WASHINGTON — First Lady Melania Trump will meet with freed American-Israeli hostage Keith Siegel and his wife, Aviva Siegel, on Wednesday at the White House.
The first lady will have a private, sit-down conversation with the Siegels in the White House&#8217;s Blue Room, where they will discuss how Hamas forcibly took the Siegels from their home in Kibbutz Kfar Aza on October 7, 2023, and held them hostage — Aviva Siegel for 51 days, and Keith Siegel for 484 days.
Aviva Siegel was released during the first hostage deal in November 2023. Hamas released her husband on February 1, 2025, during a ceasefire that was brokered by President Donald Trump before he even took office, following his wife&#8217;s meetings with both the president and first lady.
One of these meetings was included in the first lady&#8217;s new film, &#8220;Melania,&#8221; showing Melania Trump and Aviva Siegel sharing an emotional moment in Manhattan as they discuss the plight of Siegel&#8217;s husband. Melania Trump hugs Siegel as she weeps into her shoulder, and the first lady promises to pray for Keith Siegel, who was still in Hamas captivity at the time.
One of the final title cards in &#8220;Melania&#8221; states that the first lady &#8220;played a key role in securing the release of Keith Siegel after 484 days as a hostage in Gaza, just 12 days after the inauguration.&#8221;
&#8220;I will always use my influence and power to fight for those in need,&#8221; the first lady says in the documentary film.
Keith Siegel, 66, is a dual Israel-U.S. citizen who moved from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, to Israel in 1980. He is a father of four and a grandfather of five. He is an occupational therapist by trade and reportedly learned Arabic to communicate with the Gazans who worked in his kibbutz prior to Gazan civilians and Hamas massacring his neighbors.
<div id="attachment_1038181" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/melania-trump-to-meet-with-hamas-hostage-she-helped-bring-home/palestinian-israel-conflict-hostage" rel="attachment wp-att-1038181"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1038181" class="wp-image-1038181 size-large" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196440906-864x576.jpg" alt="" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196440906-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196440906-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196440906-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196440906.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" /></a>Hamas fighters escort American-Israeli hostage Keith Siegel on a stage before handing him over to a Red Cross team in Gaza City on February 1, 2025, as part of the fourth hostage-prisoner exchange.  (Photo by OMAR AL-QATTAA/AFP via Getty Images)</div>
He is a vegetarian with a particular love for classic American breakfast pancakes, a rarity in Israel. After his release, a Keith Siegel’s Pancake House <a href="https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-847923">pop-up opened</a> in Tel Aviv, selling the same pancakes his family had made him known for while they campaigned for his freedom. During that time, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum compiled a cookbook featuring his pancake recipe, which he made for his family every Saturday morning.
His daughter later said she received hundreds of photos each weekend from people around Israel cooking her father’s pancakes. The proceeds from the pancake house went to helping the family get back on their feet.
Siegel opened up about the horrific conditions of his captivity last year in an interview with Lesley Stahl, claiming he witnessed Hamas terrorists sexually assaulting female hostages in front of him.
“I witnessed a young woman who was being tortured by the terrorists. I mean literal, you know, torture, not just in the figurative sense,” he said. “I saw sexual assault with female hostages.”
He was initially held with his wife, but following her release, Siegel said conditions became worse, and he was often beaten and starved.
In the interview, Siegel quickly put interviewer Lesley Stahl in her place after she asked if Hamas actually starved Siegel, or if the terrorists simply didn’t have food themselves.
“No, I think they starved me and they — they would often eat in front of me and not offer me food,” Siegel said.
Siegel also said that Hamas shaved all the men’s heads and genitals as a way to humiliate them.
“I think they thought it was maybe, it amused them or, you know, humiliating. I felt humiliated,” Siegel said.
<div id="attachment_1038183" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/melania-trump-to-meet-with-hamas-hostage-she-helped-bring-home/palestinian-israel-conflict-gaza-hostage" rel="attachment wp-att-1038183"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1038183" class="wp-image-1038183 size-large" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196449012-864x576.jpg" alt="" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196449012-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196449012-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196449012-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/02/GettyImages-2196449012.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" /></a>Hamas secures an area before handing over an Israeli-American hostage to a Red Cross team in Gaza City on February 1, 2025. (Photo by OMAR AL-QATTAA/AFP via Getty Images)</div>
Siegel was kept in a suffocating tunnel 33 feet underground and says he was given very little food and water.
Siegel’s ribs were reportedly broken when he was taken captive, and his condition deteriorated so badly that former hostage Emily Damari said she offered to switch places with him so he could be released sooner, <a href="https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-839135">The Jerusalem Post reported</a>.
Hamas also used him for propaganda. He appeared in an April 2024 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obQ7vpgWHiU">video</a> speaking Hebrew and looking frail before beginning to cry.
Due to being a hostage, he was unable to say goodbye to his mother, Gladys, who passed away in December 2024 in North Carolina. The family chose to shield her from the news of her son’s captivity before she died, according to the American Jewish Committee.
Two weeks after he was released, Siegel recorded a video message praising Trump for helping secure his freedom.
&#8220;President Trump, you are the reason I am home alive,&#8221; he said. &#8220;You are the reason I was reunited with my beloved wife, four children, and five grandchildren. Thank you for your continued fight against terror and for your bold leadership that has brought me and many others back home to our families, to safety and to security.&#8221;
Siegel, his wife, and other hostages met with Trump in the Oval Office in March 2025, where they <a href="https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-844850">thanked him</a> for their freedom.

Amazon MGM’s “Melania” World Premiere

Melania Trump To Meet With Hamas Hostage She Helped Bring Home

General

Hamas

Melania Trump

October 7

U.S.

