US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reach to shake hands at a joint press conference in the State Dining Room at the White House in Washington, DC, US, Sept. 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday endorsed US President Donald Trump’s plan to end the Gaza war, saying in a joint briefing at the White House that it “achieves our war aims,” with the return of the remaining 48 hostages within 72 hours following a “modest Israeli withdrawal” from the Palestinian enclave.

The plan was yet to be accepted by Hamas, Trump said during his remarks at the briefing, but warned that if the Palestinian terrorist group failed to do so, he would endorse the continuation of the war.

“If Hamas rejects the deal, Bibi, you will have our full backing to finish the job of destroying the threat of Hamas,” Trump said, referring to Netanyahu by his nickname.

Qatar’s prime minister and Egypt’s intelligence chief presented Trump’s proposal to Hamas negotiators, who are now reviewing it in “good faith,” according to the Associated Press. 

Michael Oren, the former Israeli ambassador to Washington, hailed the plan for leaving Hamas with no options, saying that Israel had effectively “just won the war.”

“It’s checkmate for them,” Oren told The Algemeiner. “Trump basically said, ‘Either you surrender or give up your guns or Israel’s going to kill you.’ Either they agree with the diplomatic solution, or they reject the diplomatic solution and face the IDF [Israel Defense Forces]. But the IDF is going to have the backing of the president of the United States and regional actors.”

However, Oren went on to predict that Hamas, which had ruled Gaza for nearly two decades, would almost certainly deploy its well-worn delay tactics. “First, they’re going to accept it, but we have questions, then they’ll say but we don’t know where the hostages are.”

Netanyahu warned Hamas against exploiting the process. “If Hamas rejects US President Donald Trump’s plan, or if they supposedly accept it and then basically do everything to counter it, then Israel will finish the job by itself,” he said. “This can be done the easy way, or it can be done the hard way. But it will be done.”

If the plan was heeded, he said, it could end the fighting. “It will bring back to Israel all our hostages, dismantle Hamas’s military capabilities, end its political rule, and ensure that Gaza never again poses a threat to Israel,” he said.

The first step would be “a modest withdrawal” of Israeli forces followed within 72 hours by the release of all remaining hostages, Netanyahu said. A new international body would then be tasked with disarming Hamas and overseeing Gaza’s demilitarization.

If this international body succeeds, “we will have permanently ended the war,” Netanyahu said. He linked any further military withdrawals to progress on disarmament.

The White House outline released a day earlier included a technocratic interim government to administer Gaza, supervised by what it called a “board of peace” chaired by Trump and including former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. The document called for Hamas members who renounce violence to be granted amnesty and allowed to leave the territory. It also pledged a significant increase in humanitarian aid and a Trump economic development plan to rebuild Gaza.

For his part, Netanyahu stressed that the Palestinian Authority could take no role in Gaza in its current form. 

“The Palestinian Authority can have no role whatsoever in Gaza without undergoing a radical and genuine transformation,” he said. That would mean ending payments to families of terrorists who attack Israelis, rewriting schoolbooks that “teach hatred to Jews,” halting incitement in Palestinian media, and recognizing Israel as a Jewish state.

“A Palestinian state,” Netanyahu said, “would reward terrorists, undermine security, and endanger Israel’s very existence.”

Trump, who spoke for nearly half an hour before turning to Netanyahu, criticized governments who have “foolishly recognized a Palestinian state.”

“Let’s not forget how we got here,” he said. “Hamas was elected by the Palestinian people. Israel withdrew from Gaza, thinking they would live in peace.” He added that the Islamist group was “the only one left” not to have accepted the plan. “But I have a feeling we’re going to have a positive answer.”

Oren noted that for Hamas, mere survival would amount to victory. 

“They’re perennial victims. They love death. Hamas loves rubble. It’s the building blocks of their identity. All they need to do to win is to emerge from their tunnels with [a peace sign] and they’ve won the war,” he told radio talk-show host Hugh Hewitt. “For Israel to win the war, we actually have to win the war. For Hamas to win the war, they have only not to lose.”

In his comments, Netanyahu addressed an Israeli strike on Sept. 9 in Qatar targeting Hamas leaders — for which he had apologized in a Trump-hosted phone call to his Qatari counterpart, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani, earlier in the day.

“Israel was targeting terrorists. It wasn’t targeting Qatar. And of course, we regretted the loss of the Qatari citizen. It wasn’t our target,” he said. 

Oren said the apology was necessary after what appeared to be a failed strike. “If Israel had succeeded in eliminating the five heads of Hamas, I think we would have had a different outcome,” he said. 

