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The United States has rejected a $53 billion Arab reconstruction plan for Gaza set out as an alternative to President Donald Trump's proposal to take over the strip and remove its Palestinian inhabitants to create a "Gaza Riviera".

The highly anticipated Egypt-drafted plan endorsed by Arab powers as a counterproposal to President Donald Trump's calls for the expulsion of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip outlines a new pathway to peace, reconstruction and eventual Palestinian statehood that excludes Hamas from power.

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As Israel mourns the return of four hostage bodies, pressure mounts ahead of negotiations for the next stage of the deal. Meanwhile, Donald Trump lays out his vision for Gaza in a bizarre, AI-generated video. At the same time, new IDF investigations into October 7th reveal years of misreading Hamas, leaving southern Israel dangerously exposed.

The US president’s video depicting a future Gaza under American authority was widely shared on Arabic and Hebrew social media, with many Palestinian users criticizing it.

The Iran-backed Palestinian terrorist group Hamas has reportedly expressed readiness to cede control of the Gaza Strip and hand it over to the Palestinian Authority (PA), headed by Mahmoud Abbas.

Now comes the even harder part. On Wednesday, negotiators from Israel and Hamas agreed to a cease-fire in Gaza and the release of the remaining hostages taken by the terrorist group during its October 7, 2023 attack.

Fifteen months on, thousands lie dead and many more are injured. While Gaza has been reduced to rubble, Hamas still exerts control, hostages remain captive, and a ceasefire is hanging by a thread. Wars are a messy business, yet both sides claim to have won this one.

This past weekend, as Hamas paraded a trio of emaciated Israeli hostages who were about to be freed following more than a year of captivity in the Gaza Strip, the militant group seized the chance to direct a personal gibe at Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

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