The body of the final hostage held in Gaza was returned to Israel on Monday.
The body of Ran Gvili, a 24-year-old special-forces police officer who was killed in action on October 7, 2023, was returned to Israel, ending a long effort to force Hamas terrorists to hand over hostages. Gvili was killed while fighting off Hamas terrorists and Gazan civilians who crossed into Israel, massacring, raping, and kidnapping more than a thousand people near the Gaza border. His body was held captive for 842 days.
“We have returned Ran Gvili, of blessed memory, a hero of Israel,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in the Knesset. “There are no more hostages in Gaza.&#8221;
Netanyahu added that the yellow ribbon pin worn by people around the world to draw attention to the hostages held can now be removed.
“For &#8216;the sons have returned to their borders and the daughters have returned to their borders,’” Netanyahu said, quoting the Bible.
Israeli Defense Forces’s Southern Command completed Operation &#8220;Courageous Heart” to return Gvili after searching since October for his body. His body was found in a cemetery near Gaza City.
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Footage of the IDF recovering the body of the final hostage.
The return of Ran Gvili means all of the hostages are home after 842 days. <a href="https://t.co/AvinMQxzPQ">pic.twitter.com/AvinMQxzPQ</a>
— Kassy Akiva (@KassyAkiva) <a href="https://twitter.com/KassyAkiva/status/2015849942795841629?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 26, 2026</a></blockquote>
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Gvili’s parents fought tirelessly to keep their son&#8217;s name in the news after the remaining living hostages returned in October. They met with Netanyahu, President Donald Trump, and other members of his administration.
Trump celebrated the news of the final hostage body returning to Israel, congratulating his “great team of Champions.”
“Just recovered the last Hostage body in GAZA. Thus, got back ALL 20 of the living Hostages, and ALL of the Dead!” he <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/115962223670668620">posted</a>. “AMAZING JOB! Most thought of it as an impossible thing to do.”
Gvili was recovering from a serious shoulder injury on October 7, 2023, but left the hospital, put on his uniform, and headed south to join the fight against Hamas. He reportedly helped survivors of the Nova music festival before going to join the fight at Kibbutz Alumim.
At 10:50 a.m., he sent text messages saying he had been wounded in the leg. That was the final time his loved ones heard from him.
In total, 255 hostages from the Gaza Strip were rescued and brought back home – 168 of them alive and 87 deceased. Twelve Americans were kidnapped, with only eight being freed alive.
Gvili’s return marks the first time since 2014 that no Israelis are being held in Gaza. Before Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack, four Israelis were already in the Strip, including Hisham al-Sayed, a Bedouin Israeli who crossed into Gaza in April 2015, and Avera Mengistu, who entered in 2014. Both were later released alive in February 2025. Hamas had also held the bodies of the Israeli soldiers Oron Shaul and Hadar Goldin, who were killed in the 2014 war and whose remains were returned in 2025.
Many of the hostages who have returned testified that they were held for long periods in dark tunnels and subjected to torture, severe starvation, and physical and sexual abuse.

The Israeli army found the body of the last Israeli hostage in Gaza

‘Most Thought Of It As Impossible’: Final Hostage Body Returns From Gaza After 842 Days

Benjamin Netanyahu

Donald Trump

Gaza

Israel

Editor’s note: This week, we’re reprinting some of our best stories from the past year. This piece, published in March, details Harvard&#8217;s detachment from a partnership with a Hamas-friendly university.
The Harvard School of Public Health suspended its partnership with a Palestinian university whose faculty and students have endorsed and collaborated with Hamas and other terror groups, according to the <a href="https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/3/27/harvard-suspends-birzeit-partnership/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Harvard Crimson</a>.
The suspension follows extensive reporting by The Daily Wire into Birzeit’s terrorist ties that led to 27 members of Congress <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/lawmakers-demand-harvard-cut-ties-with-hamas-collaborator-palestinian-university" target="_blank" rel="noopener">calling for</a> Harvard to “immediately shut down this partnership and condemn Birzeit University.”
Harvard suspended the partnership as part of the Harvard School of Public Health’s investigation into Harvard’s FXB Center, which started last summer, School of Public Health spokeswoman Stephanie Simon told the student paper.
A memorandum of understanding between the FXB Center and Birzeit expired in recent months and Harvard decided not to renew it, according to Simon. While an official partnership will not exist, the FXB Center, which collaborates with Birzeit faculty and scholars, will reportedly continue.
In a Q&amp;A with the <a href="https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2025/03/a-year-into-role-chan-school-dean-focused-on-driving-change-amid-deep-challenges/">Harvard Gazette</a>, Dean Andrea Baccarelli said a &#8220;blue-ribbon panel of experts&#8221; were appointed to conduct the review of the FXB Center to &#8220;rigorously evaluate the FXB Center’s current status and future potential.&#8221; The review is expected to conclude this spring.
The FXB Center <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/harvard-to-host-summer-program-at-palestinian-university-dominated-by-hamas" target="_blank" rel="noopener">co-hosted</a> the “Palestine Social Medicine Course” with Birzeit University last summer, where students learned about “settler colonialism.” The program was originally supposed to take place on Birzeit’s campus in Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank, until it <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/harvard-cancels-program-with-hamas-friendly-university-over-security-concerns" target="_blank" rel="noopener">was relocated</a> to Jordan “due to security concerns.” Under the suspension, Harvard will no longer co-sponsor the program this year and Harvard students will not be eligible to participate because of security concerns. Instead the 2025 Social Medicine Course will be sponsored by Birzeit and the World Health Organization.
At the time, Simon told The Daily Wire she was aware of Birzeit’s student body’s association with Hamas, but said it has not affected its program.
“Student government elections at Birzeit typically involve candidates affiliated with each of the major political parties in the region, including Hamas,” she said. “These student government elections are not germane to and have not affected the FXB Center’s work with the scholars and students at Birzeit’s Institute of Community and Public Health.”
Birzeit University <a href="https://archive.ph/eRaU6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">called for</a> “glory for the martyrs” after Hamas’s October 7 terrorist attack on Israel, and has a long history of promoting terrorists on its campus. The university has hosted funerals and parades for terrorists on its campus, where several buildings are named after terrorists.
Hanan Ashrawi, chairman of Birzeit University’s board of trustees, denied that Hamas sexually assaulted Israelis on October 7, and has defended Hezbollah and the lynching of Israeli soldiers, according to <a href="https://camera-uk.org/2019/05/14/indy-fails-to-challenge-hanan-ashrawis-claim-shes-always-rejected-violence/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">CAMERA UK</a>.
On its website, Birzeit <a href="https://www.birzeit.edu/en/about/history" target="_blank" rel="noopener">boasts</a> that it is a “thorn in the side of the occupation,” and says it is committed to making an impact through “resistance.”
In 2023, the Birzeit student body elected two blocs affiliated with terrorist organizations — Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)— into the student government. In the election, which had a 77 percent voter turnout, the Hamas-affiliated Islamic bloc won 25 of the 51 seats, while the PFLP picked up six, according to the <a href="https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/article-744135" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Jerusalem Post</a>.
In July, five members of the student council were arrested for attempting to carry out a terror attack on behalf of Hamas. The students were found with an assault rifle and thousands of dollars of cash from Hamas, the Times of Israel <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/hamas-university-students-in-west-bank-arrested-for-planning-significant-terror-attack/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>.
Birzeit <a href="https://archive.is/q0BXN" target="_blank" rel="noopener">shared a letter</a> from its faculty and employee union last April which praised the “global intifada,” called for an Israel boycott, and refrained from calling the United States by name, instead opting to use “Turtle Island,” a term used by so-called “anti-colonialists” to suggest that the United States exists on stolen Native American land.
Birzeit’s faculty includes notable terrorist sympathizers, including assistant professor Basil Farraj who wrote <a href="https://www.jadaliyya.com/Details/45912" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a eulogy</a> for Walid Daqqa, the leader of a group that kidnapped and killed an IDF soldier.
Philosophy professor Abdaljawad Omar appeared at a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/rashida-tlaib-faces-calls-to-be-removed-from-congress-after-speaking-at-terrorist-connected-event" target="_blank" rel="noopener">PFLP-linked conference</a> attended by Rep. Rashida Tlaib, where he praised the October 7 attacks for opening “so many doors of political possibility” and said the “promise of liberation it holds would not have manifested in our conference without the capacity to resist.” Omar also denied accusations of rape and criticized the IDF for refusing to allow Israel to be taken over by the “Palestinian military” in <a href="https://mondoweiss.net/2023/10/how-and-why-israels-disinformation-campaign-is-enabling-its-massacre-in-gaza/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">an op-ed</a> shortly after the attack.
“Israel chose not to engage in negotiations with any groups within its borders, leading to substantial collateral damage in numerous hostage situations,” Omar wrote. “The Palestinian military strategy aimed to delay Israel’s retaking of the area around the strip. In contrast, Israel was intent on swiftly reclaiming the territory, seemingly without regard for the safety of its own citizens.”
Several other schools <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-dark-relationship-between-u-s-universities-and-the-anti-american-school-controlled-by-terrorists" target="_blank" rel="noopener">have had relationships</a> with Birzeit, including Rutgers University, which affirmed its relationship with Birzeit in May amid student encampment protests. William Paterson University entered into an <a href="https://www.wpunj.edu/provost/international-academic-agreements/Birziet.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">agreement with</a> the Hamas-run university in 2022 for exchange programs, sharing curricula, and joint degree programs. Other schools, such as MIT, have recently co-hosted conferences, invited Birzeit professors for speaking events, or had student groups visit its campus.
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<div class="p-rich_text_section">A spokeswoman for Harvard University declined to comment.</div>
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Harvard

