US-Israeli settlers hope to see a second Trump term

US-Israeli settlers hope to see a second Trump term
Eli, above, part of a cluster of Israeli settlements located in the heart of the West Bank, could become Palestinian sovereign territory under a two-state solution favored by the international community. (AFP)
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Updated 02 November 2024
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US-Israeli settlers hope to see a second Trump term

US-Israeli settlers hope to see a second Trump term
  • Recent polls show that a majority of Israelis dream of the days when the former president inhabited the White House
  • Donald Trump prioritized Israel during his previous term, moving the American embassy to Jerusalem among his other actions

SHILOH, Palestinian Territories: Less than a week before the United States presidential election, Americans living in settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank know exactly who they want to win: Donald Trump.
Recent polls show that a majority of Israelis, 66 percent according to one conducted by Israel’s Channel 12 News, dream of the days when the former president inhabited the White House.
Trump prioritized Israel during his previous term, moving the American embassy to Jerusalem, recognizing Israeli sovereignty over the occupied Golan Heights and helping to normalize ties between Israel and several Arab states under the so-called Abraham Accords.
Now, many Israelis believe Trump will offer yet more support as the country battles Iran-backed militant groups in Gaza and Lebanon, as well as Iran itself.
“I’m proud to tell you that I voted for President Trump,” Eliana Passentin, 50, who moved to Israel from San Francisco as a child, said.
For Passentin, a mother and grandmother, the stakes are higher than for the average Israeli.
For the past 29 years she has lived in Eli, part of a cluster of Israeli settlements located in the heart of the West Bank.
The area has been occupied by Israel since 1967, but it could become Palestinian sovereign territory under a two-state solution favored by the international community.
Passentin is employed by the local regional council.
She recalls how successive administrations in Washington pressured Israel to stop expanding settlements in an attempt to mediate peace between Israelis and Palestinians and reach a two-state solution.
“United States of America, our greatest ally, we thank you, but please understand we know how to run our country,” Passentin said.
In her backyard, with sweeping views of the entire area, Passentin points to nearby Israeli and Palestinian towns.
“I don’t think that Israelis living here are an obstacle to peace. On the contrary, I think that the Israelis living here are building the region for everyone,” she said.
She said the region was a hub for Jews in Biblical times, and claims that under international agreements Israelis have a right to live here.
International law says otherwise, however, and Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank are considered illegal by the international community.
Among Israelis who vote for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ruling right-wing coalition, 93 percent support Trump’s candidacy, according to the Channel 12 poll.
“Things have changed since October 7,” Passentin said, referring to Hamas’s attack on southern Israel on that day in 2023 which sparked the war in Gaza.
“Now it’s a whole different story — it’s not about Judea and Samaria, it’s about Israel,” she said, using the Biblical terms for the southern and northern West Bank.
“We have a right to defend ourselves... and I think President Trump respects and understands that.”
Gedaliah Blum, 45, a neighbor who was born in New Jersey, also said he voted for Trump based on the question of “what kind of future we want to have here in Israel.”
“Do we want a future that has an embargo threatened on Israel every time we defend ourselves?” he asked.
“Trump is not going to pressure Israel to sign a ceasefire that will let Hamas remain in power in Gaza. They’re not going to push Israel to sign a peace agreement with Lebanon that will allow Hezbollah to remain in power.”
With Kamala Harris in the Oval Office, Israel will be under constant “pressure,” Blum said.
“We’re going to get pressure, we’re going to get embargoes, we’re going to get Iranian money in their pockets. It’s not in the best interest of Israel.”
In the nearby settlement of Shiloh, where an estimated 20 percent of residents hold US citizenship, New York-born Yisrael Medad, 77, said he believed Trump would be good not only for America but also for “America’s friends abroad, including Israel.”
“I think the policies that a Republican candidate such as Trump are promoting are most beneficial for the administration, Congress and the American people,” he said.
On Israel, Medad said he believed that Trump would treat Israel more “fairly in terms of not denying its rights to defend itself... not only in a physical sense but also on the ideological front.”
Referring to a recent incident at a Democratic campaign rally in which Harris did not push back against a demonstrator who said Israel was committing a “genocide” in Gaza, Medad said: “That’s not the type of candidate I want in the White House.”


