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Argentina, Canada, other countries plan airlifts to help their citizens leave war-torn Israel

(JTA) — Argentina is launching an airlift to evacuate its citizens from Israel, four days after Hamas attacked Israel, killing and wounding thousands of people and spurring a war that could be long-lasting.

The Foreign Ministry opened a hotline on Saturday, the day of the attack, for Argentinian citizens to request repatriation. Foreign Minister Santiago Cafiero said on Tuesday that more than 713 requests had been received.

Now, the “Safe Return” program will allow up to 625 people to leave the country. A military Hercules airplane and a Boeing jet will be deployed first to Cyprus and then to Tel Aviv. On Thursday, three flights will take off from Tel Aviv to Rome, each carrying about 200 people.

“There are people who were there for tourism, for work, for studies and others who have been living for a long time,” Cafiero told the national news agency Telam.

So far, most people in Israel who wish to leave are on their own to do so, and many flights have been canceled, making it hard to get out.

The decision to evacuate expatriates, which tends to be made in only the most extreme and dangerous circumstances, reflects a growing realization that the war launched in response to the attack could be long and grueling. Argentina is not the only country to send planes to retrieve its citizens: Poland and Australia, for example, have said they would evacuate citizens who want to exit the country. Canada plans to announce an evacuation effort, using military planes and with special provisions for people who cannot safely get to Israel’s international airport, on Wednesday.

The airlift by Argentina — home to an estimated 180,000 Jews, the sixth-largest Jewish population in the world — is especially notable because until this week, the country held the ignominious record of being the site of the worst terrorist attack on Jews since the Holocaust. Eighty-five people died in the 1994 bombing of the headquarters of AMIA, Buenos Aires’ Jewish community center, which like the Hamas attack is widely understood to have been carried out in collaboration with Iran.

Jorge Knoblovits, president of DAIA, Argentina’s Jewish umbrella organization, decried Hamas during a massive rally in Buenos Aires, outside a Jewish community center at the corner of Avenue Estado de Israel and Avenue Estado de Palestina. The group, he said, aimed to destroy not only Israel “but all of us, all Jews, anywhere in the world.”

The demonstration, one of dozens that have taken place around the world in support of Israel this week, occupied two full blocks and drew prominent figures including the U.S. ambassador, the city mayor and Patricia Bullrich, a candidate for president in this month’s election. Moshe and Sara Korin, whose son Abi has not been heard from since the attack on his kibbutz, also appeared at the rally.

A number of Argentinian expatriates were killed in the Hamas attack, all on kibbutzes in Israel’s south that were popular destinations for South Americans who moved to Israel. According to the Foreign Ministry’s latest data, Argentina has confirmed seven deaths among its citizens and 15 remain missing.


The post Argentina, Canada, other countries plan airlifts to help their citizens leave war-torn Israel appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

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Trump Open to Meeting Iran’s Leaders, Sees Chance of Nuclear Deal

US President Donald Trump speaks to reporters at the White House in Washington, DC, US, April 23, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

US President Donald Trump this week said he is open to meeting Iran’s supreme leader or president and that he thinks the two countries will strike a new deal on Tehran’s disputed nuclear program.

However, Trump, who in 2018 pulled the US out of a now moribund nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers, repeated a threat of military action against Iran unless a new pact is swiftly reached to prevent it developing nuclear weapons.

Trump, in an April 22 interview with Time magazine published on Friday, said “I think we’re going to make a deal with Iran” following indirect US-Iranian talks last week in which the side agreed to draw up a framework for a potential deal.

The Republican US president, speaking separately to reporters at the White House on Friday, reiterated his positive prognosis, saying: “Iran, I think, is going very well. We’ll see what happens.”

A US official said the discussions yielded “very good progress.”

Asked by Time whether he was open to meeting Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, an anti-Western hardliner who has the last say on all major state policies, or President Masoud Pezeshkian, Trump replied: “Sure.”

Expert-level talks are set to resume on Saturday in Oman, which has acted as intermediary between the longtime adversaries, with a third round of high-level nuclear discussions planned for the same day.

Israel, a close US ally and Iran’s major Middle East foe, has described the Islamic Republic’s escalating uranium enrichment program – a potential pathway to nuclear bombs – as an “existential threat.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has called for a complete dismantling of Iran’s nuclear capabilities, saying partial measures will not suffice to ensure Israel’s security.

Asked in the interview if he was concerned Netanyahu might drag the United States into a war with Iran, Trump said: “No.”

‘I’LL BE LEADING THE PACK’

However, when asked if the US would join a war against Iran should Israel take action, he responded: “I may go in very willingly if we can’t get a deal. If we don’t make a deal, I’ll be leading the pack.”

In March, Iran responded to a letter from Trump in which he urged it to negotiate a new deal by stating it would not engage in direct talks under maximum pressure and military threats but was open to indirect negotiations, as in the past.

Although the current talks have been indirect and mediated by Oman, US and Iranian officials did speak face-to-face briefly following the first round on April 12.

The last known face-to-face negotiations between the two countries took place under former US President Barack Obama during diplomacy that led to the 2015 nuclear accord.

Western powers accuse Iran of harboring a clandestine agenda to develop nuclear weapons capability by enriching uranium to a high level of fissile purity, above what they say is justifiable for a civilian atomic energy program.