Best Of 2025: Harvard Cuts Ties With Hamas-Friendly Birzeit University 

Education

Harvard University

Palestinian

President Donald Trump will become the first non-Israeli to receive Israel’s top civilian honor, the “Israel Prize,” announced Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a press conference with the two leaders at Mar-a-Lago.
“In almost our 80 years, we’ve never awarded it to a non-Israeli, and we’re going to award it this year to President Trump,” Netanyahu said. “It’s going to be awarded to President Donald J. Trump for his tremendous contributions to Israel and the Jewish people.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
NEW: Benjamin Netanyahu announces that President Donald Trump is being awarded with the &#8220;Israel Prize.&#8221;
It has never been awarded to a non-Israeli, according to Netanyahu. <a href="https://t.co/VK7OfJsRju">pic.twitter.com/VK7OfJsRju</a>
— Kassy Akiva (@KassyAkiva) <a href="https://twitter.com/KassyAkiva/status/2005746113735717048?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 29, 2025</a></blockquote>
The award will be for the newly established peace category. 
Netanyahu said that he hopes Trump will visit Israel on its Independence Day in May to accept the prize. 
“I have to say that this reflects the overwhelming sentiment of Israelis across the spectrum,” Netanyahu said of Israeli citizens who are often split on a variety of issues but are grateful to Trump for securing the release of all living hostages from Hamas captivity. 
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Trump learned that he was being awarded the prize by Israeli Education Minister Yoav Kisch, who called into the Trump-Netanyahu meeting.
“That really is a great honor,” Trump responded, adding that it was “really surprising and very much appreciated.”
Following his sixth meeting with Netanyahu this year, Trump said he is focused on the future of Gaza, including the objective of getting Hamas to finally disarm, adding that it would be “horrible for them” if the terror group does not.
&#8220;It&#8217;ll be horrible for them — horrible, really, really bad for them,” Trump said. “I don&#8217;t want that to happen, but they made an agreement that they were going to disarm.&#8221;
The president said that if Hamas continues to resist, the 59 countries that backed the ceasefire will get involved, adding, &#8220;This is a real peace in the Middle East.”
&#8220;Based on the fact that Hamas pledged, they swore that they were going to disarm. Now, if they&#8217;re not going to disarm, those same countries will wipe out Hamas,” Trump said. 
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
&#8220;Based on the fact that Hamas pledged, they swore that they were going to disarm. Now, if they&#8217;re not going to disarm, those same countries will wipe out Hamas.&#8221; &#8211; President Donald J. Trump 🇺🇸 <a href="https://t.co/mYIBfZzCV0">pic.twitter.com/mYIBfZzCV0</a>
— The White House (@WhiteHouse) <a href="https://twitter.com/WhiteHouse/status/2005757621278761205?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 29, 2025</a></blockquote>
Upon welcoming Netanyahu to his Palm Beach estate, Trump said he would support an Israeli military strike on Iran if its regime continues advancing its ballistic missile and nuclear programs.
“The missiles, yes. The nuclear, fast,” Trump said. “One would be yes, absolutely, the other was, we’ll do it immediately.” 
The president also noted that the Iranian people were expressing discontent as their country suffers from inflation, a “bust” economy, and the threat of violence or death when protesting.
“Every time they have a rioter, or someone forms a group, little or big, they start shooting people. You know, they kill people,” Trump said. “They’re vicious, vicious people.”
On Sunday and Monday, protests and strikes erupted across Tehran <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/tehran-in-turmoil-irans-currency-collapse-triggers-civil-unrest-anti-regime-protests?author=Hank+Berrien&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=2&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Tehran+In+Turmoil%3A+Iran%E2%80%99s+Currency+Collapse+Triggers+Civil+Unrest%2C+Anti-Regime+Protests">following a historic collapse</a> of Iran’s currency, which reportedly plunged to 1.42 million rials to the dollar on Sunday.

