Trump expected to bring peace to Ukraine, though picture unclear on Middle East: WEF panel

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A panel of political analysts and experts shared their “early thoughts” on Donald Trump’s actions on his first day back in office. (Screenshot)
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Updated 21 January 2025
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Trump expected to bring peace to Ukraine, though picture unclear on Middle East: WEF panel

  • Expert predicts war in Ukraine would end within the next six months
  • Despite bringing a ceasefire in Gaza, Trump’s presidency does not signal guaranteed peace in Palestine, warn analysts

DUBAI: Donald Trump’s US presidency will likely bring peace in Ukraine even if the future of the Middle East remains unclear, panelists at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos said on Tuesday.

The annual meetings, which got into full swing on Tuesday, comes a day after Trump was sworn in for his second term as the 47th US president, marking perhaps the greatest political comeback in American history.

In one of the earliest sessions, a panel of political analysts and experts shared their “early thoughts” on Trump’s actions on his first day back in office as speculation rises about the implications of his presidency on the domestic and international fronts.

Graham Allison, Douglas Dillon Professor of Government at Harvard Kennedy School of Government, predicted the war in Ukraine would end within the next six months.

“If you look at [Trump’s] inaugural speech and the press conference, he wants to be not only a deal maker, but an international deal maker who’s a peacemaker,” said Allison, adding the new president would leverage his power to strike a deal with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky or starve Kyiv of Washington’s military aid.

However, prospects of peace seem unclear in the Middle East, where a major paradigm shift took place last year with the decline of Iran and its proxies, as well as the new governments that rose to power in Syria and Lebanon.

Trump took credit for implementing a fragile ceasefire in Gaza after 14 months of negotiations.

“You can see a paradigm shift without peace. Israel has had a strategic problem since the 1940s (in) that it wins wars but cannot get to a stable peaceful arrangement. And I think that that remains the case,” said Walter Mead, Ravenel B. Curry III Distinguished Fellow in Strategy and Statesmanship at Hudson Institute.

He noted the decline of the “Iranian challenge” as the only factor destabilizing the Middle East was no guarantee of lasting peace in the Middle East.

“Peace in the Middle East perhaps remains a beautiful but maybe distant dream,” warned Mead.

Despite bringing a ceasefire in Gaza, Trump’s presidency does not signal guaranteed peace in Palestine given his desire to expand the Abraham Accords and resume pressure on Tehran.

Panelists warned of the consequences of Trump’s return to power.

Ian Bremmer, president and founder of Eurasia Group, warned against treating Trump as “just another president” given his victory despite impeachments and criminal indictments.

“It’s a very unusual time to have an individual that is in no way concerned about, or constrained by, rule of law,” said Bremmer, referring to the global power that Trump has amassed in light of America’s post-COVID-19 economic growth and tech dominance, combined with the weakening of Washington’s adversaries like China, Russia and Iran.

“To understand what Trump will do is to understand who pays him.”

In his first two days in office, Trump has already taken major decisions that include withdrawing the US from the World Health Organization and the Paris Agreement on climate change for the second time.

Although panelists signaled optimism towards his domestic economic policies, they disagreed on Washington’s projected relationship with China during his tenure.

“I think that we are heading towards a trade war and towards a more strategic decoupling of the economies. One reason for that is because Trump isn’t just focusing on tariffs on China, but he’s also focusing on third countries where there are pass-throughs to the US,” said Bremmer.

Trump unexpectedly held off tariffs on China on his first day back at the White House and delayed the ban on short video app TikTok. But in an unprecedented move he floated the possibility of a joint venture, saying he was seeking a 50-50 partnership between Washington and Chinese owner ByteDance.

“Getting to a deal with China will require a level of execution implementation that’s far more complicated across the Trump administration, not to mention some support from the GOP and Congress, and we’re nowhere close to that,” said Bremmer.

However, Allison predicted positive relations between both economic powers as their leaders enjoy a “very right relationship” and could find common areas of cooperation, including ending the war in Ukraine.

He added: “In terms of their interests, while fundamentally in the long run there is rivalry of a rising and ruling power, but if I look at the agency and the opportunities for agency here, doing a deal to conclude a war in Ukraine is not hard for [Xi Jinping] to be part of.”

World leaders, business titans, and policymakers gathered in Davos, Switzerland, for the WEF’s 55th annual meeting, which runs until Jan. 24.

This year’s conference explores ways to tackle shared challenges like climate change, technology, and economic inequality through global collaboration.


Several areas south of Sudan capital at risk of famine, says World Food Programme

Updated 12 sec ago
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Several areas south of Sudan capital at risk of famine, says World Food Programme

  • Several areas south of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, are at risk of famine, the World Food Programme

GENEVA, June 10 : Several areas south of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, are at risk of famine, the World Food Programme said on Tuesday, with need on the ground outstripping resources amidst a funding shortfall.
“The level of hunger and destitution and desperation that was found (is) severe and confirmed the risk of famine in those areas,” Laurent Bukera, WFP Country Director in Sudan, told reporters in Geneva via video link from Port Sudan. 


