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Trump Executive Orders Reverse Sanctions on Israelis, Suspend Aid to Palestinians

Then-US President-elect Donald Trump makes remarks at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida, US, Jan. 7, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Carlos Barria
In a series of executive orders signed during his first day back on the job, US President Donald Trump rescinded a Biden administration policy sanctioning Israelis living in the West Bank and put a hold on foreign aid for 90 days, a decision which will impact support for Palestinians.
Trump revoked former President Joe Biden’s Executive Order 14115, signed on Feb. 1, 2024, which imposed sanctions on “persons undermining peace, security, and stability in the West Bank.”
The executive order stated that Biden felt “the situation in the West Bank — in particular high levels of extremist settler violence, forced displacement of people and villages, and property destruction — had reached intolerable levels and constituted a serious threat to the peace, security, and stability of the West Bank and Gaza, Israel, and the broader Middle East region.”
Biden claimed that those sanctioned “undermine the foreign policy objectives of the United States, including the viability of a two-state solution and ensuring Israelis and Palestinians can attain equal measures of security, prosperity, and freedom. They also undermine the security of Israel and have the potential to lead to broader regional destabilization across the Middle East, threatening United States personnel and interests.”
The executive order then said that the United States would seize the property of those sanctioned.
Two Americans — Issachar Manne and Levi Yitzchak Pilant, both of whom were sanctioned this past summer — sued the Biden administration earlier this month for their inclusion in the list of those sanctioned. Biden officials would later admit error in the targeting of Manne and Pilant.
Eugene Kontorovich, a legal consultant on the lawsuit and a professor at George Mason University Law School told the Washington Free Beacon that the Biden administration “has carried out this sanctions program with scant regard for the underlying facts and scant independent investigation, relying instead on the say-so of virulently anti-Israel groups in order to impose life-changing penalties on people.” On Monday, Kontorovich thanked Trump for rescinding the executive order.
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich praised Trump’s decision.
“These sanctions were a severe and blatant foreign intervention in Israel’s internal affairs and an unjustified violation of democratic principles and the mutual respect that should guide relations between friendly nations,” Smotrich wrote. “Mr. President, your unwavering and uncompromising support for the State of Israel is a testament to your deep connection to the Jewish people and our historical right to our land.”
Itamar Ben-Gvir, the former Israeli national security minister, additionally celebrated the rescinding of Biden’s order, writing that he welcomed the “historic decision of incoming US President Donald Trump to lift the sanctions imposed by the Biden administration on the settlers of Judea and Samaria [also known as the West Bank]. This is a righting of an injustice of many years, in which distorted policies were pursued by the American administration and also by local elements who confused lovers with enemies.”
Trump also signed an order on Monday declaring a goal of “reevaluating and realigning foreign aid,” a move which will impact support for Palestinians.
The order stated that “the United States foreign aid industry and bureaucracy are not aligned with American interests and in many cases antithetical to American values. They serve to destabilize world peace by promoting ideas in foreign countries that are directly inverse to harmonious and stable relations internal to and among countries.”
Trump’s decision will result in a 90-day suspension of all foreign aid in order to conduct an “assessment of programmatic efficiencies and consistency with United States foreign policy.”
The move puts a hold on a Biden administration decision from November which would provide $230 million to Palestinians. Amy Tohill-Stull, the West Bank and Gaza mission director at the US Agency for International Development (USAID), said at the time that “our commitment to the Palestinian people remains steadfast” and that “this funding demonstrates our resolve to support sustainable development and provide essential services that enhance the quality of life for all Palestinians and further reduce the influence of Hamas.”
Newly confirmed US Secretary of State Marco Rubio will lead efforts to determine which foreign aid qualifies as in alignment with the administration’s foreign policy objectives. At his confirmation hearing last week, he said that “every dollar we spend, every program we fund, and every policy we pursue must be justified with the answer to three simple questions: Does it make America safer? Does it make America stronger? Does it make America more prosperous?”
The post Trump Executive Orders Reverse Sanctions on Israelis, Suspend Aid to Palestinians first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War

Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests

A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan

Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.