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Cash-Strapped Hamas Seeks to Regroup With New Recruits as Egypt, Qatar Said to Push 5-Year Gaza Truce

A Palestinian Hamas terrorist shakes hands with a child as they stand guard as people gather on the day of the handover of Israeli hostages, as part of a ceasefire and a hostages-prisoners swap deal between Hamas and Israel, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, Feb. 22, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed

Egypt and Qatar are negotiating a long-term ceasefire deal with the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas that would include a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails in exchange for the return of all hostages, according to a BBC report published Tuesday.

The report came as the cash-strapped terrorist group, which ruled Gaza for nearly two decades before its Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of southern Israel started the current war, was said to be reinforcing its military ranks by enlisting 30,000 new recruits.

Mediators from Egypt and Qatar presented a new framework to both parties, which included a five-to-seven-year truce, an end to Israel’s war in Gaza, the release of all remaining Israeli hostages held in the enclave, and the release of an undisclosed number of Palestinian detainees, the report said citing an unnamed senior Palestinian official. 

Meanwhile, a separate report by the Saudi-owned Al Arabiya outlet said Hamas’s military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, has enlisted approximately 30,000 new recruits. Most of the new fighters had previously undergone training in covert camps, the report said, adding that they lacked advanced combat skills, having been trained primarily in guerrilla warfare, basic rocket attacks, and the use of improvised explosives.

The recruitment campaign came as Hamas confronted severe operational challenges. The Iran-backed Islamist group was short on drones and long-range missile systems and had begun harvesting unexploded Israeli munitions from the battlefield to construct improvised explosive devices, the Al Arabiya report said. 

National security expert Prof. Eitan Shamir said the new recruits were no substitute for the cadre of experienced operatives the group had lost since the war resumed in March — losses that, according to Israeli military estimates earlier this year, totaled around 20,000.

Shamir said the new recruits were likely “very young or old,” and largely “inexperienced and untrained.” He also noted that Hamas no longer had the experienced commanders or the equipment it once did.

“Even if the numbers [of operatives] partially rebound, it’s not the same Hamas,” Shamir told The Algemeiner.

Shamir added that Hamas had lost much of its chain of command, including members of its elite Nukhba forces, who led the Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel that saw 1,200 Israelis murdered and more than 250 people taken hostage to Gaza. While Hamas retained some capacity to launch localized attacks, its ability to conduct a large-scale offensive had been significantly degraded, he said. Instead, the group was moving toward guerilla tactics. 

“To the extent that they have some people in Gaza with guns, with explosives, and they have some sort of a chain of command, and they’re still functioning, and they can still cause, as we saw, casualties to the IDF [Israel Defense Forces],” said Shamir, who serves as the director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar-Ilan University.

It would likely take years to reduce Hamas’s operational capabilities to what he described as a “minimal, though not zero” threat level, he said. 

Despite its recruitment bid, Hamas is struggling to pay its existing fighters, according to a Wall Street Journal report citing Arab, Israeli, and Western officials. The group is facing a growing cash shortage, exacerbated by Israel’s six-week blockade on aid entering Gaza since the resumption of fighting following the ceasefire and hostage-release deal earlier this year. Some of the aid that previously reached the enclave had been seized and sold by Hamas on the black market, according to the officials, but these revenues had since dwindled.

Arab intelligence sources said Israel’s renewed military campaign had killed or forced into hiding several Hamas operatives responsible for distributing funds. Payments to civil servants in the Hamas-run government had reportedly ceased altogether, while senior political and military figures are receiving only half of their salaries. Lower-ranking fighters are being paid between $200 and $300 a month, the report said.

Shamir said Israel faced what he called a “horrible dilemma” between continuing its military campaign to dismantle Hamas and risking the lives of the remaining hostages, or pausing the fighting for an extended period in order to secure their immediate release. While he acknowledged that Hamas had been “severely damaged,” the idea that Israel could resume the fighting after such a truce was unrealistic. “I don’t believe that Israel would be able to go back to the war,” he said. “It’s a slogan. It’s not going to work like this.”

A ceasefire could effectively grant Hamas a “lifeline,” allowing the group to remain in control of Gaza in a weakened but still functional state, Shamir warned. The terrorist group was using pauses to entrench its positions further. “They prepare hideouts, they prepare ambushes, they prepare explosive devices in different areas. This is not going to be easy.”

“This is a war of attrition, which is long and devastating,” he added.

The post Cash-Strapped Hamas Seeks to Regroup With New Recruits as Egypt, Qatar Said to Push 5-Year Gaza Truce first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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FBI Investigating ‘Targeted Terror Attack’ in Boulder, Colorado, Director Says

FILE PHOTO: FBI Director Kash Patel testifies before the Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on President Trump’s proposed budget request for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., May 8, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/File Photo

FBI Director Kash Patel said on Sunday the agency was aware of and fully investigating a targeted terror attack in Boulder, Colorado.