Abbas tells Macron he supports demilitarization of Hamas

Updated 24 min 33 sec ago
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Abbas tells Macron he supports demilitarization of Hamas

PARIS: Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has said that Hamas “must hand over its weapons” and called for the deployment of international forces to protect “the Palestinian people,” France announced on Tuesday.
In a letter addressed on Monday to French President Emmanuel Macron and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who this month will co-chair a conference on a two-state solution for Israel and the Palestinians, Abbas outlined the main steps that he thinks must be taken to end the war in Gaza and achieve peace in the Middle East.
“Hamas will no longer rule Gaza and must hand over its weapons and military capabilities to the Palestinian Security Forces,” wrote Abbas.
He said he was “ready to invite Arab and international forces to be deployed as part of a stabilization/protection mission with a (UN) Security Council mandate.”
The conference at UN headquarters later this month will aim to resurrect the idea of a two-state solution — Israel currently controls large parts of the Palestinian territories.
“We are ready to conclude within a clear and binding timeline, and with international support, supervision and guarantees, a peace agreement that ends the Israeli occupation and resolves all outstanding and final status issues,” Abbas wrote.
“Hamas has to immediately release all hostages and captives,” Abbas added.
In a statement, the Elysee Palace welcomed “concrete and unprecedented commitments, demonstrating a real willingness to move toward the implementation of the two-state solution.”
Macron has said he is “determined” to recognize a Palestinian state, but also set out several conditions, including the “demilitarization” of Hamas.
In his letter, Abbas reaffirmed his commitment to reform the Palestinian Authority and confirmed his intention to hold presidential and general elections “within a year” under international auspices.
“The Palestinian State should be the sole provider of security on its territory, but has no intention to be a militarised State.”
France has long championed a two-state solution, including after the October 7, 2023 attack by Palestinian militants Hamas on Israel.
But formal recognition by Paris of a Palestinian state would mark a major policy shift and risk antagonizing Israel, which insists that such moves by foreign states are premature.


Lebanon says two dead in Israel strike

Updated 10 June 2025
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Lebanon says two dead in Israel strike

BEIRUT: An Israeli strike killed a Lebanese father and son Tuesday in a southern village, the Lebanese health ministry and state media said, the latest deaths despite a November ceasefire.
A second son was also wounded in the strike in Shebaa, the state-run National News Agency reported. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.
“An Israeli enemy drone carried out a strike in the village of Shebaa, killing two people and wounding one,” a health ministry statement said.
Israel had warned on Friday that it would keep up its strikes on Hezbollah targets across Lebanon despite the condemnation expressed by the Lebanese government after a massive strike on south Beirut the previous night on the eve of the Eid Al-Adha holiday.
Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah said the strikes levelled nine residential blocks. The Israeli military said they targeted underground drone factories.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun condemned the strikes as a “a flagrant violation” of the November 27 ceasefire agreement, which was supposed to end more than a year of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah that culminated in two months of full-blown war.


Israel commits ‘extermination’ in Gaza by killing in schools, UN experts say

Updated 10 June 2025
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Israel commits ‘extermination’ in Gaza by killing in schools, UN experts say

  • In its latest report, the commission said Israel had destroyed more than 90 percent of the school and university buildings and more than half of all religious and cultural sites in Gaza

VIENNA: UN experts said in a report on Tuesday that Israel committed the crime against humanity of “extermination” by killing civilians sheltering in schools and religious sites in Gaza, part of a “concerted campaign to obliterate Palestinian life.”

The United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel was due to present the report to Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council on June 17.

“We are seeing more and more indications that Israel is carrying out a concerted campaign to obliterate Palestinian life in Gaza,” former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, who chairs the commission, said in a statement.

“Israel’s targeting of the educational, cultural and religious life of the Palestinian people will harm the present generations and generations to come, hindering their right to self-determination,” she added.

The commission examined attacks on educational facilities and religious and cultural sites to assess if international law was breached.

Israel disengaged from the Human Rights Council in February, alleging it was biased.

When the commission’s last report in March found Israel carried out “genocidal acts” against Palestinians by systematically destroying women’s health care facilities during the conflict in Gaza, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the findings were biased and antisemitic.

In its latest report, the commission said Israel had destroyed more than 90 percent of the school and university buildings and more than half of all religious and cultural sites in Gaza.

“Israeli forces committed war crimes, including directing attacks against civilians and wilful killing, in their attacks on educational facilities ... In killing civilians sheltering in schools and religious sites, Israeli security forces committed the crime against humanity of extermination,” it said.

The war was triggered when Hamas-led militants killed 1,200 people in Israel in a surprise attack in October 2023, and took 251 hostages back to the enclave, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel responded with a military campaign that has killed over 54,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities.

Harm done to the Palestinian education system was not confined to Gaza, the report found, citing increased Israeli military operations in the West Bank and East Jerusalem as well as harassment of students and settler attacks there.

“Israeli authorities have also targeted Israeli and Palestinian educational personnel and students inside Israel who expressed concern or solidarity with the civilian population in Gaza, resulting in their harassment, dismissal or suspension and in some cases humiliating arrests and detention,” it said.

“Israeli authorities have particularly targeted female educators and students, intending to deter women and girls from activism in public places,” the commission added.


Israel says activist Greta Thunberg leaving on flight to France

Updated 10 June 2025
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Israel says activist Greta Thunberg leaving on flight to France

  • Israel says Greta Thunberg is being deported after Gaza-bound ship she was on was seized

PARIS: Israel on Tuesday said Swedish campaigner Greta Thunberg was leaving the country on a flight to France, after she was detained along with other activists aboard a Gaza-bound aid boat and taken to a Tel Aviv airport for deportation.
“Greta Thunberg is departing Israel on a flight to France,” Israel’s foreign ministry said on its official X account, along with two photos of the activist on board a plane.

Five French activists aboard the boat for Gaza were set to face an Israeli judge, the French foreign minister said on Tuesday.
“Our consul was able to see the six French nationals arrested by the Israeli authorities last night,” Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said on X. “One of them has agreed to leave voluntarily and should return today. The other five will be subject to forced deportation proceedings.”