The Trump administration invoked an obscure legal statute over the weekend in an attempt to deport a recent Columbia University graduate — and lawful permanent resident of the United States — who helped lead campus protests against Israel last year, people with knowledge of the action said on Monday. Mahmoud Khalil, 30, who graduated in … Read more
Federal immigration authorities on Saturday detained a well-known activist who played a major role in Columbia University’s pro-Palestinian student movement last year, his lawyer said on Sunday. The arrest of the activist, a legal permanent resident of the United States, was a significant escalation of President Trump’s crackdown on what he has called antisemitic campus … Read more
Hamas said on Thursday it had handed over the bodies of four Israelis abducted during the Oct. 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel — including a woman and her two young children — in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. Large crowds had gathered near the southern Gazan city of Khan Younis to watch the choreographed handoff … Read more
For decades, the Educational Bookshop has been a cultural cornerstone of East Jerusalem, its two outlets hosting foreign diplomats, feting prominent authors and providing readers with both sides of the story in the conflict between Israel and Palestinians. This weekend, the Israeli police raided the stores and arrested their two owners after concluding that books … Read more
Sixteen months after the Oct. 7 massacre, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has concluded his official visit to Washington a victor. The Israeli leader — who spent years actively strengthening Hamas’s rule in Gaza and bears deep responsibility for the events leading up to the worst disaster in modern Jewish history since the Holocaust … Read more
Hamas released three Israeli hostages on Saturday in exchange for 183 Palestinians jailed by Israel, in a staged handover where rifle-toting Hamas fighters prodded their gaunt captives to give short speeches, effectively at gunpoint, thanking the militants who had held them captive for 16 months. The events made an already tenuous cease-fire more fragile, possibly … Read more
President Trump basked as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel praised his “willingness to think outside the box.” But when it came to Gaza, Mr. Trump’s thinking on Tuesday was so far outside the box that it was not clear he even knew there was a box. Mr. Trump’s announcement that he intends to seize … Read more
President Trump’s Middle East envoy is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel on Wednesday, according to a spokesman for Mr. Netanyahu. The visit by the envoy, Steven Witkoff, was set to take place as Israeli and Hamas officials prepared for a new round of negotiations aimed at cementing the current cease-fire in … Read more
It is unclear if Mr. Trump would try to use the $1.3 billion that Egypt is supposed to receive in annual aid as leverage to try to force it to accept more Palestinian refugees. The fear of being driven from Gaza runs deep among Palestinians, who reject it as a replay of what they call … Read more
Hamas said on Friday that it would release four female soldiers held hostage for over a year in Gaza, as part of a hostage-for-prisoner swap set to take place on Saturday, as Israelis and Palestinians anxiously await the next steps in the deal. In a statement, Hamas named the four women, who were abducted from … Read more