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New York Times Freaks Out Over Trump Gaza Plan
US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hold a joint press conference in the East Room at the White House in Washington, US, Feb/ 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Leah Millis
President Trump’s proposal to take over Gaza is being greeted by the New York Times with the same mixture of unremitting contempt, historical ignorance, alarmism, and disregard for factual accuracy that has characterized the newspaper’s reaction to every other pro-Israel Trump policy initiative.
A professor at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School, Eugene Kontorovich, who is also a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, said the New York Times is “boldly lying about President Trump’s Middle East plans.”
Kontorovich pointed to a Times news analysis that included a passage stating, “Never mind that he could name no legal authority that would permit the United States to unilaterally assert control over someone else’s territory or that the forcible removal of an entire population would be a violation of international law.”
“Gaza, unlike most places in the world, is not part of any sovereign state and thus not ‘someone else’s’ in the usual sense. Nor has Trump favored forcible removal of anyone, though the Grey Lady apparently favors forcible incarceration of the entire population of Gaza,” Kontorovich said in a post on X.
The next two sentences of the Times article were also error-ridden. “Never mind that resettling two million Palestinians would be a gargantuan logistical and financial challenge, not to mention politically explosive. Never mind that it would surely require many thousands of US troops and possibly trigger more violent conflict,” the article said.
However, such an operation would not “surely require many thousands of US troops.” Trump posted to social media Thursday morning that “the Gaza Strip would be turned over to the United States by Israel at the conclusion of fighting … No soldiers by the US would be needed!”
That news analysis is not the only Times article that misleads readers about Trump’s Gaza plan or the historical context in which it is made.
As is often the case, the more named Times reporters that are involved with a story, the less reliable it is. A page-one Times article with three bylines — Michael Shear, Peter Baker, and Isabel Kershner — and with reporting and research contributed by another three journalists — Edward Wong, Adam Rasgon, and Ephrat Livni — claims “Egypt captured Gaza during the 1948 war and controlled it until Israel seized it, along with other Palestinian territory, in a 1967 war against a coalition of Arab nations seeking to destroy the Jewish state.”
Yet that ignores a period in 1956 and 1957 during which Israel, not Egypt, controlled Gaza. A headline on the New York Times front page of Sunday, Nov. 11, 1956 said, “Israel Terms Gaza Strip Integral Part of Nation.” The Nov. 3, 1956, front page Times headline included the phrase “Israelis Capture Gaza.”
The Times journalists of 2025 appear to have forgotten the 1956 to 1957 period. Or maybe they just never learned the history of the Suez crisis. The alternative — that the Times journalists themselves are aware of it, but are trying to prevent Times readers from learning about it — requires assuming an almost unthinkable level of arrogance of the Times journalists. Do they think today’s readers have no other sources of information or are incapable of checking a history book or the Times online archives?
One reason the Times might prefer to avoid mentioning the 1956 to 1957 period is that it is further evidence for the proposition that the Arabs will use Gaza as a base to launch attacks against Israel. It is also further evidence for the related proposition that when Israel withdraws from Gaza and the Arabs remain there, the Arabs will then revert to the practice of using Gaza as a base to launch attacks against Israel. That is the long pattern that Trump’s proposal for a US takeover of Gaza, and for voluntary resettlement of Gaza Arabs in other destinations, is designed to disrupt. The chance that it could succeed might explain the vehemence of some of the opposition, at the New York Times and elsewhere.
It is reminiscent of the panics during the first Trump term surrounding American withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal, recognition of Israel sovereignty in the Golan Heights, and moving of the embassy to Jerusalem. Each of those steps was accompanied by endless Times warnings of “experts” and local governments predicting dire consequences and explaining the impossibility of whatever was about to happen. They made the Times look ridiculous.
Ira Stoll was managing editor of The Forward and North American editor of The Jerusalem Post. His media critique, a regular Algemeiner feature, can be found here.
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Israel to Send Delegation to Qatar for Gaza Ceasefire Talks
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a news conference in Jerusalem, Sept. 2, 2024. Photo: Ohad Zwigenberg/Pool via REUTERS
Israel has decided to send a delegation to Qatar for talks on a possible Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal, an Israeli official said, reviving hopes of a breakthrough in negotiations to end the almost 21-month war.
Palestinian group Hamas said on Friday it had responded to a US-backed Gaza ceasefire proposal in a “positive spirit,” a few days after US President Donald Trump said Israel had agreed “to the necessary conditions to finalize” a 60-day truce.