President Trump Meets With Israeli PM Netanyahu At His Palm Beach Estate

Netanyahu Crowns Trump As First Non-Israeli To Win His Country’s Most Prestigious Award

Trump To Be First Non-Israeli To Win ‘Israel Prize,’ Netanyahu Announces After Mar-A-Lago Meeting

There is a particular kind of tragedy that unfolds when good intentions are fed the wrong script. Hollywood has seen it before — the irresistible pull of a neatly packaged narrative, a morality play that casts a prisoner as a prophet and a conflict as a parable. But the global chorus of <a href="https://www.christianpost.com/news/over-200-celebrities-demand-release-of-convicted-terrorist.html">actors</a>, writers, and <a href="https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-879707">musicians</a> who recently called for the release of Marwan Barghouti walked into something far more complicated: a story crafted not to inform, but to activate.
More than <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/over-200-cultural-figures-call-for-release-of-palestinian-terror-convict-marwan-barghouti/">200 cultural figures</a> were presented with an emotionally charged narrative: Barghouti as the Palestinian Mandela — a heroic symbol of liberation, a political detainee whose freedom could heal a broken land. It was a narrative engineered with precision. It invoked apartheid, redemption, and the irresistible idea of the righteous prisoner held unjustly by a cruel state.
But the story they <a href="https://freemarwan.org/public-figures/">signed their names</a> to didn’t just omit context. It omitted the dead.
Marwan Barghouti is not in prison for his ideology. He is serving five life sentences plus 40 years after being convicted in 2004 for his role in attacks that killed five civilians and attempted to kill others. These are not points of political contention; they are matters of public record.
His victims had names.
Father Georgios Tsibouktzakis, a Greek Orthodox monk, was shot dead in 2001 while driving near St. George’s Monastery — a man who devoted his life to prayer and his final years to quiet service.
Yoela Chen, 45, was murdered at a gas station near Giv’at Ze’ev.
Eli Dahan, 53, Yosef Habi, 52, and Police Officer Salim Barakat, 33, were gunned down in the March 2002 attack at Tel Aviv’s Seafood Market restaurant — civilians and a Druze Israeli officer, none of whom had any political role in anything at all.
Their lives were not symbols. They were the texture of ordinary days: errands run, meals shared, shifts finished, families waiting at home. They remain absent at every holiday table, every birthday, every unspoken conversation that grief continues on their behalf.
And yet — in the celebrity campaign to free Barghouti, these names vanish. Their faces are unimagined. Their humanity is eclipsed by the seductive narrative of the “freedom fighter.”
This selective empathy is not an oversight. It is the fingerprint of the modern anti-zionist narrative machine, a hate movement that excels at converting geopolitical complexity into emotionally consumable scripts. It packages the conflict into a digestible drama: one side oppressed, the other villainous; one man heroic, the other side faceless. It knows whom it is speaking to — the artists, the idealists, the storytellers who respond instinctively to the visual of a lone prisoner against the world.
This is why the comparison to Mandela was seeded into the campaign from the start.
<div id="attachment_1012859" style="width: 874px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1012859" class="size-large wp-image-1012859" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/12/GettyImages-2118348628-864x576.jpg" alt="ROME, ITALY - MARCH 30: Protesters carry a banner calling for freedom for Marwan Barghouti as they attend a demonstration, in solidarity with the Palestinian people, against Israel’s Gaza bombardment and to call for a ceasefire on March 30, 2024 in Rome, Italy. The demonstration dedicated to &quot;Earth Day&quot; is organized by the Palestinian Students Movement, the Palestinian Arab Democratic Union (UDAP), the Association of Palestinians in Italy and the Coordination of Solidarity with the Palestinian People. (Photo by Simona Granati - Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images)" width="864" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/12/GettyImages-2118348628-864x576.jpg 864w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/12/GettyImages-2118348628-300x200.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/12/GettyImages-2118348628-768x512.jpg 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/12/GettyImages-2118348628.jpg 1024w" sizes=" (max-width: 864px) 100vw, 864px" />Simona Granati &#8211; Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images</div>
But Mandela’s greatness was forged in restraint — his refusal to condone violence against civilians, his devotion to reconciliation, his commitment to building a multiracial democracy. Barghouti’s record is not that. His ascent through Tanzim, and his association in analyses with the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, places him in the lineage of armed factions that targeted civilians during the Second Intifada. His conviction for the murders of Father Georgios, Yoela, Eli, Yosef, and Officer Barakat stands unchallenged in the legal record.
To equate him with Mandela is not inspiration. It is historical malpractice.
None of this diminishes Palestinian suffering under Hamas. The Palestinian people deserve dignity, freedom, safety, functioning governance, and leaders who place their communities’ well-being over factional theatrics. They deserve institutions instead of militias, opportunity instead of stagnation, a future shaped by education, reform, and civil society rather than martyrdom posters, hate, and funerals.
But elevating Barghouti as the vessel of that hope does not help Palestinians. It keeps them chained to the very political culture that has failed them for decades — a culture where leaders rise not through governing, but through “resistance” defined as violence; not through building, but through spectacle.
There is nothing progressive about resurrecting an old militant as the future of a nation.
What Palestinians need — what every people need — is leadership rooted in accountability, anti-corruption, institution-building, economic development, and the protection of civilians. They need a government that values life more than symbolism and the living more than the dead.
And yet the world’s cultural elite were persuaded to throw their moral authority behind a man convicted of killing civilians, because the narrative they received was engineered to bypass scrutiny and appeal directly to empathy.
Empathy is not the problem.
The manipulation of empathy is.
The selective framing that presents Barghouti as a moral beacon while erasing his victims is a hallmark of a hate movement masquerading as justice work.
Modern anti-zionism often conflates political advocacy with emotional coercion — telling Western audiences that compassion requires elevating those who commit violence, while portraying any demand for accountability as oppression.
But true solidarity does not require abandoning truth. And true justice does not require erasing the names of the dead.
The celebrity signatories were right about one thing: the region needs renewal. Palestinians desperately need political transformation. But that transformation will not come from releasing a man whose legacy contains the deaths of innocents. It will come from amplifying those working — often quietly, often without fanfare — to build civil society, strengthen institutions, combat corruption, and create genuine pathways to prosperity, liberty, and safety.
If the world’s storytellers want to stand on the right side of history, they must first stand on the right side of facts. And the facts demand this: the path to peace is not paved by celebrating those who shed blood. It is paved by elevating those who choose life.
If the signatories truly seek justice, the path forward is simple: reconsider and retract your support for Barghouti’s release, and commit to vetting future campaigns that appeal to your empathy while obscuring violence. Direct your influence instead toward the real peace-builders — the Palestinian reformers, journalists, educators, and civic leaders fighting corruption and constructing a future rooted in dignity, agency, and safety. Honor all victims of political violence, Israeli and Palestinian alike, whose lives deserve remembrance rather than erasure. And finally, resist the seduction of myth-making — the heroic scripts that feel righteous but flatten truth. Your voices carry weight; let them be used in service of the living, the grieving, and those who are building a future rather than those who helped destroy it.
* * *
Elicia Brand is the founder and president of <a href="https://armyofparents.org/">Army of Parents</a> in Loudoun County, VA.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.
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The Belfast International Wall