But pointing to past incidents in which Israel had apologized for failed assassination attempts, including the 1996 elimination effort against Hamas leader Khaled Mashal in Jordan, he went on, “It’s important that Israel, that Prime Minister Netanyahu, called the ruler of Qatar, apologized. It’s fine.”

Argentina’s President Javier Milei attends a commemoration event ahead of the anniversary of the 1994 bombing attack on the Argentine Israeli Mutual Association (AMIA) community center, marking the 30th anniversary of the attack, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, July 17, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Martin Cassarini

A viral video showing high school students in Argentina chanting “Today, we burn the Jews” has triggered widespread outrage and condemnation from political leaders and the country’s Jewish community.

Earlier this month, a group of students from the Humanos school in Buenos Aires went on a graduation trip organized by the private company Baxtter.

In a video widely circulated on social media, the students — joined by the trip coordinator and one of the students’ fathers — are seen chanting antisemitic slogans while riding a bus.

Antisemitism in Argentina: School students sang “today we burn the Jews” during a bus trip. This happened at “Escuela Humanos,” which presents itself as a “global ambassador for peace.” pic.twitter.com/S5HMuInBft

— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) September 29, 2025

Shortly after the incident sparked public outrage, the school issued a statement denouncing the students’ conduct and reaffirming its commitment against antisemitism and all forms of hate speech.

“Escuela Humanos strongly condemns the behavior of this group of students during their trip. We also repudiate the conduct of the organizing company and the coordinator in charge,” the statement read. “We clarify that our institution has no connection whatsoever with [the company’s] practices or messages.”

“These chants in no way reflect the values of our school, which are founded on respect, inclusion, and democratic coexistence,” it continued.

The school also said it has been in touch with the Delegation of Argentine Israelite Associations (DAIA), the country’s Jewish umbrella organization, to discuss the incident.

“We hereby renew our commitment against all forms of racism, antisemitism, and hate speech,” the statement added.

The travel company also issued a statement announcing it has dismissed the group coordinator and requested his permanent removal from the Argentinian Society of Travel Coordinators.

“Baxtter expresses its categorical and forceful rejection, making clear that we in no way share or condone the abhorrent remarks made by the group,” the statement read.

Argentine President Javier Milei denounced the incident in a post on X, describing it as “reprehensible.”

REPUDIABLE.
Fin.

Cc: @m_cuneolibarona @SPettovelloOK https://t.co/Kbs1wgpx1x

— Javier Milei (@JMilei) September 28, 2025

The DAIA also condemned the incident, announcing it will pursue a criminal complaint for incitement to persecution or hatred to hold those responsible accountable.

En virtud de los hechos de público conocimiento, en los que se registraron cánticos de neto corte antisemita ocurridos en un viaje de egresados, nuestro Departamento de Asistencia Jurídica presentará una denuncia penal por incitación a la persecución o al odio, con el objetivo de… pic.twitter.com/QYszkFW7zv

— DAIA (@DAIAArgentina) September 29, 2025

Like many countries worldwide, Argentina has seen a rise in antisemitism and anti-Israel sentiment following the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

According to a DAIA report, Argentina saw a 15 percent increase in reported antisemitic incidents last year, with 687 anti-Jewish hate crimes recorded — up from 598 in 2023 — marking a significant surge in antisemitism across the country.

Demonstrators take part in an “Emergency Rally: Stand With Palestinians Under Siege in Gaza,” amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US, Oct. 14, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Brian Snyder

Harvard University remains under investigation over its handling of campus antisemitism, the US House Committee on Education and the Workforce wrote to school president Alan Garber on Monday, and as such must continue to comply with requests for internal communications regarding discrimination complaints filed by Jewish students.

The committee said it is especially interested in documents related to an October 2023 incident in which two anti-Zionists activists, joined by a mob, assaulted a Jewish graduate student while screaming “Shame!” at him as he struggled to free himself.

“Obtaining the documents will aid the committee in considering whether potential legislative changes, including legislation to specifically address antisemitic discrimination, are needed,” said the letter, authored by the committee’s chairman, Rep. Tim Walberg (R-MI), and Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY). “Harvard does not appear to have disciplined — and instead has rewarded — two students who assaulted an Israeli Jewish student who was filming a ‘die-in’ protest on Oct. 18, 2023.”

It continued, “Following the attack, Harvard said that it would ‘address the incident through its student disciplinary procedures’ after law enforcement completed its investigations. However, Harvard is alleged to have obstructed the district attorney’s investigation into the attack.”

