Trump aims to drum up financial support for the US with his Middle East trip, but Iran and Gaza also hang in the balance.
United States President Donald Trump plans to tout trillions of dollars of Arab investments in the US as a major achievement, but other issues are at stake, says University of Maryland professor Shibley Telhami.
Israel is threatening to further destroy the Gaza Strip unless progress is made in its ceasefire talks with Hamas. Meanwhile, Israel has refused to allow any food to enter Gaza – home to more than 2 million Palestinians – for more than two months.
And despite Israeli objections, Trump may soon be able to reach a deal with Iran on its nuclear program.
Interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa says Syria holding indirect talks with Israel ‘through mediators’.
Syrian’s interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa says his government has engaged in indirect talks with Israel in an attempt to ease escalating tensions between the two nations.
The announcement comes after an escalation in Israeli attacks on Syria last week, including a strike that landed just 500 metres (1,640 feet) from the presidential palace in Damascus on Friday.
Israel claimed its most recent air strikes were a response to what it described as threats to the country’s minority Druze community.
“There are indirect talks with Israel through mediators to calm and attempt to absorb the situation so that it does not reach a level that both sides lose control over,” al-Sharaa said, reiterating blame on Israel over what he described as its “random interventions” in Syria.
He also said Damascus was talking to states that communicate with Israel to “pressure them to stop intervening in Syrian affairs and bomb some of its infrastructure.”
There was no immediate comment from Israeli authorities.
French President Emmanuel Macron and Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa attend a joint news conference after a meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, on May 7, 2025 [Stephanie Lecocq/Pool/AFP]
Al-Sharaa’s remarks come during a landmark visit to Paris, his first trip to a European country since assuming office after he led opposition fighters in a lightning offensive that toppled longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December.
The visit required a special exemption from the United Nations, as al-Sharaa remains under international sanctions due to his previous role as leader of the armed group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a former al-Qaeda affiliate.
Lifting sanctions
Speaking in Paris after meeting President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace, al-Sharaa called for the lifting of economic restrictions on Syria, stating: “Nothing justifies maintaining sanctions imposed on the previous regimes.”
President Macron said France would consider gradually lifting European Union sanctions if Syria continued along its current path.
“I told the president that if he continues on his path, we would do the same, namely by first progressively lifting European sanctions, and then we would also lobby our American partners to follow suit on this matter,” Macron said.
The European Union has already lifted some restrictions, while other measures targeting individuals and entities are set to expire on 1 June. Sanctions relief in sectors such as oil, gas, electricity and transport remain crucial for Syria, where the World Bank estimates reconstruction of the country could cost more than $250bn.
Despite some easing of sanctions by European countries, the Trump administration has been more reserved in its approach to the new Syrian administration.
Macron revealed that he is urging the United States to delay its planned military withdrawal from Syria, arguing that lifting sanctions should be prioritised as a step towards ensuring long-term stability.
Al Jazeera’s Natacha Butler, reporting from Paris, said, “In return, Macron expects Syria’s new government to protect minorities, ensure stability and crack down on what he called terrorist organisations, including ISIS.”
“Sharaa is here to project a reassuring image to France’s Western allies, who have been a little bit wary and are looking to see what direction the new leadership takes,” Butler added.
Good morning. Here’s what you need to know to start your day. I’m metro columnist Gustavo Arellano, writing from Orange County, California — not the one in Florida, New York or North Carolina.
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A grandfather of Trumpism started out as a California commie
If there were a Mt. Rushmore of people who exemplified the California art of reinvention, author and commentator David Horowitz would be the face furthest on the right.
The son of bona fide communists died last week at 86 as one of the most consequential figures in the modern-day conservative movement.
He supported the Iraq war, accused Muslim activists of supporting a second Holocaust against Jews and claimed the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump — and that’s just a piece of lint on the ball of whine that was Horowitz’s career (I’m a columnist, so I’m allowed to have opinions). The raspy-voiced provocateur reveled in demonizing his opponents. He perfected the politics of grievance and victimization — ironic, since that was the cudgel Horowitz accused opponents of employing — and relied on straw man arguments so much that I’m sure the Scarecrow from “The Wizard of Oz” is wondering where his royalties are.
He perfected his craft in the Golden State.
His 1996 autobiography “Radical Son: A Generational Odyssey” tracked the evolution of a red-diaper baby from working as an editor for the pioneering progressive magazine Ramparts and palling around with the Black Panthers to identifying himself as a “Lefty for Reagan” to waging well-funded wars through his Center for the Study of Popular Culture (now called the David Horowitz Freedom Center) against anything with the slightest patina of liberalism.
