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Senators describe ‘optimism’ after Middle East tour, leaving questions on Israel’s extremist leaders unanswered
WASHINGTON (JTA) — Judging by her response to a question at a press briefing on Tuesday, Jackie Rosen had likely read the headlines involving Israel she had made over the past week. She was prepared to deflect.
Had she really nixed meetings with two government ministers in Israel’s extremist Religious Zionist bloc, as Axios had reported?
“Let’s focus on what these historic agreements mean,” the Nevada Democrat said, referring to the Abraham Accords, the 2020 normalization agreements with multiple Arab countries that edged Israel closer to its dream of peaceful coexistence with its neighbors. Rosen and six other U.S. senators last week toured four of the five signatories to the accords, including Israel — where Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, who have incurred international criticism, currently hold powerful positions in Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition.
“The real optimism between these countries for partnerships, for people to people relationships, things that benefit their people on the ground, like markets … energy, agriculture technology, and, just coming out of the global pandemic, healthcare,” Rosen added.
For all their optimism on Tuesday, however, the senators acknowledged, in guarded language, that plans by Smotrich to annex territories in the West Bank and Ben-Gvir’s provocative actions on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount could not only undercut the aim of their tour — to seek ways to expand the accords to other countries — but could also scuttle them entirely.
“We were very clear when we spoke with Prime Minister Netanyahu that it is important that they would maintain the status quo and they not do anything that would impede the progress of the Abraham accords and a negotiated two-state solution,” Rosen said. “I believe we were very clear.”
The United Arab Emirates threatened to pull out of the accords before they were formally launched in the summer of 2020, when Netanyahu sought then to advance partial annexation. Netanyahu retreated and the accords went ahead.
The only senator who spoke at length about the most fragile element of the effort — how to extend the peacemaking to the Palestinians — was Mark Kelly, an Arizona Democrat.
“A lot of us talked about the optimism, but there are also a lot of risks,” Kelly said. “The visit that we had with the Palestinian Authority highlighted to me that there is a lot more work to do, not just with the Abraham Accords, but the work needed to get to a resolution — the plight of the Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, a two-state solution.”
The Palestinian Authority declined to be part of the Abraham Accords process, saying the deal, brokered under former President Donald Trump, ignores Palestinian national aspirations. The Biden administration hopes to bring the Palestinians in through economic incentives and by keeping the two-state outcome alive, although Netanyahu and his government have renounced it.
Rosen, who says she got her political chops as a synagogue president in suburban Las Vegas, never answered the question about whether she would have met with Smotrich, the finance minister who has a stake in the trade side of the accords, if he had asked for a meeting.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, a New York Democrat, ran interference for Rosen.
“I would just add that Prime Minister Netanyahu was very clear that he spoke for his government, and that the meeting we had with him was the most important meeting to hear — what his strategy was and why the Abraham Accords was such a huge opportunity,” Gillibrand said.
The group of senators — which also included Dan Sullivan, an Alaska Republican; Ted Budd, a North Carolina Republican; and Michael Bennet, a Colorado Democrat — toured Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco and Israel as well as the Palestinian areas. They did not tour Sudan, which is a party to the accords, but is currently in turmoil.
They described witnessing the benefits of the accords, but in a curiously one-sided way — noting the masses of Israeli tourists who have visited the UAE, Bahrain and Morocco, but not mentioning that there was little to no movement in the other direction.
Pressed by a reporter, the senators acknowledged that enthusiasm for the accords in the Arab countries was for now confined to the elites, and that support for the deals has yet to trickle own to the everyday citizen level.
“We’re outsiders stepping in, we’re meeting with leaders, we’re meeting with key people. We’re not interacting with everyone on the streets and doing polling in the streets,” said Sen. James Lankford, a Republican from Oklahoma.
Gillibrand said leaders admitted that they had to make the case for normalization with Israel to their peoples.
“Every head of state that we spoke to said ‘This is where I’m leading my people. I know it’s going to take time for people to understand why and why it’s so important, but I’m doing what it takes to lead my people for a safer security region, for greater economic ties, so that actually benefits [the people] over time’,’” she said. She described changes in education that the governments introduced to promote better understanding of Jews and others.
There was also talk of the benefits the senators hoped the accords would bring stateside. The senators from western states, including Kelly, Bennet and Rosen, spoke about Israeli and Emirati drought expertise they hoped to put to use at home.
“We hope to learn a lot about the work that’s being done to try to deal with drought and deal with the shortage of water in the region. We’re facing many similar challenges in the Rocky Mountain West,” Bennet said.