Israel FM says ‘may have opportunity’ for Gaza hostage deal

Israel FM says ‘may have opportunity’ for Gaza hostage deal
Updated 06 December 2024
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Israel FM says ‘may have opportunity’ for Gaza hostage deal

Israel FM says ‘may have opportunity’ for Gaza hostage deal
JERUSALEM: Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said Thursday that Israel may have “an opportunity now” to secure a deal for the release of its hostages held by Palestinian militants in Gaza.
Speaking in a video message from a meeting in Malta, he said: “We may have an opportunity now for a hostage deal. Israel is serious about reaching a hostage deal and I hope we can do this and do it as soon as possible.”

Palestinian security forces exchange gunfire with militants in West Bank

Palestinian security forces exchange gunfire with militants in West Bank
Updated 06 December 2024
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Palestinian security forces exchange gunfire with militants in West Bank

Palestinian security forces exchange gunfire with militants in West Bank

JENIN: Gunfights erupted in Jenin in the north of the occupied West Bank on Thursday between militants and Palestinian security forces following the theft of vehicles belonging to the Palestinian Authority, according to AFP journalists in the city.
The intense exchanges of fire began around 9:30 PM (1930 GMT) and followed the deployment of members of the security forces around the Jenin refugee camp, which is adjacent to the city and a stronghold for armed groups in the territory, according to the journalist.
Witnesses reported that the Palestinian security forces set up roadblocks on routes leaving the camp.
Tensions were running high in Jenin earlier in the day after a group of armed men seized two vehicles belonging to the PA and paraded through the streets waving Islamic Jihad flags.
In a statement, General Anwar Rajab, spokesman for the security forces, said “a group of outlaws opened fire on the headquarters of the security services” and stole two vehicles.
He said the security forces would “recover the vehicles and hold accountable anyone who committed this act.”
Tensions between the PA and armed groups appear to have been exacerbated by recent arrests by the security forces.
At a press conference inside Jenin camp, Mahmud Abu Talal, spokesman for a collective of local armed groups, said the PA had “abandoned its people in the most difficult circumstances.”
He rejected the label of outlaws and accused the PA of “carrying out a continuous operation to undermine those who protect their people.”
Jenin has long been a bastion of Palestinian armed groups and was the focus of a major Israeli raid launched at the end of August.
Violence in the West Bank, already increasing, surged after the start of the war in Gaza in October 2023.
Israel has occupied the territory since 1967.


Syria war monitor says tens of thousands flee Homs as rebels advance

Syria war monitor says tens of thousands flee Homs as rebels advance
Updated 06 December 2024
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Syria war monitor says tens of thousands flee Homs as rebels advance

Syria war monitor says tens of thousands flee Homs as rebels advance

BEIRUT: Tens of thousands of members of President Bashar Assad’s Alawite minority community were fleeing Syria’s third city Homs Thursday, for fear that Islamist-led rebels would keep up their advance, a war monitor said.
Homs lies just 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of Hama, which the rebels captured on Thursday.
Analysts said they expected the fighters led by Islamist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) to push on toward the city, a key link between Damascus and the Alawite heartland on the Mediterranean coast.
Britain-based war monitor, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, reported “the mass exodus of Alawites from Homs neighborhoods, with tens of thousands heading toward the Syrian coast, fearing the rebel advance.”
Khaled, who lives on the city’s outskirts told AFP that “the road leading to (coastal) Tartus province was glowing... due to the lights of hundreds of cars on their way out.”
In April 2014, at least 100 people, mostly civilians, were killed in twin attacks in Homs that targeted a majority Alawite neighborhood.
The attacks were claimed by the Al-Nusra Front, the Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda which now HTS leader Abu Mohammed Al-Jolani previously led.
Jolani announced his group had cut ties with the jihadists in 2016, and Al-Nusra was dissolved the following year, to be replaced by the key component of HTS.
Haidar, 37, who lives in an Alawite-majority neighborhood, told AFP by telephone that “fear is the umbrella that covers Homs now.”
“I’ve never seen this scene in my life. We are extremely afraid, we don’t know what is happening from one hour to the next,” he said.
He has managed to send his parents to Tartus, but has not found a car to take him and his wife “due to the high demand.”
“When we find a car, we’ll leave as fast as possible for Tartus.”
The province, which hosts a naval base operated by Assad ally Russia, has remained safe though 13 years of war.


