united behind the peace plan including Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. “It’s really peace in the Middle East,” he said.
Israel’s Kan broadcaster has published the full agreement signed in Israel by Hamas and Israel.
- Titled “Implementation Steps for President’s Trump for a ‘Comprehensive End of Gaza War,’” the document details the stages of the deal, beginning with Mr Trump’s announcement of “the end to the war in the Gaza Strip, and that the parties have agreed to implement the necessary steps to that end.”
- The second step states that “the war will immediately end upon the approval of the Israeli government,” while the third step calls for the “immediate commencement of full entry of humanitarian aid and relief” into the Gaza Strip.
- The fourth step is that the “IDF will withdraw to lines agreed upon as per map X attached herewith, and this will be completed after President Trump’s announcement and within 24 hours of Israeli government approval.” It adds: “The IDF will not return to areas that have been withdrawn from, as long as Hamas fully implements the agreement.”
- In the fifth step, which will take place “within 72 hours of the withdrawal of Israeli forces, all Israeli hostages, living and deceased, held in Gaza will be released.” One of the fifth step’s subclauses calls for “the establishment of an information-sharing mechanism … on any deceased hostages that were not retrieved within the 72 hours or remains of Gazans held by Israel.” “The mechanism shall ensure that the remains of all the hostages fully and safely exhumed and released. Hamas shall exert maximum effort to ensure the fulfilment of these commitments as soon as possible,” it adds.
- The final step says “a task force will be formed of representatives from the United States, Qatar, Egypt, Turkey and other countries to be agreed upon by the parties, to follow up on the implementation with the two sides and co-ordinate with them.”
Khalil al-Hayya, Hamas’s chief negotiator in Qatar said the militant group had received US guarantees that the war would end. “We acted responsibly in relation to [US President Donald] Trump’s plan,” he said in his first statement since the agreement was signed. “Today we announce an agreement to end the war, [see Israel] withdraw from the Strip and carry out a prisoner exchange.” He added: “We received guarantees from the mediators and the Americans that the war has ended indefinitely.”
Earlier, Mr Trump said that, while the October 7 2023 attack on Israel was “terrible,” there had since been 70,000 Palestinians that had been killed. “That’s big retribution,” he said. Mr Trump argued that Gaza would be rebuilt given the tremendous wealth in the region and expected countries would be “stepping up and putting up a lot of money.”
He also said the strikes by the US on Iran’s nuclear enrichment sites had been central to securing the prospect of peace. If they had not proceeded, Mr Trump warned that Tehran would have probably developed nuclear weapons and plunged the Middle East into further chaos. “Even if we signed a deal there’d be a big dark cloud over it,” he said. Mr Trump said that Iran had informed the US that it supported the peace process and was “totally in favour of this deal.” He expressed special gratitude to Qatar, Egypt and Turkey in smoothing the path to a deal and said Americans should also feel proud of the efforts made by Washington in clinching the agreement.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio praised Mr Trump’s efforts in securing the peace deal, saying that it began with the US President’s “trip to the Middle East, where these relationships were forged with partners in the region (and) personal relationships.” He said the turning point came at the United Nations in New York where Mr Trump “convened an historic meeting, not simply of Arab countries, but Muslim majority countries from around the world including Indonesia”. Mr Rubio said the US President crated a powerful coalition behind his peace plan and followed this by meeting the following Monday at the White House with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu where he presented the proposal. “Perhaps the stories will be told. Perhaps they will never be told,” he said. “The President had some extraordinary phone calls and meetings that required a high degree of intensity and commitment and made this happen.”
Mr Rubio said no other US President in the modern era could have secured the agreement, saying the deal would go down “as an historic moment in the history of our country.” He also praised the efforts of Mr Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and his special envoy for the Middle East, Steve Witkoff.
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said that Mr Trump had demonstrated peace through strength, and noted the importance of the decision to target the Iranian nuclear enrichment sites. Vice President JD Vance also took aim at the “fake news media”, saying it had attacked Mr Trump and his approach to the Middle East for months. “The reason we’re here is because the President actually charted a different course,” he said. “He invested a lot of authority in Steve Witkoff in particular and that’s why we’re here. It’s because you did something different.”
