Trump’s Middle East tour tells us he has forgotten about Gaza, much to Netanyahu’s delight | Yossi Mekelberg

As thousands of IDF soldiers prepare to occupy the strip, the president is silent. Israel’s ultra-right could want nothing moreAs Donald Trump hops from one Gulf capital to another, signs some eye-catching deals, meets the new Syrian president and even supposedly makes progress on the Iran nuclear issue, it looks like the war in Gaza has been pushed on to the sidelines of US diplomacy. While there were negotiations involving the Americans this week in Qatar over the release of hostages, Israel also saw fit to conduct a devastating assassination attempt on Hamas’s leader, Mohammed Sinwar, followed by intensive airstrikes across the strip. While Sinwar’s fate has not yet been confirmed, it is telling that this all took place while the US president was in the region: it reveals how unserious the Israeli government is about ending the war.The truth is that if the war is resumed in earnest, it will be unsurprising because, earlier this month, the Israeli security cabinet unanimously approved a plan to expand its military offensive in the Gaza Strip (with the caveat of waiting until the US president’s Middle East trip was over). The new Israeli military plan, agreed under immense pressure by the most extreme rightwing members of the coalition, goes beyond “defeating Hamas” and expresses little interest in the fate of the remaining hostages. Instead, it aims to indefinitely occupy the entire territory.Yossi Mekelberg is professor of international relations and associate fellow of the Middle East and North Africa programme at Chatham House Continue reading...

Comments

Opinions

Trump offers incentives for illegal aliens to return to their home countries

washington times

RICHARD LITTLEJOHN: We have turned our prisons into Love Island with female guards who look like the Kardashians. It's no wonder so many of them are having affairs with criminals

about 6 hours ago

Cole Palmer risks being trapped outside the elite with Chelsea - here's why his days there may be numbered

Dailymail

Detained Bella May Culley's ordeal will be on so many parents' minds as their teenagers jet off on girls trips and lads holidays this summer

about 15 hours ago

Herald Diary: Here's how to party like John Lennon

The Herald

STEPHEN GLOVER: Israel is a civilised democracy disfigured by a nasty government. I pray that Netanyahu and his allies aren't allowed to practise ethnic cleansing - so we can focus on the real villains

about 21 hours ago

Now is the time to get the National Security Council right

washington times

EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Lace and Superwoman author Shirley Conran leaves half her fortune to designer Jasper Conran, the fashion designer she was estranged from for a decade

about 24 hours ago

QUENTIN LETTS: For once Starmer united the House, but there was a peevishness in our stodgy helmsman's breast

Dailymail

Comments

Similar News

Media ought to quit whining about Trump

Contributor: AmeriCorps volunteers were making America healthy again. Until Trump fired them

Trump, the Resistance and What Democrats Should Do Next: 11 Voters Discuss.

Trump’s Law Firm Crackdowns Aren’t Just About Revenge. They’re About Something Darker.

Two Opinion Columnists on Trump’s Era of International Bullying

Calmes: Will the Qatar gift to Trump fly?

Romania might be about to make a Trump-admiring former football hooligan its president. This is why | Andrei Popoviciu

Peace through strength: Why Trump's Middle East strategy works

Trump’s ‘promising start,’ a GOP win on Medicaid reform and other commentary

You know prescription drug prices are a big problem when Trump and Sanders agree

Yes, Trump can accept an airplane from Qatar. Here’s why he shouldn’t.

Trump’s Middle East tour: Letters to the Editor — May 15, 2025

Contributor: The Mideast has changed since Trump's first term. How will he reshape it?