The Israeli negotiation delegation will fly to Qatar on Sunday, the Israeli official, who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the matter, told Reuters.
But in a sign of the potential challenges still facing the two sides, a Palestinian official from a militant group allied with Hamas said concerns remained over humanitarian aid, passage through the Rafah crossing in southern Israel to Egypt and clarity over a timetable for Israeli troop withdrawals.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is due to meet Trump in Washington on Monday, has yet to comment on Trump’s announcement, and in their public statements Hamas and Israel remain far apart.
Netanyahu has repeatedly said Hamas must be disarmed, a position the terrorist group, which is thought to be holding 20 living hostages, has so far refused to discuss.
Israeli media said on Friday that Israel had received and was reviewing Hamas’ response to the ceasefire proposal.
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Tucker Carlson Says to Air Interview with President of Iran
Tucker Carlson speaks on July 18, 2024 during the final day of the Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Photo: Jasper Colt-USA TODAY via Reuters Connect
US conservative talk show host Tucker Carlson said in an online post on Saturday that he had conducted an interview with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, which would air in the next day or two.
Carlson said the interview was conducted remotely through a translator, and would be published as soon as it was edited, which “should be in a day or two.”
Carlson said he had stuck to simple questions in the interview, such as, “What is your goal? Do you seek war with the United States? Do you seek war with Israel?”
“There are all kinds of questions that I didn’t ask the president of Iran, particularly questions to which I knew I could get an not get an honest answer, such as, ‘was your nuclear program totally disabled by the bombing campaign by the US government a week and a half ago?’” he said.
Carlson also said he had made a third request in the past several months to interview Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who will be visiting Washington next week for talks with US President Donald Trump.
Trump said on Friday he would discuss Iran with Netanyahu at the White House on Monday.
Trump said he believed Tehran’s nuclear program had been set back permanently by recent US strikes that followed Israel’s attacks on the country last month, although Iran could restart it at a different location.
Trump also said Iran had not agreed to inspections of its nuclear program or to give up enriching uranium. He said he would not allow Tehran to resume its nuclear program, adding that Iran did want to meet with him.
Pezeshkian said last month Iran does not intend to develop nuclear weapons but will pursue its right to nuclear energy and research.
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Hostage Families Reject Partial Gaza Seal, Demand Release of All Hostages
Demonstrators hold signs and pictures of hostages, as relatives and supporters of Israeli hostages kidnapped during the Oct. 7, 2023 attack by Hamas protest demanding the release of all hostages in Tel Aviv, Israel, Feb. 13, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Itai Ron
i24 News – As Israeli leaders weigh the contours of a possible partial ceasefire deal with Hamas, the families of the 50 hostages still held in Gaza issued an impassioned public statement this weekend, condemning any agreement that would return only some of the abductees.
In a powerful message released Saturday, the Families Forum for the Return of Hostages denounced what they call the “beating system” and “cruel selection process,” which, they say, has left families trapped in unbearable uncertainty for 638 days—not knowing whether to hope for reunion or prepare for mourning.
The group warned that a phased or selective deal—rumored to be under discussion—would deepen their suffering and perpetuate injustice. Among the 50 hostages, 22 are believed to be alive, and 28 are presumed dead.
“Every family deserves answers and closure,” the Forum said. “Whether it is a return to embrace or a grave to mourn over—each is sacred.”
They accused the Israeli government of allowing political considerations to prevent a full agreement that could have brought all hostages—living and fallen—home long ago. “It is forbidden to conform to the dictates of Schindler-style lists,” the statement read, invoking a painful historical parallel.
“All of the abductees could have returned for rehabilitation or burial months ago, had the government chosen to act with courage.”
The call for a comprehensive deal comes just as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepares for high-stakes talks in Washington and as indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas are expected to resume in Doha within the next 24 hours, according to regional media reports.
Hamas, for its part, issued a statement Friday confirming its readiness to begin immediate negotiations on the implementation of a ceasefire and hostage release framework.
The Forum emphasized that every day in captivity poses a mortal risk to the living hostages, and for the deceased, a danger of being lost forever. “The horror of selection does not spare any of us,” the statement said. “Enough with the separation and categories that deepen the pain of the families.”
In a planned public address near Begin Gate in Tel Aviv, families are gathering Saturday evening to demand that the Israeli government accept a full-release deal—what they describe as the only “moral and Zionist” path forward.
“We will return. We will avenge,” the Forum concluded. “This is the time to complete the mission.”
As of now, the Israeli government has not formally responded to Hamas’s latest statement.
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