What Celebrities Got Wrong About Marwan Barghouti – He’s No Palestinian Mandela

What Celebrities Got Wrong About Marwan Barghouti – He's No Palestinian Mandela

Anti-Semitism

Middle East

Nelson Mandela

Opinion

Zionism

Dutch activists who signed on to the so-called Global Sumud Flotilla — a Gaza “aid” mission that managed to launch with little more than a symbolic stash of supplies — are now <a href="https://www.jns.org/flotilla-activists-refuse-dutch-repatriation-bill-say-they-shouldnt-have-to-pay-amid-gaza-genocide">fuming</a> that their own government dared to charge them for the trip home after Israel detained and deported them.
The activists, who framed their effort as resistance against “genocide,” insist they “risk[ed] their lives,” were “kidnapped,” and therefore shouldn’t have to pay for the flights arranged by their own embassy.
The Dutch Foreign Ministry says it made a “rare exception” in booking their tickets and made clear from the start that, like every other citizen who receives consular assistance, they’d have to reimburse the costs. One activist, Roos Ykema, was billed €526 (approximately $610) for a flight routed through Madrid, which she says she won’t pay because she was “forcibly deported” by Israel. Invoices show that several activists told Dutch officials they wanted to go home “as soon as possible.”
They weren’t alone. Nineteen Swiss participants have also refused to pay, appealing bills ranging from 300 to 1,047 Swiss francs ($375-$1300) for prison visits, interventions with Israeli authorities, and travel home.
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Meanwhile, the flotilla itself — marketed as a brave civilian push to “break the siege” on Gaza — collapsed under the weight of its own contradictions. Israeli naval forces intercepted 50 boats in early October, many owned or financed by what Israeli officials <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ships-in-greta-thunbergs-flotilla-secretly-owned-by-hamas-israel-says?utm_source=chatgpt.com">say</a> is a Hamas front company. Documents recovered in Gaza tie senior flotilla organizers directly to the Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad, a group Israel designated a terrorist organization in 2021 for acting as Hamas’s de facto foreign operations arm.
Among those organizers: figures overseeing Hamas-linked sectors in Europe, including a UK-based operator responsible for recruiting flotilla crews and a Spain-based executive running Cyber Neptune, the company controlling dozens of boats in Greta Thunberg’s flotilla, Israel’s foreign ministry stated bluntly: “These ships are secretly owned by Hamas.”
Despite the flotilla carrying less aid than a single truck — while more than 1,200 trucks a week have entered Gaza through approved crossings — activists rejected proposals from Italy and Israel to deliver their cargo safely. Israel said the refusal revealed the flotilla’s real purpose: not relief, but provocation.
Thunberg herself was intercepted in June, filmed reacting for cameras, and was later accused of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/what-a-mythomaniac-greta-thunberg-fakes-being-handcuffed-after-being-deported-from-israel?utm_source=chatgpt.com">mimicking being handcuffed </a>— a pattern critics note mirrors earlier staged detentions. The IDF described the voyage as a “selfie flotilla,” noting that passengers were given water and sandwiches before being returned home.
Israel’s stance remains unchanged: the naval blockade is legal, and attempts to breach it — especially aboard Hamas-owned boats — will be stopped.

Detained Flotilla activists return to Netherlands via Madrid

Pro-Palestinian Activists Outraged Over Paying Travel Costs After Israel Busts Hamas-Tied Operation

Flotilla

Greta Thunberg

Social Issues

The Netherlands

World

At a gala in Washington, D.C., the Association and Club of Foreign Press Correspondents USA managed a feat only today’s media establishment could pull off: honoring veteran NBC journalist Andrea Mitchell on the same night it elevated terrorists posing as “journalists.” The organization, joined by event co-sponsor Al Jazeera, even handed the Qatari state outlet its own “press freedom grant.”
The evening veered into moral fog when organizers held a moment of silence for 10 Al Jazeera “reporters” killed in Gaza. Their photos were displayed on a memorial table deliberately echoing the empty-seat tributes to Israelis kidnapped by Hamas — a grotesque appropriation of genuine suffering.
Fox News correspondent Trey Yingst, accepting an award, used his speech to commend “fearless Palestinian journalists” and criticize Israel’s restrictions on Gaza reporting — without noting that Hamas routinely censors, intimidates, and murders reporters who deviate from its propaganda line. Instead, Yingst praised “fearless and tenacious Palestinian journalists” who supposedly “don’t have the luxury to leave.”
Those “journalists,” conveniently unnamed, include operatives whose résumés read like counterterrorism dossiers, as Honest Reporting <a href="https://honestreporting.com/exposed-foreign-press-correspondents-honor-terrorists-award-al-jazeera-cash-grant/">noted</a>:
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" data-start="1384" data-end="1567">Anas Al-Sharif — not a reporter but the head of a Hamas rocket cell, photographed with senior leaders and praising October 7 murderers “roaming the country killing and capturing.”</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" data-start="1569" data-end="1670">Ismail Al-Ghoul — a member of Hamas’ Nukhba forces who trained operatives to film terror attacks.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" data-start="1672" data-end="1837">Hossam Shabat — a Hamas sniper involved in attacks on Israeli soldiers and civilians, who also fronted Al Jazeera’s false gang-rape allegation at Shifa Hospital.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" data-start="1839" data-end="1936">Hamza Al Dahdouh — a Palestinian Islamic Jihad officer operating a hostile drone when killed.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" data-start="1938" data-end="2043">Mustafa Thuria — a Hamas deputy squad commander killed alongside Al Dahdouh during military activity.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" data-start="2045" data-end="2145">Mohammed Salama — an October 7 infiltrator who filmed the massacre while chanting “Allahu Akbar.”</li>
</ul>
By memorializing operatives who used cameras as camouflage for jihad, the Foreign Press Correspondents Association turned a celebration of journalism into a moral collapse. This wasn’t solidarity with the press. It was the whitewashing and elevation of militants masquerading as reporters — an abdication of integrity dressed up as virtue.
Rather than elevating truth-tellers, the group effectively legitimized terrorists posing as reporters.