While he did not provide further details, Patel said in a social media post: “Our agents and local law enforcement are on the scene already, and we will share updates as more information becomes available.”

According to CBS News, which cited witnesses at the scene, a suspect attacked people with Molotov cocktails who were participating in a walk to remember the Israeli hostages who remain in Gaza.

The Boulder Police Department said it was responding to a report of an attack in the city involving several victims. It has not released further details but a press conference was expected at 4 p.m. Mountain Time (2200 GMT).

The attack comes just weeks after a Chicago-born man was arrested in the fatal shooting of two Israeli embassy employees in Washington, D.C. Someone opened fire on a group of people leaving an event hosted by the American Jewish Committee, an advocacy group that fights antisemitism and supports Israel.

The shooting fueled polarization in the United States over the war in Gaza between supporters of Israel and pro-Palestinian demonstrators.

The post FBI Investigating ‘Targeted Terror Attack’ in Boulder, Colorado, Director Says first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Terrorist Responsible for Death of 21 Soldiers Eliminated

An Israeli F-35I “Adir” fighter jet. Photo: IDF

i24 NewsKhalil Abd al-Nasser Mohammed Khatib, the terrorist who commanded the terrorist cell that killed 21 soldiers in the southern Gaza Strip on January 22, 2024, was killed by an Israeli airstrike, the IDF said on Sunday.

In a joint operation between the military and the Shin Bet security agency, the terrorist was spotted in a reconnaissance mission. The troops called up an aircraft to target him, and he was eliminated.

Khatib planned and took part in many other terrorist plots against Israeli soldiers.

i24NEWS’ Hebrew channel interviewed Dor Almog, the sole survivor of the mass casualty disaster, who was informed on live TV about the death of the commander responsible for the killing his brothers-in-arms.

“I was sure this day would come – I was a soldier and I know what happens at the end,” said Almog. “The IDF will do everything to bring back the abductees and to topple Hamas, to the last one man.”

The post Terrorist Responsible for Death of 21 Soldiers Eliminated first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Stanley Fischer, Former Fed Vice Chair and Bank of Israel Chief, Dies at 81

FILE PHOTO: Vice Chair of the U.S. Federal Reserve System Stanley Fischer arrives to hear Governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney delivering the Michel Camdessus Central Banking Lecture at the International Monetary Fund in Washington, U.S., September 18, 2017. Photo: REUTERS/Joshua Roberts/File Photo

Stanley Fischer, who helped shape modern economic theory during a career that included heading the Bank of Israel and serving as vice chair of the US Federal Reserve, has died at the age of 81.

The Bank of Israel said he died on Saturday night but did not give a cause of death. Fischer was born in Zambia and had dual US-Israeli citizenship.

As an academic at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Fischer trained many of the people who went on to be top central bankers, including former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke as well as Mario Draghi, the former European Central Bank president.

Fischer served as chief economist at the World Bank, and first deputy managing director at the International Monetary Fund during the Asian financial crisis and was then vice chairman at Citigroup from 2002 to 2005.

During an eight-year stint as Israel’s central bank chief from 2005-2013, Fischer helped the country weather the 2008 global financial crisis with minimal economic damage, elevating Israel’s economy on the global stage, while creating a monetary policy committee to decide on interest rates like in other advanced economies.

He was vice chair of the Federal Reserve from 2014 to 2017 and served as a director at Bank Hapoalim in 2020 and 2021.

Current Bank of Israel Governor Amir Yaron praised Fischer’s contribution to the Bank of Israel and to advancing Israel’s economy as “truly significant.”

The soft-spoken Fischer – who played a role in Israel’s economic stabilization plan in 1985 during a period of hyperinflation – was chosen by then Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon as central bank chief.

Netanyahu, now prime minister, called Fischer a “great Zionist” for leaving the United States and moving to Israel to take on the top job at Israel’s central bank.

“He was an outstanding economist. In the framework of his role as governor, he greatly contributed to the Israeli economy, especially to the return of stability during the global economic crisis,” Netanyahu said, adding that Stanley – as he was known in Israel – proudly represented Israel and its economy worldwide.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog also paid tribute.

“He played a huge role in strengthening Israel’s economy, its remarkable resilience, and its strong reputation around the world,” Herzog said. “He was a world-class professional, a man of integrity, with a heart of gold. A true lover of peace.”

The post Stanley Fischer, Former Fed Vice Chair and Bank of Israel Chief, Dies at 81 first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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