US President Donald Trump’s tour of the Gulf states this week — to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates — was intently adopted in Israel.
Trump didn’t go to Israel — a snub that Israeli officers performed down, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has already visited the White Home twice — and there was a rising sense amongst Israeli commentators that one thing wasn’t fairly proper.
This comes at a time when Israel is dealing with growing criticism and isolation from different nations over the conflict in Gaza.
“If you happen to take the final month and definitely the final week, in a collection of strikes and a collection of statements, Trump not solely utterly sidelined Netanyahu and stored him out of the loop, however marginalized Israel as if it was not an ally,” former senior Israeli diplomat Alon Pinkas, now a columnist for the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, instructed DW.
In the meantime, Israel has intensified its airstrikes in Gaza, a potential indication that it’s increasing its offensive in Gaza.
On Friday, heavy strikes and tank actions had been reported in northern Gaza. In response to native well being authorities, at least 90 people were killed in strikes across Gaza, together with many kids. The Israeli military has issued more evacuation orders in several areas, forcing many people to flee to areas that are equally unsafe.
The unexpected recent release of the American-Israeli hostage Edan Alexander, reportedly a results of direct negotiations between the US and Hamas and mediators, was seen as an indication that Netanyahu seemed to have been sidelined or, at best, was no longer the center of Trump’s attention, according to Israeli analysts. Alexander is a soldier who was taken captive from his military post during the Hamas-led terror attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023.
During the October 7 attack, over 200 people were taken as hostages into the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. Fifty-eight hostages are still in Gaza. At least 21 of them are believed to be alive.
In January, Hamas and Israel agreed on the first phase of a ceasefire, which saw 33 Israeli hostages released in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. However, a second phase was never negotiated and, in March, Israel broke the ceasefire, vowing to eradicate Hamas.
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