PALESTINIAN-ISRAEL-CONFLICT

Foreign Press Gala Honors Hamas Terror Operatives Masquerading As ‘Journalists’

journalists

Media

Politics

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the second phase of a U.S. plan to end the war in Gaza was close, but cautioned several key issues still needed to be resolved, including whether a multinational security force would be deployed.
Netanyahu, speaking to reporters alongside German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in Jerusalem, said that he would hold important discussions with U.S. President Donald Trump at the end of the month on how to ensure the plan&#8217;s second phase was achieved.
The prime minister&#8217;s office in November said that Trump had invited Netanyahu to the White House &#8220;in the near future,&#8221; although a date for the visit has not yet been made public.
Netanyahu said that he would discuss with Trump how to bring an end to Hamas rule in Gaza. A ceasefire between Israel and Hamas is entering its second month, although both sides have repeatedly accused each other of violating the truce agreement.
Netanyahu said that it was important to ensure Hamas not only upholds the ceasefire but also follows through on &#8220;their commitment&#8221; to the plan to disarm and for Gaza to be demilitarized.
Israel retained control of 53% of Gaza under the first phase of Trump&#8217;s plan, which involved the release of hostages held by militants in Gaza and of Palestinians detained by Israel. The final hostage remains to be handed over are those of an Israeli police officer killed on October 7, 2023 fighting Gazan militants who had invaded Israel.
&#8220;We&#8217;ll get him out,&#8221; Netanyahu said.
Since the ceasefire started in October, the militant group has reestablished itself in the rest of Gaza.
According to the plan, Israel is to pull back further in the second phase as a transitional authority is established in Gaza and a multinational security force is deployed, Hamas is disarmed, and reconstruction begins.
A multinational coordination centre has been established in Israel, but there are no deadlines in the plan and officials involved say that efforts to advance it have stalled.
&#8220;What will be the timeline? What are the forces that are coming in? Will we have international forces? If not, what are the alternatives? These are all topics that are being discussed,&#8221; Netanyahu said, describing them as central issues.
Merz said that Germany was willing to help rebuild Gaza but would wait for Netanyahu&#8217;s meeting with Trump, and for clarity on what Washington was prepared to do, before Berlin decides what it would contribute but that phase two &#8220;must come now&#8221;.
Israel has repeatedly carried out air strikes since the ceasefire came into effect that it says are fending off attacks or destroying militant infrastructure. Gaza&#8217;s health ministry says 373 Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire started. Three Israeli soldiers have been killed by militants.
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Netanyahu said that he would also discuss with Trump &#8220;opportunities for peace&#8221;, an apparent reference to U.S. efforts for Israel to establish formal ties with Arab and Muslim states.
&#8220;We believe there&#8217;s a path to advance a broader peace with the Arab states, and a path also to establish a workable peace with our Palestinian neighbours,&#8221; Netanyahu said, asserting Israel would always insist on security control of the West Bank.
Trump has said he promised Muslim leaders that Israel would not annex the occupied West Bank, where Netanyahu&#8217;s government is backing the development of Jewish settlements.
The &#8220;question of political annexation&#8221; of the West Bank remains a subject of discussion, Netanyahu said.
(Reporting by Alexander Cornwell and Andreas Rinke, additional reporting by Steven Scheer and Christoph Steitz; Editing by Louise Heavens and Philippa Fletcher)

Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu Meets With Trump At The White House

Phase Two Of Gaza Plan: Trump, Netanyahu Prep For Next Steps

Global Politics

In a move that drew near-uniform support on the House floor, lawmakers on Monday advanced a blunt, unambiguous message: those who took part in the Hamas-led October 7 atrocities in Israel will not set foot in the United States. The “No Immigration Benefits for Hamas Terrorists Act of 2025,” introduced by Rep. Tom McClintock (R-CA), <a href="https://www.jns.org/house-passes-bill-to-bar-deport-oct-7-perpetrators/">sailed through the House</a> by voice vote—without objection—underscoring just how little patience remains in Washington for loopholes that allow terrorists to slip through America’s immigration system.
McClintock’s bill takes direct aim at anyone who “carried out, participated in, planned, financed, afforded material support to or otherwise facilitated” the brutal rampage Hamas launched on October 7, 2023, a massacre that left more than 1,200 Israelis—children, infants, seniors—slaughtered for the crime of being Jewish. The bill explicitly includes members of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and it arrives with 18 Republican co-sponsors, including Reps. Joe Wilson (R-SC), Claudia Tenney (R-NY), and Ann Wagner (R-MO).
Democrats signaled support but quibbled with the method. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) insisted that members of Foreign Terrorist Organizations are already barred from entering the United States, and argued that Congress has historically avoided naming specific attacks in the Immigration and Nationality Act—even after 9/11. McClintock countered that there is precedent, pointing to the Nazi Party and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), whose members are explicitly blocked under American law. “Does anyone seriously argue that we should repeal the sanctions against persons who aided and abetted the Nazis’ Holocaust?” he asked. “If not, why oppose extending the same sanctions to the Nazis’ would-be modern-day successors?”
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The timing of the bill’s passage wasn’t accidental. It comes on the heels of the shocking <a href="https://x.com/EFischberger/status/1979143145632772553?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">arrest</a> of Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi, a Gaza-born operative accused of helping coordinate the October 7 attacks, then waltzing into the United States on a fraudulent visa. According to federal prosecutors, al-Muhtadi organized fighters in Gaza, moved behind the first wave of terrorists entering Israel, and sent messages instructing attackers to “bring the rifles” and “get ready.” His phone even <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/17/us/fbi-hamas-attack-louisiana.html?unlocked_article_code=1.uE8.zTMe.8-olRlhIWLLf&amp;smid=nytcore-ios-share&amp;referringSource=articleShare">pinged</a> an Israeli cell tower on the morning of the assault. Yet he made it into the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport in 2024 and was later found working at a restaurant in Lafayette, Louisiana.
For McClintock and his allies, that case alone is all the justification America needs. The bill now moves to the Senate—where an earlier version languished—and House Republicans are making clear they won’t accept another failure to act.