Long before the likes of Andrew Breitbart and my fellow former Daily Bruin columnist Ben Shapiro figured out that politics is downstream from culture, Horowitz was busy trying to conquer that realm.
He assailed Hollywood while also offering salons for conservatives in the industry. He was a prolific writer of books and articles, and someone who lectured across the country with the zest of a circus barker. He especially tried to change the hearts and minds of young adults — or at least troll them.
One of Horowitz’s favored fronts was university campuses.
I was a senior in 2001 when Horowitz pulled off one of his most notorious collegiate projects. That spring, he approached student newspapers across the country and offered to buy full-page ads attacking reparations for Black Americans. Those who didn’t take his money were accused by his supporters of squelching free speech; those who did were attacked by progressives for platforming a person they felt was a racist and inevitably apologized. The move made national headlines and allowed Horowitz to harrumph about wokeness before wokeness was even a term.
“I see the left as being at war with human nature,” he told The Times in a 1997 profile. “The left thinks you can change people profoundly.”
That same piece said opponents dismissed Horowitz as a “bitter graybeard loon,” with legendary Times columnist and fellow Ramparts alum Robert Scheer sneering that Horowitz was “fighting battles that most people don’t care about anymore.”
Well, we live in Horowitz’s world now.
His motto of “begin every confrontation by punching progressives in the mouth” is gospel in the Trump White House. And his most famous acolyte has the president’s ear: Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller.
The teenage Miller invited Horowitz to speak at Santa Monica High School in the early aughts, entranced by his bromides against multiculturalism. Horowitz returned the favor by publishing Miller’s essay “How I Changed My Left-Wing High School” in his FrontPage Magazine. Miller then started a chapter of Horowitz’s Students for Academic Freedom at Duke as an undergrad.
This ping-pong of flattery culminated with Horowitz connecting Miller to jobs on Capitol Hill before he joined Trump’s 2016 campaign — and here we are.
Today’s top stories
(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
New polling has some bad news for Newsom
The Real ID deadline is finally here
The LAPD is investigating killings that went undiscovered
Botched California State Bar tests
L.A.’s $1-billion budget deficit
National Endowment for the Arts cuts
Facing an existential threat from President Trump, the NEA canceled grants for L.A. Theatre Works, L.A. Chamber Orchestra and other groups.
The grant cancellations marked the latest salvo in Trump’s battle to claim the landscape of American arts and culture, including his takeover of the Kennedy Center.
What else is going on
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Israel’s far-right government has approved a “plan” to carve up and ethnically cleanse Gaza, analysts told Al Jazeera.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced the plan, couching it in claims that its goal is to dismantle Hamas and retrieve the 24 or so living captives taken from Israel on October 7, 2023.
Asserting that the “powerful operation in Gaza” was necessary, he went on to emphasise that “there will be a movement of the population to protect it.”
Here’s what you need to know:
What is this ‘plan’?
Israel will expel hundreds of thousands of hungry Palestinians from the north of Gaza and confine them in six encampments.
It says food will be provided to the Palestinians in these encampments, and that it will allow aid groups and private security contractors to distribute it. Palestinians will be forced to move – or starve.
Some 5,000 to 6,000 families will be pushed into each camp, according to The Washington Post. Each household will send someone to trek miles to pick up a weekly food parcel from what the Norwegian Refugee Council’s Jan Egeland called “concentration hubs”.
It is unclear how the rest of the population – possibly some 1.5 million people – will eat.
Israel says it will use facial recognition to identify people picking up food parcels, to deny aid to “Hamas” – yet Israel treats every fighting-age male as a Hamas operative.
The private security companies from the United States would also guard within the designated areas.
Experts and UN agencies are decrying the plan as impractical and inhumane.
What does this mean for the people of Gaza?
Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza continues, and Palestinians will continue to suffer.
Since Israel began its war on Gaza on October 7, 2023, it has cloaked its mass expulsions in what it claims are humane “advance warnings” in which families have mere hours to pack their belongings and flee to a zone Israel determines. Israel often bombs those safe zones anyway.
“If you are viewing this plan through aid distribution, it makes no sense,” Diana Buttu, legal scholar and former adviser to the Palestine Liberation Organization, told Al Jazeera.