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Russian Drones, Missiles Pound Ukraine Ahead of Zelensky-Trump Meeting
Rescuers work at the site of the apartment building hit by a Russian drone during a Russian missile and drone strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine December 27, 2025. REUTERS/Viacheslav Ratynskyi
Russia attacked Kyiv and other parts of Ukraine with hundreds of missiles and drones on Saturday, ahead of what President Volodymyr Zelensky said would be a crucial meeting with US President Donald Trump to work out a plan to end nearly four years of war.
Zelensky cast the vast overnight attack, which he said involved about 500 drones and 40 missiles and which knocked out power and heat in parts of the capital, as Russia’s response to the ongoing peace efforts brokered by Washington.
The Ukrainian leader has said Sunday’s talks in Florida would focus on security guarantees and territorial control once fighting ends in Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War Two, started by Russia’s 2022 invasion of its smaller neighbor.
The attack continued throughout the morning, with a nearly 10-hour air raid alert for the capital. Authorities said two people were killed in Kyiv and the surrounding region, while at least 46 people were wounded, including two children.
“Today, Russia demonstrated how it responds to peaceful negotiations between Ukraine and the United States to end Russia’s war against Ukraine,” Zelensky told reporters.
In Russia, air defense forces shot down eight drones headed for Moscow, the city’s mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on Saturday.
THOUSANDS OF HOMES WITHOUT HEAT
Explosions echoed across Kyiv from the early hours on Saturday as Ukraine’s air defense units went into action. The air force said Russian drones were targeting the capital and regions in the northeast and south.
State grid operator Ukrenergo said energy facilities across Ukraine were struck, and emergency power cuts had been implemented across the capital.
DTEK, Ukraine’s largest private energy company, said the attack had left more than a million households in and around Kyiv without power, 750,000 of which remained disconnected by the afternoon.
Deputy Prime Minister Oleksiy Kuleba said over 40% of residential buildings in Kyiv were left without heat as temperatures hovered around 0 degrees Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit) on Saturday.
TERRITORIAL CONTROL: A DIPLOMATIC STUMBLING BLOCK
On the way to meeting Trump in Florida, Zelensky stopped in Canada’s Halifax to meet Prime Minister Mark Carney, after which they planned to hold a call with European leaders.
In a brief statement with Zelenskiy by his side, Carney noted that peace “requires a willing Russia.”
“The barbarism that we saw overnight — the attack on Kyiv — shows just how important it is that we stand with Ukraine in this difficult time,” he said, announcing 2.5 billion Canadian dollars ($1.83 billion) in additional economic aid to Ukraine.
Territory and the future of the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant remain the main diplomatic stumbling blocks, though Zelensky told journalists in Kyiv on Friday that a 20-point draft document – the cornerstone of a US push to clinch a peace deal – is 90% complete.
He said the shape of U.S. security guarantees was crucial, and these would depend on Trump, and “what he is ready to give, when he is ready to give it, and for how long.”
Zelensky told Axios earlier this week that the US had offered a 15-year deal on security guarantees, subject to renewal, but Kyiv wanted a longer agreement with legally binding provisions to guard against further Russian aggression.
Trump said the United States was the driving force behind the process.
“He doesn’t have anything until I approve it,” Trump told Politico. “So we’ll see what he’s got.”
Trump said he believed Sunday’s meeting would go well. He also said he expected to speak with Putin “soon, as much as I want.”
FATE OF DONETSK IS KEY
Moscow is demanding that Ukraine withdraw from a large, densely-urbanized chunk of the eastern region of Donetsk that Russian troops have failed to occupy in nearly four years of war. Kyiv wants the fighting halted at the current lines.
Russia has been grinding slowly forwards throughout 2025 at the cost of significant casualties on the drone-infested battlefield.
On Saturday, both sides issued conflicting claims about two frontline towns: Myrnohrad in the east and Huliaipole in the south. Moscow claimed to have captured both, while Kyiv said it had beaten back Russian assaults there.
Under a US compromise, a free economic zone would be set up if Ukrainian troops pull back from parts of the Donetsk region, though details have yet to be worked out.
Axios quoted Zelensky as saying that if he is not able to push the US to back Ukraine’s position on the land issue, he was willing to put the 20-point plan to a referendum – as long as Russia agrees to a 60-day ceasefire allowing Ukraine to prepare for and hold the vote.
On Saturday, Zelensky said it was not possible to have such a referendum while Russia was bombarding Ukrainian cities.
He also suggested that he would be ready for “dialogue” with the people of Ukraine if they disagreed with points of the plan.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Kyiv’s version of the 20-point plan differed from what Russia had been discussing with the US, according to the Interfax-Russia news agency.