Tehran says its nuclear program is wholly peaceful. The 2015 deal temporarily curbed its uranium enrichment activity in exchange for relief from international sanctions, but Iran resumed and accelerated enrichment after the Trump walkout in 2018.

The post Trump Open to Meeting Iran’s Leaders, Sees Chance of Nuclear Deal first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Trump Poised to Offer Saudi Arabia Over $100 Billion Arms Package, Sources Say

US President Donald speaking in the Roosevelt Room at the White House in Washington, DC on March 3, 2025. Photo: Leah Millis via Reuters Connect

The United States is poised to offer Saudi Arabia an arms package worth well over $100 billion, six sources with direct knowledge of the issue told Reuters, saying the proposal was being lined up for announcement during US President Donald Trump‘s visit to the kingdom in May.

The offered package comes after the administration of former President Joe Biden unsuccessfully tried to finalize a defense pact with Riyadh as part of a broad deal that envisioned Saudi Arabia normalizing ties with Israel.

The Biden proposal offered access to more advanced US weaponry in return for halting Chinese arms purchases and restricting Beijing’s investment in the country. Reuters could not establish if the Trump administration’s proposal includes similar requirements.

The White House and Saudi government communications office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

A US Defense official said: “Our defense relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is stronger than ever under President Trump‘s leadership. Maintaining our security cooperation remains an important component of this partnership and we will continue to work with Saudi Arabia to address their defense needs.”

In his first term, Trump celebrated weapons sales to Saudi Arabia as good for US jobs.

Lockheed Martin Corp could supply a range of advanced weapons systems including C-130 transport aircraft, two of the sources said. One source said Lockheed would also supply missiles and radars.

RTX Corp, formerly known as Raytheon Technologies, is also expected to play a significant role in the package, which will include supplies from other major US defense contractors such as Boeing Co, Northrop Grumman Corp and General Atomics, said four of the sources.

All the sources declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter.

RTX, Northrop and General Atomics declined to comment. Boeing did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A Lockheed Martin spokesperson said foreign military sales are government-to-government transactions. Questions about sales to foreign governments are best addressed by the US government.

Reuters could not immediately establish how many of the deals on offer were new. Many have been in the works for some time, two of the sources said. For example, the kingdom first requested information about General Atomics’ drones in 2018, they said. Over the past 12 months, a deal for $20 billion of General Atomics’ MQ-9B SeaGuardian-style drones and other aircraft came into focus, according to one of the sources.

Several executives from defense companies are considering traveling to the region as a part of the delegation, three of the sources said.

The US has long supplied Saudi Arabia with weapons. In 2017, Trump proposed approximately $110 billion of sales to the kingdom.

As of 2018, only $14.5 billion of sales had been initiated and Congress began to question the deals in light of the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

In 2021, under Biden, Congress imposed a ban on sales of offensive weapons to Saudi Arabia over the Khashoggi killing and to pressure the kingdom to wind down its Yemen war, which had inflicted heavy civilian casualties.

Under US law, major international weapons deals must be reviewed by members of Congress before they are finalized.

The Biden administration began to soften its stance on Saudi Arabia in 2022 after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine impacted global oil supplies. The ban on offensive weapons sales was lifted in 2024, as Washington worked more closely with Riyadh in the aftermath of Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack to devise a plan for post-war Gaza.

A potential deal for Lockheed’s F-35 jets, which the kingdom has been reportedly interested in for years, is expected to be discussed, three of the sources said, while downplaying the chances for an F-35 deal being signed during the trip.

The United States guarantees that its close ally Israel receives more advanced American weapons than Arab states, giving it what is labeled a “Qualitative Military Edge” (QME) over its neighbors.

Israel has now owned F-35s for nine years, building multiple squadrons.

The post Trump Poised to Offer Saudi Arabia Over $100 Billion Arms Package, Sources Say first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Iran Summons Dutch Envoy to Protest Assassination Attempts Claim

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi looks on before a meeting with Qatar’s Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, in Tehran, Iran, Aug. 26, 2024. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS

The Iranian foreign ministry summoned the Dutch ambassador to Tehran on Friday, the official IRNA news agency reported, a day after the Netherlands called in Iran‘s envoy over suspicions that Iran was behind two assassination attempts.

An Iranian foreign ministry official described the Dutch accusation as “laughable” and based on “suspicions or assumptions,” according to IRNA.

“It is regrettable that the Dutch diplomatic apparatus acts so easily on speculations injected by its security bodies and the Zionist regime [Israel], and even summons the Iranian ambassador over such an absurd fabrication,” the official, Alireza Yousefi, was quoted as saying.

The Netherlands summoned Iran‘s ambassador after the Dutch intelligence agency, known as the AIVD, said in its annual report published on Thursday that it was likely Iran was behind two assassination attempts in the Netherlands and Spain.

Two men were arrested in June 2024 in the Dutch town of Haarlem after an assassination attempt on an Iranian residing in the country, the report said.

One of the suspects was also believed to have been behind the failed assassination attempt on Spanish politician and Iran critic Alejo Vidal-Quadras in Madrid in November 2023, it said.

The post Iran Summons Dutch Envoy to Protest Assassination Attempts Claim first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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