Global Outlook

  Benjamin Netanyahu has criticised massive street protests against his handling of the Gaza war, and failure to secure the release of remaining Israeli hostages, suggesting demonstrators were giving comfort to Hamas’s position in negotiations. The Israeli prime minister made his comments against the backdrop of the largest protests in almost two years of war, with estimates that upwards of 400,000 people joined marches across  Israel  on Sunday. “The people who are calling today for the war’s end without Hamas’s defeat are not only toughening Hamas’s stance and distancing our hostages’ release, they are also ensuring that the atrocities of October 7 will recur time and again, and that our sons and daughters will have to fight time and again in an endless war. “Therefore, in order to advance our hostages’ release and to ensure that  Gaza  no longer poses a threat to Israel, we have to finish the job and defeat Hamas,” said Netanyahu in a statement. The Palestini...

  Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is pushing back against international pressure for a Palestinian state, calling it an act of “suicide.” Despite strong criticism from the U.N. and others, Israel announced a large housing project for Jewish residents of the West Bank. And in an exclusive interview with  CBN News,  Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz shares his appreciation for Christians standing for Israel worldwide. Netanyahu offered a history lesson Thursday on why the two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians is a deadly mistake. Netanyahu noted that “Before World War II, the Western countries tried to appease Hitler.” He elaborated, “Well, today the West is telling Israel, ‘Just give the Palestinians a piece of Israel and they’ll make peace with you.’ No, they won’t. For the last century, they’ve been offered a state of their own. And they refused, because their goal is not to create a state for themselves, it’s to destroy the state of ours, the ...

  Riot police at Greece’s largest port cordoned off an area around an Israeli cruise ship that arrived early Thursday to prevent several hundred union-backed protesters from approaching the vessel. Protests have been held on Greek islands and at mainland ports along the route of the Crown Iris and several of them have led to clashes with police. Unions in Greece and other European Union countries have become increasingly outspoken in their condemnation of Israel over widespread destruction and severe food shortages in Gaza. At the port of Piraeus, near Athens, demonstrators held flares and waved Palestinian flags behind a cordon formed with riot police buses. Protest organizers, citing online posts from travelers, said off-duty Israeli soldiers were among the passengers. “They are unwanted here and have no business being here,” protest organizer Markos Bekris said. “The blood of innocent people is on their hands, and we should not welcome them.” Many European governments have becom...

  Israeli opposition chief Yair Lapid on Tuesday backed calls for a general strike in solidarity with hostages still held in Gaza. “Strike on Sunday,” Lapid posted on X, saying even supporters of the current government should take part and insisting it was not party political. Sunday is the first day of the working week in Israel. “Strike out of solidarity. Strike because the families have asked, and that’s reason enough. Strike because no one has a monopoly on emotion, on mutual responsibility, on Jewish values.” Lapid’s post followed a call on Sunday by around 20 parents of hostages still held by Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip for a strike. On Monday, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, the main representative group for relatives, backed the idea. The group has been pressing the leaders of Israel’s main trade union federation, Histadrut, to join in, but it decided against doing so. Instead, it said it would support “workers’ solidarity demonstrations”, the Forum sai...

  At least 38 Palestinians were killed overnight and into Wednesday   in the Gaza Strip   while seeking aid from United Nations convoys and sites run by an Israeli-backed American contractor, according to local health officials. The Israeli military said it had fired warning shots when crowds approached its forces. The latest deaths came as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was expected to announced further military action — and possibly  plans for Israel to fully reoccupy Gaza . Experts say Israel’s ongoing military offensive and blockade are already pushing the territory of some 2 million Palestinians  into famine . Another escalation of the nearly 22-month war could put the lives of countless Palestinians and around 20 living Israeli hostages at risk, and would draw fierce opposition  both internationally  and within Israel. Netanyahu’s far-right coalition allies have long called for the war to be expanded, and for Israel to eventually take over Gaz...

  Israeli Prime Minister  Benjamin Netanyahu  is expected to push to “occupy all of the Gaza Strip” as  ceasefire talks  with Hamas founder and the hunger crisis in the besieged  Palestinian enclave spirals . A bid by Netanyahu   to occupy all of Gaza   would follow similar calls from members of his far-right government upon whom his fragile coalition relies, and could mark a significant shift in policy since Israel withdrew from the territory in 2005. Officials from Netanyahu’s office said in a statement shared with NBC News on Monday night that the Israeli leader had decided to “occupy   all of the  Gaza Strip , including areas where hostages may be held.” The statement was shared in Hebrew and the term used can be translated to mean both “occupy” and “conquer.” Netanyahu’s office did not immediately respond to a request for clarification on the intended definition, but Israeli media, including  The Times of Israel , reported that...

  Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised Monday to update Israel’s Gaza war plan, a day before a UN Security Council meeting on the fate of hostages still held in the Palestinian territory. Addressing a cabinet meeting nearly 22 months into the war, the Israeli leader told ministers that later in the week he would instruct the military on how “to achieve the three war objectives we have set”. Netanyahu’s announcement comes as he faces increasing pressure to return the remaining hostages in Gaza, as well as mounting international calls to address the dire food situation in the Gaza Strip. Israel — backed by the United States and Panama — is preparing to convene a UN Security Council meeting on Tuesday to highlight the fate of the hostages. At the weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu reiterated that Israel’s three war goals remain “the defeat of the enemy, the release of our hostages and the promise that Gaza will no longer pose a threat to Israel”. His statement came after hundreds...

  U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday in a bid to salvage Gaza truce talks and tackle a humanitarian crisis caused by Israel’s military assault in the enclave, where a global hunger monitor has warned that famine is unfolding. Shortly after Witkoff’s arrival, U.S. President Donald Trump posted on his Truth Social network: “The fastest way to end the Humanitarian Crises in Gaza is for Hamas to SURRENDER AND RELEASE THE HOSTAGES!!” The U.S. State Department also announced sanctions on officials of the Palestinian Authority and the Palestine Liberation Organization, saying the groups were undermining peace efforts. It was Washington’s latest apparent diplomatic shift backing Israel against the Palestinians and diverging from its European allies. The PA and PLO, rivals of the Hamas fighters that control Gaza, are internationally accepted as the representatives of the Palestinian people and administrators of a Palestinian state that...