Walberg and Stefanik went on to describe the rising fortunes of the attackers, Ibrahim Bharmal, former editor of the prestigious Harvard Law Review, and Elom Tettey-Tamaklo. As previously reported by The Algemeiner, Bharmal was not removed from the presidency of the Harvard Law Review, a coveted post once held by former US President Barack Obama. As of last year, he was awarded a law clerkship with the Public Defender for the District of Columbia, a government-funded agency which provides free legal counsel to “individuals … who are charged with committing serious criminal acts.”

Bharmal has also been awarded a $65,000 fellowship from Harvard Law School to work at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), an Islamic group whose leaders have defended the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s atrocities against Israelis, TheEditors.com reported earlier this year.

Tettey-Tamaklo walked away from Harvard Divinity School with honors. For the Spring 2025 semester, he was voted class marshal by the Class Committee, a role which awarded conferred to him the right to lead the graduation procession through Harvard Yard alongside the institution’s most accomplished scholars and faculty.

After being charged with assault and battery, Bharmal and Tettey-Tamaklo were ordered in April by Boston Municipal Court Judge Stephen McClenon to attend “pre-trial diversion” anger management courses and perform 80 hours of community service each. The decision did not require their apologizing to the Jewish student against whom they allegedly perpetrated what local Assistant District Attorney Ursula Knight described as “hands on assault and battery,” allowing them to avoid a trial and jail time for behavior that was filmed and widely viewed online.

Walberg and Stefanik also demanded confirmation of Harvard’s decision to pause a partnership with Birzeit University in the West Bank. The Harvard-Birzeit partnership was put into abeyance following an internal investigation of Harvard’s François-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights (FXB), the institution directly affiliated with Birzeit. It is not clear what ultimately caused Harvard to discontinue the arrangement, but it is a move for which prominent members of the Harvard community and federal lawmakers have clamored before, as previously reported by The Harvard Crimson.

“The committee is concerned that Harvard has not made its decision, if any, public,” they wrote. “Refusing to partner with a university that explicitly endorses a US-designated terrorist organization is entirely different than the BDS movement, which boycotts the only democracy in the Middle East because it is Jewish.”

The letter comes three weeks after a US federal judge ruled that US President Donald Trump acted unconstitutionally when he confiscated about $2.2 billion in Harvard University’s federal research grants as punishment for the institution’s alleged failing to address antisemitic harassment and discrimination on campus.

In her ruling, US District Judge Allison Burroughs, who was appointed to her position in 2014 by then-President Barack Obama, said that the Trump administration “used antisemitism as a smokescreen for a targeted, ideologically motivated assault on this country’s premier universities.”

Burroughs went on to argue that the federal government violated Harvard’s free speech rights under the US Constitution’s First Amendment and that it was the job of courts to “ensure that important research is not improperly subjected to arbitrary and procedurally infirm grant terminations.”

Burroughs’s ruling restored Harvard’s access to some of the billions of dollars in funds paid for by the American taxpayer, preventing a fiscal crisis which has already caused draconian budget cuts at other institutions facing similar financial penalties imposed by the Trump administration.

The decision also awarded Garber a major political victory, as he has in recent weeks endured growing criticism from faculty and Democratic lawmakers for entertaining a settlement with the Trump administration which would have included concessions to the conservative movement on issues ranging from diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) to viewpoint diversity on campus. Such a deal would risk inciting a mutiny at Harvard, where 94 percent of faculty donated to Democratic candidates in 2024.

The White House has vowed to continue fighting Harvard in court — which may include requesting emergency proceedings at the conservative-leaning US Supreme Court — accusing Burroughs of being compromised by partisanship.

“This activist Obama-appointed judge was always going to rule in Harvard’s favor, regardless of the facts,” Liz Huston, spokesperson for the White House, said in a statement following the ruling. “We will immediately move to appeal this egregious decision, and we are confident we will ultimately prevail in our efforts to hold Harvard accountable.”

In the interim, Harvard University is in no rush to strike a deal with the federal government that would conclude its investigations of antisemitism in exchange for a payment of what Trump stipulated as “nothing less” than $500 million. According to a Monday report by The Harvard Crimson, Penny Pritzker, a Harvard Corporation senior fellow — and sibling of Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) — said in her first public comments on the controversy, “I have absolutely no idea how this is going to play out.” Another official, asked about the status of the talks by a Crimson reporter, flashed “a tight smile before walking away.”

Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.