Rep. Tom McClintock (R-CA)

House Overwhelmingly Passes Bill Blocking Oct. 7 Terrorists From Entering U.S.

Congress

House of Representatives

Terrorists

Tom McClintock

Binance Holdings Ltd., the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, is facing a sweeping new federal lawsuit in North Dakota, alleging that it knowingly enabled more than $1 billion in crypto transactions for Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad —funds that plaintiffs say helped finance the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel and subsequent assaults.
More than 300 American victims and family members of those killed, wounded, or taken hostage on October 7, 2023, brought the suit under the Anti-Terrorism Act and its Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act amendment. The 284-page complaint names Binance, its co-founder and former CEO Changpeng Zhao, and top executive Guangying Chen as defendants, alleging they “knowingly, willfully, and systematically assisted” designated foreign terrorist organizations for years by providing a platform to transfer and launder hundreds of millions of dollars.
“From the outset, Binance boasted that it maintained no headquarters anywhere in the world. Its now-disgraced CEO and owner, Defendant Zhao, claimed the company was ‘based’ wherever he was situated at any given moment: ‘Wherever I sit is the Binance office. Wherever I meet somebody is going to be the Binance office,’” the lawsuit <a href="https://image.jewishinsider.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/24144541/Balva-v.-Binance-Complaint-Filed-ECF.pdf?_gl=1*1e2w9w0*_gcl_au*MTg3NDcwNDMzNy4xNzYzNzM3OTQ1LjI0MjQzOTY0NC4xNzY0MDc4MjkwLjE3NjQwNzgyODk.&amp;_ga=2.108981378.1640150554.1764077904-684018400.1763737945">states</a>. “That is, Binance pitched itself to terrorist organizations, narcotics traffickers, and tax evaders as beyond the reach of any single country’s laws or regulations.”
The October 7 attack left 1,200 people in Israel dead and roughly 250 kidnapped. The plaintiffs argue that the scale and sophistication of Hamas’s assault — including weapon stockpiles and an extensive tunnel network — were made possible by covert funding streams funneled in part through Binance.
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“Binance rapidly grew to be the largest crypto trading platform globally because, as detailed below, it purposely attracted criminals including terrorist organizations like Hamas, the IRGC, Hezbollah, and PIJ to its platform and assisted them to launder money in order to maximize Binance’s trading volume and monetize criminal activities via platform fees,” the lawsuit states.
The lawsuit asserts that Binance intentionally built itself into a “refuge for illicit activity,” courting high-volume criminal users to boost revenues while evading United States oversight. It cites internal communications in which compliance officials remarked that customers were “here for crime” and joked about advertising Binance as a destination for laundering drug money. The complaint recounts multiple instances in which third-party compliance firms flagged Hamas-linked accounts. Yet, Binance allegedly declined to freeze or report them, instead warning certain customers to withdraw funds before scrutiny intensified.
“Binance not only knowingly provided financial services to Hamas; it actively tried to shield its Hamas customers and their funds from scrutiny by U.S. regulators or law enforcement—a practice that continues to this day,” the lawsuit states.
The filing expands on details disclosed in 2023, when Binance and Zhao pleaded guilty to violating United States anti-money-laundering laws and agreed to a $4.3 billion settlement — one of the largest in American history. Zhao resigned and served a four-month prison term before being pardoned last month by President Donald Trump. Chen was not charged. As part of its plea, Binance admitted it had failed to report suspicious Hamas-related transactions and had permitted millions of dollars in illicit transfers.
The new lawsuit goes further, alleging extensive previously undisclosed transactions involving Hamas, Hezbollah, and the IRGC, as well as a transnational gold-smuggling network in Venezuela that plaintiffs say funneled proceeds to Iran and its proxies via Binance-linked wallets. One Venezuelan woman, allegedly acting as a front for Hezbollah, received $177 million in crypto and withdrew $43 million in cash, according to the complaint.
The suit also identifies several Gaza-based exchange houses and sanctioned individuals who allegedly moved hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of cryptocurrencies through Binance accounts before and after October 7. Plaintiffs argue that assets flowing through these channels “could foreseeably be used to commit terrorist attacks” and that Binance’s actions “directly and materially contributed” to violence against Israelis and Americans.

In this photo illustration, a Binance logo is seen displayed

Binance Accused Of Enabling Hamas Terror Funding Ahead Of October 7 Attack

Binance

Cryptocurrency

Terrorism

President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order laying the groundwork for his administration to designate chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood as terrorist organizations. 
The executive order directed Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to begin preparing to designate chapters of the organization in Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt as Foreign Terrorist Organizations and Specially Designated Global Terrorists. Rubio and Bessent now have 30 days to submit a report on the designation of any Muslim Brotherhood chapters and 45 days to officially designate the chapters as terrorist organizations. 
The Muslim Brotherhood, a group founded in Egypt in 1928, has been linked to violent groups across the Middle East, including Hamas. 
“Its chapters in Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt engage in or facilitate and support violence and destabilization campaigns that harm their own regions, United States citizens, and United States interests,” Trump wrote in the executive order. “A senior leader of the Egyptian chapter of the Muslim Brotherhood, on October 7, 2023, called for violent attacks against United States partners and interests, and Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood leaders have long provided material support to the militant wing of Hamas.”
The executive order also noted that the Muslim Brotherhood’s military wing in Lebanon joined Hamas and Hezbollah in launching rockets into Israel in the aftermath of the October 7 attacks.
“Such activities threaten the security of American civilians in the Levant and other parts of the Middle East, as well as the safety and stability of our regional partners,” Trump wrote. 
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<a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/11/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-begins-process-to-designate-certain-muslim-brotherhood-chapters-as-foreign-terrorist-organizations-and-specially-designated-global-terrorists/">According</a> to the White House, the order&#8217;s “ultimate aim is to eliminate the designated chapters’ capabilities and operations, deprive them of resources, and end any threat such chapters pose to U.S. nationals and the national security of the United States.” 
Trump <a href="https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/all-things-trump/trump-says-he-will-designate-muslim-brotherhood-terrorist">previewed</a> the executive order on Sunday, telling Just the News that the final documents were being drawn up and that the action “will be done in the strongest and most powerful terms.”
Republicans in the House and Senate have <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/cruz-introduces-bill-to-name-muslim-brotherhood-a-terrorist-group">long pushed</a> for the Muslim Brotherhood to be designated as a terrorist organization. Last week, Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott designated the Muslim Brotherhood, alongside the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), as foreign terrorist organizations.