In a rare interview with Israeli media, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said his organisation was co-ordinating with the United States on reforms. The ceasefire deal demands significant changes if the PA is to take part in governing a post-war Gaza. “We launched a reform that also includes the issue of prisoners’ salaries, which we agreed upon with the United States, in addition to reforms in education, health and the economy — some have already been implemented and others will be implemented until we reach a point where the Palestinian Authority can continue to lead the Palestinian people,” Mr Abbas said.
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BEAUTIFUL DAY
Tears of joy, grief and relief as horrors of war are finally over
Yoni Bashan, Liam Mendes
The Australian
Tuesday, October 14th 2025
Tel Aviv For 738 days, an entire nation held its breath. Two years of bitter anguish, of families clinging to a hope that seemed to slip by with every passing dawn, of time running out and a war within Gaza’s labyrinthine tunnels that seemed endless in its cycle of carnage.
But on Monday, under cloudless skies in Tel Aviv, the rarest of gifts arrived: an ending. Public squares overflowed with people. Strangers embraced, veteran news anchors wept, and a nation, held captive by grief, became swept up in unbridled joy as the last of the living hostages were finally reunited with their families.
“You’re coming home,” Einav Zangauker cried into her phone. It was her first conversation with son Matan since Hamas militants dragged him to Gaza from Nir Oz on October 7, 2023. In a rush of words, she said what the nation had been longing to hear. “There’s no war. It’s over. I love you. I’m waiting for you.” In a region beset by chaos, the hostages’ liberation unfolded with surprising precision, brokered by US President Donald Trump, who arrived in Israel as the first captives began tasting their freedom.
At 8am local time, seven of the men walked free: Matan Angrest, 22; twin brothers Gali and Ziv Berman, 28, who were reunited at the border after being held separately in captivity; Alon Ohel, 24; Eitan Mor, 25; Omri Miran, 48; and Guy Gilboa-Dalal, 24, who appeared in good spirits as he was flown across Israel in a military helicopter.
“Thank you to the IDF, to all of Israel,” a smiling Mr Gilboa-Dalal wrote on a small whiteboard while airborne. “I returned. The people of Israel live!” The Berman twins, wearing the jerseys of their beloved soccer team, Maccabi Tel Aviv, waved to the crowds on arrival at Sheba Medical Centre. The facility was told to remain on standby for a possible visit by Mr Trump following his address to the Israeli Knesset in Jerusalem, attended by his daughter, Ivanka, and son-in-law Jared Kushner.
Hours later, 13 more captives emerged: Bar Kupershtein, 23, Evyatar David, 24, Yosef-Chaim Ohana, 25, Segev Kalfon, 27, Avinatan Or, 32, Elkana Bohbot, 36, Rom Braslavski, 21, Maxim Herkin, 37, Nimrod Cohen, 20, Matan Zangauker, 25, Eitan Horn, 38, and brothers Ariel, 28 and David Cunio, 35. Gaunt and pale from years underground, some hostages spoke to their families via FaceTime while still in Gaza, their masked captors appearing on screen with them. Evyatar David – last glimpsed emaciated and digging his own grave in a proof of life video released by Hamas in August – briefly participated in a television interview alongside a Hamas militant, a surreal moment that underscored the extraordinary nature of the conflict.
One of the first phone calls Mr Angrest made was to former hostage Keith Siegel, released in February, with whom he’d spent time in captivity. Mr Siegel, aged 65, praised the young man for his courage in captivity. “What a hero you are, Matan. You’re a hero.” A photograph of Mr Angrest, released by the IDF, showed him aboard a helicopter draped in an Israeli flag. Another, released by his family, appeared to show a large burn on the outside of his arm. He had reportedly been tortured in captivity.
As the day unfolded, gratitude streamed forth from families who had endured the unbearable; dignity prevailed. Mr Angrest’s family said: “We can breathe again. We salute with awe and respect the IDF soldiers, the heroes in uniform, the heads and members of the security forces who left everything and risked their lives.”