But he expressed optimism that matters had reached a “turning point” in the search for a settlement.
($1 = 1.3671 Canadian dollars)
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Message from the Sky: Saudi Strikes Signal Shifting Dynamics Between Riyadh and Southern Yemeni Actors
A drone view shows people attending a rally organized by Yemen’s main separatist group, the Southern Transitional Council (STC), in Aden, Yemen, Dec. 21, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Fawaz Salman
i24 News – In recent days, Saudi Arabia has taken notable steps that suggest a recalibration of its relationship with one of its key local partners in southern Yemen: the Southern Transitional Council (STC). The developments come at a time when Washington and regional actors continue to closely monitor stability in southern Yemen, a region critical to Red Sea security and regional trade routes.
The most significant move was a Saudi airstrike targeting a site linked to STC-affiliated forces in Hadramawt, eastern Yemen. While official confirmation remains limited, the strike has drawn attention to shifting dynamics between Riyadh and southern Yemeni actors.
To understand the implications of this development, it is important to clarify who the main actors are.
The Southern Transitional Council is a political and military body that enjoys strong popular support in large parts of southern Yemen. It advocates for the restoration of an independent South Yemen, which existed as a separate state until unification with North Yemen in 1990. Since its emergence in 2017, the STC has become a dominant force on the ground, maintaining effective security and military forces, particularly in Aden and along the southern coast.
Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, leads the Arab coalition backing Yemen’s internationally recognized government. That government, which operates largely from outside the country, relies heavily on regional and international support and has struggled to assert full authority on the ground. Riyadh approaches Yemen primarily through the lens of regional security, border stability, and preventing further fragmentation that could fuel prolonged conflict.
While Saudi Arabia has worked with the STC at various stages of the war, it has not granted the group unrestricted freedom to expand its influence across all southern regions. This is especially true in eastern governorates such as Hadramawt and Al-Mahra, which are strategically sensitive for Saudi Arabia due to their geography, border proximity, and relevance to regional security and trade routes.
Against this backdrop, the recent airstrike appears less about achieving a tactical military objective and more about sending a political signal. The message seems to be that Riyadh intends to retain primary control over the eastern Yemen file and limit unilateral moves by the STC that could alter the balance of power without Saudi coordination.
Recent Saudi media commentary and political messaging have reinforced this interpretation, emphasizing the need to prevent actions that could complicate broader regional arrangements at a time when Saudi Arabia is seeking to stabilize its Yemen policy and focus on wider strategic priorities.
For the STC, the signal is clear: southern aspirations may be tolerated within defined limits, but eastern Yemen remains a red line where Saudi Arabia expects coordination rather than faits accomplis. For Riyadh, the episode reflects a strategy of calibrated pressure—seeking influence and containment rather than open confrontation with a key southern actor.
As reactions continue to unfold, the episode highlights a central reality of Yemen’s conflict: local power on the ground matters, but the ultimate boundaries are often set by regional actors shaping the pace and direction of political change.
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Italy Arrests Nine Over Alleged Hamas Funding Through Charities
President of the Palestinian Association in Italy, Mohammad Hannoun, carries a Palestinian flag during a nationwide strike, called by the USB union, in solidarity with Gaza and against the government and its plan to increase military spending, in Rome, Italy, November 29, 2025. Italian Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi said Mohammad Hannoun is among nine people arrested on December 27 on suspicion of financing Hamas through charities based in Italy, in an operation coordinated by anti-mafia and anti-terrorism units. in Italy. REUTERS/Remo Casilli
Italian prosecutors said on Saturday they had arrested nine people on suspicion of financing Hamas through charities based in Italy, in an operation coordinated by anti-mafia and anti-terrorism units.
The suspects are accused of “belonging to and having financed” the Palestinian group, which the European Union designates as a terrorist organization, prosecutors in the northern Italian city of Genoa said in a statement.
Those arrested allegedly diverted to Hamas-linked entities around 7 million euros ($8.24 million) raised over the last two years for ostensibly humanitarian purposes, prosecutors said. Police seized assets worth more than 8 million euros.
The investigation began after suspicious financial transactions were flagged and expanded through cooperation with Dutch authorities and other EU countries, coordinated through the EU judicial agency Eurojust.
Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni thanked the authorities for “a particularly complex and important operation” which had uncovered financing for Hamas through “so-called charity organizations.”
The Israeli prime minister’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Meloni’s support for Israel during its war with Hamas in Gaza has triggered large and repeated street protests in Italy.