President Trump Holds Press Conference With FBI Director Kash Patel

Trump Signs Executive Order Targeting The Muslim Brotherhood

Executive Orders

Marco Rubio

Muslim Brotherhood

Scott Bessent

Reem Alsalem, the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, was harshly criticized after posting a statement on X that implied no one from Hamas raped any women on October 7, 2023, during their barbaric massacre against the Israeli people.
Alsalem was born in Cairo, Egypt, but now identifies as Jordanian.
“No Palestinian applauded rape in Gaza. No independent investigation found that rape took place on the 7th of October,” she stated.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
No Palestinian applauded rape in Gaza. No independent investigation found that rape took place on the 7th of October.
&mdash; Reem Alsalem UNSR Violence Against Women and Girls (@UNSRVAW) <a href="https://twitter.com/UNSRVAW/status/1989315118358745148?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Israel’s Ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, fired back:
<blockquote>
Any UN representative who denies Hamas rape must be removed from their post. Period. It is a stain on the UN’s reputation that Reem Alsalem, the Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women and Girls, denies the sexual violence that took place on October 7. This is a moral disgrace, an insult to the victims and their families, and a violation of every basic international standard. Israel will not allow Hamas&#8217; horrific crimes to be whitewashed. Antonio Guterres, your silence is complicity.
</blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Any UN representative who denies Hamas rape must be removed from their post. Period. It is a stain on the UN’s reputation that Reem Alsalem, the Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women and Girls, denies the sexual violence that took place on October 7. 
This is a moral… <a href="https://t.co/LIpmZtqZqr">https://t.co/LIpmZtqZqr</a>
&mdash; Danny Danon 🇮🇱 דני דנון (@dannydanon) <a href="https://twitter.com/dannydanon/status/1989822608666218805?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 15, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
A father and son from Gaza <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13451089/The-father-son-Hamas-rapists-Terrorists-going-house-house-carrying-sex-attacks-murder-One-screamed-cried-father-raped-did-cousin-did-father-killed-her.html">openly admitted</a> they raped and murdered Israeli women on October 7. The father admitted raping a woman, adding, “She was screaming, she was crying, I did what I did, I raped her. &#8216;I threatened her with my gun to take her clothes off, I remember she was wearing jean shorts, that&#8217;s about it. I don&#8217;t know what happened to her, I was there for fifteen minutes and then I left.”
But his son Abdallah said his father had killed the woman: “My father raped her, then I did and then my cousin did and then we left but my father killed the woman after we finished raping her. &#8230; Before this woman, we had raped another girl as well, I killed two people, I raped two people, and I broke into five houses.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
On October 7th, Hamas didn&#39;t just murder, kidnap, and burn civilians. They raped.
​This is the chilling confession from a captured Hamas terrorist: &quot;She was afraid of me and said, &#39;Help me.&#39; The devil took over me. I laid her down, started undressing her, and did what I did (I… <a href="https://t.co/Z7tKwItBf7">pic.twitter.com/Z7tKwItBf7</a>
&mdash; Yossi BenYakar (@YossiBenYakar) <a href="https://twitter.com/YossiBenYakar/status/1978928818174775735?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 16, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Reem Alsalem is saying that she is being &quot;deliberately misrepresented&quot; after people became angry that she made the claim that &quot;No independent investigation found that rape took place on the 7th of October.&quot;
If you are wondering if the link she included somehow proves that she… <a href="https://t.co/WR9kAz8qFR">pic.twitter.com/WR9kAz8qFR</a>
&mdash; Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) <a href="https://twitter.com/HenMazzig/status/1989755511504281659?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 15, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
UN Special Rapporteur slash Hamas propagandist Reem Alsalem continues to deny Israelis were raped on October 7.
The <a href="https://twitter.com/UN?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@UN</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/nytimes?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@nytimes</a>, not to mention many Israeli investigations, have confirmed Hamas used sexual violence as a weapon during the 10/7 massacre. <a href="https://t.co/AIb8HIWF5X">https://t.co/AIb8HIWF5X</a> <a href="https://t.co/lrhqP3T3uO">pic.twitter.com/lrhqP3T3uO</a>
&mdash; Israel War Room (@IsraelWarRoom) <a href="https://twitter.com/IsraelWarRoom/status/1989860497793954254?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 16, 2025</a></blockquote>
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In March 2024, a mission team led by the United Nations Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict, Pramila Patten found that there was substantial evidence to conclude that victims, as well as hostages and survivors of October 7, were sexually <a href="https://www.jpost.com/israel-hamas-war/article-784636">abused and raped</a> by Hamas terrorists.
Two weeks before the UN report, the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel (ARCCI) issued their report, which <a href="https://www.jpost.com/israel-hamas-war/article-790204">stated</a> of the multiple rapes, “In most of these incidents, victims first subjected to rape were then killed, and at least two incidents relate to the rape of women’s corpses.”
“<a href="https://www.jpost.com/israel-hamas-war/article-790390">Last year in March</a>, Alsalem also denied knowing Israel had been a victim of repeated missile attacks by Hamas and Hezbollah as the terrorist groups launched air barrages on civilian communities across Israel,” the Jerusalem Post <a href="https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-873910">noted</a>.
As far back as December 2023, the Lieber Institute at West Point stated, “The <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/04/world/middleeast/israel-hamas-sexual-violence-un.html">New York Times</a>, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/05/un-hears-accounts-of-sexual-violence-during-7-october-attacks-by-hamas">The Guardian</a>, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/sexual-assault-hamas-oct-7-attack-rape-bb06b950bb6794affb8d468cd283bc51">AP News</a>, and <a href="https://www.phr.org.il/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/5771_Sexual_Violence_paper_Eng-final.pdf">Physicians for Human Rights Israel</a> all mention instances of rape and gang rape in their reports relating to October 7. Other reported acts of sexual violence from these sources include forced nudity, sexual mutilation, and gunshots in the sexual organs and breasts of women.”

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UN Special Rapporteur On Violence Against Women And Girls Denies Hamas Raped Women On October 7

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