The family of Omri Miran, torn from his home in the Nahal Oz community, thanked the people of Israel “for standing by us in the darkest hours and on days when this moment seemed like a distant and impossible wish”. The Israel Defense Forces released pictures of Mr Miran tearfully embracing his wife Lishay Miran-Lavi and speaking to his daughters on an iPad. “This moment, today, is not a personal victory but a victory of an entire people,” they said.
From the family of Eitan Mor, abducted while working security at the Nova festival, came a sentiment that honoured Israel’s security forces, many of whom sacrificed their lives to bring home the hostages. “We want to thank them and embrace with a strong hug the bereaved families, the widows, the orphans, and the wounded. Only thanks to your sacrifice are we embracing Eitan today.” It was a homecoming that bore no resemblance to the dangers and theatre of previous exchanges. Gone were the baying crowds, the spectacles and signing ceremonies that had endangered the captives and outraged the Israeli public. Instead, the hostages were discreetly moved from undisclosed locations in Gaza to Red Cross collection points, then handed to Israeli military officials in the territory.
The passage to freedom continued from Gaza to a military base in Re’im, Israel, where families waited. After medical assessments, helicopters carried the hostages to hospitals across Israel where the real journey home would begin. The nation bore witness at every moment. Israelis lined highways to create corridors of welcome and salute. But nowhere was the emotion more palpable than at Tel Aviv’s Hostage Square – a plaza of blue and white flags where hundreds of thousands of people had assembled from dawn.
Just days earlier nearly half a million people packed the site to celebrate the announcement of the ceasefire in Gaza and the return of the hostages. But the price of freedom, accepted by Israelis, was known to be steep: twenty living hostages for up to 2,000 Palestinian prisoners, including 250 men affiliated with Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Fatah – all of them serving life sentences
Click here for Assad downfall in Syria in December 2024
Click here for news in Iran with US bombing of its uranium plant in June 2025
Earlier News in Israel
- Yasser Arafat, Fatah, PLO, and Lebanese War 1959 - 2004
- Six Day War, June 5-10 1967
- Closure Lebanese war, August 14 2006
- PLO Interior Minister resigns in Gaza City, May 14 2007
- Annapolis Maryland Peace Conference, November 29 2007
- Iraq Iran truce in Tehran, June 14 2008
- Markets Spin in New York, October 1 2008
- Israel hammers Gaza, December 28 2008
- Fault lines in Netanyahu's fractious alliance, April 6 2009
- Washington jitters, July 29 2009
- Israel agrees to settlement moratorium, November 27 2009
- Israel 'wrecks' peace talks, March 12 2010
- Gaza naval raid, June 1 2010
- Peace or War on settlements, September 20 2010
- Arab "spring", January 29 2011
- Golan Heights confrontations, June 7 2011
- West Bank recognition at UN, September 17 2011
- Iran fires missile near Hormuz in Persian Gulf, January 2 2012
- Iran's nuclear facilities, February 28 2012
- Damascus bomb attack, July 19 2012
- Israel prepares for War with Iran, September 18 2012
- Hamas leader assassination, November 15 2012
- Netanyahu election victory, January 23 2013
- Syria's civil war, June 1 2013
- Western action in Syria, August 28 2013
- Bethlehem separation barrier, December 26 2013
- Gaza offensive, June 21 2014
- State land announced at Gush Etzion Bethlehem, September 2 2014
- Ehud Olmert jail sentence, May 26 2015
- Netanyahu announces Golan Heights is Israel's, April 19 2016
- Jordan thanks Trump (for tempering Temple Mount crisis), July 28 2017
- Israel strikes Syria, April 10 2018
- Israel election, April 7 2019
- Trump's Peace Plan, January 28 2020
- Israel election, March 23 2021
- East Jerusalem clashes, May 11 2021
- West Bank aid offer, February 9 2022
- Israel election, November 1 2022
- Protests in Israel and Backdown by Netanyahu, June 30 2023
- includes Attack by Gaza October 7 2023
- War in Gaza, January 10 2024
- War in Gaza, June 15 2024
- War in Gaza, November 27 2024
- includes Truce in Lebanon
- War in Gaza, May 20 2025
** End of article