Hezbollah leader says $77m allocated to Lebanon war displaced

Hezbollah leader says $77m allocated to Lebanon war displaced
Updated 06 December 2024
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Hezbollah leader says $77m allocated to Lebanon war displaced

Hezbollah leader says $77m allocated to Lebanon war displaced
  • “A total of $57 million has been paid,” covering 172,000 families, or some 75 percent of those registered, while the rest will receive a total of $20 million, Qassem added
  • He thanked Iran for “the generous support,” emphasising Hezbollah’s commitment to shelter and reconstruction

BEIRUT: Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem said Thursday that his group and its backer Iran had allocated $77 million so far to Lebanese displaced by its war with Israel, with more to come.
“In November, Hezbollah decided to give a monetary gift — a gift from the Iranian people and Hezbollah — of between $300 and $400 for each family,” out of more than 233,000 families who registered for its assistance, Qassem said.
“A total of $57 million has been paid,” covering 172,000 families, or some 75 percent of those registered, while the rest will receive a total of $20 million, he added in a televised address.
Qassem thanked Iran for “the generous support,” emphasising Hezbollah’s commitment to shelter and reconstruction.
Israel stepped up its campaign in south Lebanon in late September after nearly a year of cross-border exchanges begun by Hezbollah in support of its ally Hamas following the Palestinian group’s October 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel.
In a report released last month, the World Bank provided estimates for damage between October 8, 2023, and October 27, 2024, saying “the conflict has caused $5.1 billion in economic losses,” with damage to physical structures amounting to “at least $3.4 billion” on top of that.
It has also “damaged an estimated 99,209 housing units” — mainly in the south near the border with Israel — totalling $2.8 billion in damage, it said.
Eighty-one percent of damaged and destroyed houses are in the southern districts of Tyre, Nabatiyeh, Sidon, Bint Jbeil and Marjayoun, it said.
Qassem said that in addition to the $77 million already set aside, for “all those whose homes have been completely destroyed and cannot return to them” in Beirut and its southern suburbs, Hezbollah will pay “$14,000 over one year” to cover rent and furniture.
Those living in other areas will receive $12,000 for the same purpose, he added.
“Most of the amount will be offered in cash by the Islamic republic (of Iran) for shelter,,” Qassem said, calling on “brotherly Arab countries and friendly countries to contribute to the reconstruction.”
After Hezbollah and Israel went to war in 2006, Gulf countries led by Qatar helped with reconstruction, while Iran assisted with rebuilding bridges, roads and establishing service centers.


Syrian, Iraqi, Iranian foreign ministers to meet on Friday

Members of a joint force involving Hashed Al-Shaabi and Iraqi army standing guard at the Iraqi-Syrian border on December 5. (AFP
Members of a joint force involving Hashed Al-Shaabi and Iraqi army standing guard at the Iraqi-Syrian border on December 5. (AFP
Updated 06 December 2024
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Syrian, Iraqi, Iranian foreign ministers to meet on Friday

Members of a joint force involving Hashed Al-Shaabi and Iraqi army standing guard at the Iraqi-Syrian border on December 5. (AFP
  • Ministers will discuss situation in Syria after militants seize Aleppo and Hama

CAIRO: Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein will meet his Syrian and Iranian counterparts on Friday to discuss the situation in Syria, the Iraqi state news agency said on Thursday.
The Friday meeting comes after a whirlwind advance by Syrian militantss that started last week as they captured the main northern city of Aleppo from Iran-backed Syrian President Bashar Assad and then captured the city of Hama on Thursday.
Earlier on Thursday, Syrian foreign minister Bassam Sabbagh arrived in Iraq’s capital Baghdad, the Iraqi state news agency (INA) said, adding that the Iranian foreign minister is to arrive on Friday.
Some Iraqi fighters entered Syria early this week to support Assad, Iraqi and Syrian sources said. Iraq’s Iran-aligned Hashd Al-Shaabi paramilitary coalition has mobilized along the border with Syria, saying this was purely preventative in case of spillover into Iraq.