Trump plays the Gulf card: President's deals in the Middle East should be a wake-up call for Britain, says ALEX BRUMMER

Trump must stay tough on China: No 'shared interests' with a genocidal regime

Trump belatedly wakes up to Putin’s brutality

Trump strikes a righteous blow against the feds’ rabid criminal code

The Guardian view on Trump’s conflicts of interest: the shadow of kleptocracy | Editorial

Ben Jennings on Trump’s $145bn arms deal with Saudi Arabia – cartoon

Letters to the Editor: 'Trump will never be able to truly destroy art that he does not like'

Opinions

Trump offers incentives for illegal aliens to return to their home countries

Strategic international aid is the key to America's peace through strength

The week in whoppers: Publisher pretends NY Times is unbiased, Nancy Pelosi distorts GOP’s Medicaid plan and more

White South African refugees reveal partisan pundits’ true colors — and they’re ugly

Democrats are delusional to blame Biden for their election mess

Arab Israelis stand with their country — and reject the rage of Hamas

Starmer is learning the hard way that the EU is still hellbent on taking revenge for Brexit

America's China strategy needs urgent overhaul

America's GPS vulnerability threatens defense strategy

LOVERRO: The banishment of Pete Rose was about deterrence, and good luck with that now

Republicans should look to states for budgeting model

Trump torches neocon elite in the Middle East

Take American jobs back from China

Greedy water execs’ bonus scheme worth MILLIONS is outrageous – they’re filling pockets while pumping rivers with s**t

How the hell can prisons be full when proper criminals don’t get jailed anymore & paedos & groomers get soft sentences?

I'm Kevin and I'm a Catholic so why do I feel a certain empathy for the Orange Lodge?

Thanks to Netflix, you will never watch this episode of Black Mirror ever again

Air traffic controller union is … out of control

RICHARD LITTLEJOHN: We have turned our prisons into Love Island with female guards who look like the Kardashians. It's no wonder so many of them are having affairs with criminals

Cole Palmer risks being trapped outside the elite with Chelsea - here's why his days there may be numbered

Letter to the editor: Menendez brothers' abuse claim disingenuous

Letter to the editor: Thorium for nuclear power

So Stacey Solomon didn’t win a Bafta? She should thank her lucky stars

The SNP reduced education targets and hoped no one would notice

Manhattan's West Village Girl plague has already spread to Scotland

Letters to the Editor: Is it right for insurance companies to charge more for others' losses?

Letter to the editor: Freedom under political left is a joke

Media ought to quit whining about Trump

Letters: Stop tinkering around the edges: we need a National Care Service, now

It's time for Scotland to rethink women's healthcare

The Washington Post’s fact-challenged ‘Fact Checker’ is a propaganda mill

Detained Bella May Culley's ordeal will be on so many parents' minds as their teenagers jet off on girls trips and lads holidays this summer

Herald Diary: Here's how to party like John Lennon

Brian Wilson: The case for an accountable CalMac run by the people who depend on it

Letters: This is wrong: why are we sending out the message that some suicides are OK?

The agony of man who lost 38 years in jail for a crime he didn’t commit

The Herald cartoon on more potential ferry delays

'Orange Order's enemies are not found in the Catholic Church - they are in Holyrood'

Peter van Onselen: Australia can breathe easy after Greens go for the blandest option in Larissa 'Still' Waters

Does my mum have a fortune in a lost bond from 1972? CRANE ON THE CASE

Miranda Devine: The left tries to claim white South Africans aren’t worthy of refugee status

STEPHEN GLOVER: Israel is a civilised democracy disfigured by a nasty government. I pray that Netanyahu and his allies aren't allowed to practise ethnic cleansing - so we can focus on the real villains

Now is the time to get the National Security Council right

Peace through strength: Why Trump's Middle East strategy works

Breaking up Google: Bad for innovation, developers and U.S. tech leadership

Lasers in space: Sci-fi or sci-reality?

Before we celebrate America's 250th, let's honor the military that made it possible

Insiders reveal why ACS decided to leave kids in hands of abusive parents

Trump’s ‘promising start,’ a GOP win on Medicaid reform and other commentary

Hochul jokes congestion pricing might not work— after NYC traffic made her late for dinner

If Russia won’t go for peace, US must boost Ukraine aid

Drill, baby, drill — in Brooklyn: Let’s tap the energy bonanza beneath our feet

Britain’s overcrowded prisons are in meltdown & law-abiding Brits’ patience is being tested to the limit

EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Lace and Superwoman author Shirley Conran leaves half her fortune to designer Jasper Conran, the fashion designer she was estranged from for a decade

QUENTIN LETTS: For once Starmer united the House, but there was a peevishness in our stodgy helmsman's breast

Exposing the leftist race hustlers

What if freedom is suspended?