A Palestinian man embraces the body of his five-year-old son, Adam Namrouti, who Israel killed in an overnight air raid on a UN school used as a shelter, at Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on May 7, 2025 [Abdel Kareem Hana/AP]
“If you view it through a political project, which is ethnic cleansing and cantonisation by using food as a weapon of war, then this plan does make sense,” she said, adding that the “plan” is consistent with Israel’s aim of carrying out a genocide in Gaza.
What did the people of Gaza say?
That they are afraid, and starving, after two months of Israel blocking all aid and regular shipments of food.
“If there is a plan to expand the war and reoccupy Gaza and repeat the displacement, why were we allowed to return to the north again?” Noor Ayash, 31, asks.
“What more does Netanyahu want? We’re dying in every way.”
Mahmoud al-Nabahin, 77, who has been displaced for the past 18 months, says Netanyahu’s threats are meaningless.
He has lost everything; Israel killed his wife and daughter in a raid months ago, and their home and farm are gone.
“[This] means nothing but our annihilation. We’ve lost all hope. Let him do whatever he wants,” he says from his tent in Deir el-Balah.
“We don’t have weapons. We’re civilians left in the wind. People will refuse displacement, but will be forced by the army.”
What does Israel want?
They want to finish their genocide under the guise of facilitating food aid and rescuing Israeli captives, Omar Rahman, an expert on Israel-Palestine for the Middle East Council on Global Affairs, said.
“Israel has been telegraphing its real intentions from the start of this campaign: Destroy Gaza and eliminate its population both by starvation and mass killing,” he said.
Israel’s “plan” signals its intent to starve Palestinians who resist being expelled from north Gaza, said Heidi Matthews, a legal scholar at York University, Canada.
“It is inconceivable that the population can be adequately provided for … whilst being crowded into southern Gaza,” she said.
“This indicates the genocidal intent to inflict on the Palestinian population of Gaza conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.”
Can Israel even manage this?
Not clear.
Israel plans to hire two US private security firms, Safe Reach Solutions and UG Solutions, to provide security and possibly help with food distribution.
The first is headed by Phil Riley, a former CIA intelligence officer. The second is run by Jameson Govoni, a former member of the US Army Special Forces.
These companies could give Israel plausible deniability if abuses or atrocities occur, said Mairav Zonszein, an expert on Israel-Palestine for the International Crisis Group.
A morgue worker places the body of a child among the bodies of other victims killed in at least two separate Israeli army attacks, before of a burial ceremony outside al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, Monday, May 5, 2025 [AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi] (AP)
She added that Israel will also call up thousands of reservists to maintain a physical occupation over northern Gaza, despite many soldiers being fatigued by war and financial troubles.
“There is definitely a lower … turnout among reservists than at the start of the war. But that doesn’t mean there is actually a manpower shortage,” Zonszein told Al Jazeera.
In addition, she noted, despite Israeli society opposing expanding the war on Gaza without first retrieving the captives, Netanyahu is more concerned with appeasing far-right ministers in his coalition by fighting on.
Netanyahu risks losing power and standing trial for corruption charges if the coalition collapses.
Are aid agencies on board?
Not UN agencies.
A UN spokesman said Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was “alarmed” by Israel’s plan and that it will “inevitably lead to countless more civilians killed and the further destruction of Gaza”.
“Gaza is, and must remain, an integral part of a future Palestinian state,” said spokesman Farhan Haq.
The UN also issued a statement saying Israel’s plan for Gaza would “contravene fundamental humanitarian principles” and deepen suffering for civilians.
But the UN may conclude that it must participate in Israel’s scheme out of fear that even more Palestinians in Gaza will starve if it doesn’t, said Buttu, putting the onus on Western states, who primarily fund UN agencies, to support the UN’s position by sanctioning Israel.
Donald Trump pushed out his National Security Advisor Mike Waltz because he was reportedly talking to Israeli PM Netanyahu about bombing Iran. Does this mean Trump is serious about diplomatic reconciliation with Iran? Soraya Lennie explains.
Israeli Prime Minister says Palestinians in Gaza will be relocated to the south during a ‘new phase’ of intense military operation, with reports suggesting that Israel is considering occupying the entire enclave and taking control of aid distribution.
Beirut, Lebanon – More than five years into an economic crisis that sent inflation spiralling and saw the Lebanese lira plummet, Lebanon’s government is facing its biggest infrastructure project in years: Post-war reconstruction.
After 14 months of war with Israel, Lebanon needs $11bn to rebuild, according to World Bank estimates.
But, experts say, donors do not trust the Lebanese political class, which has a track record of funnelling construction contracting money to politically connected businessmen.
The needs
In addition to more than 4,000 deaths, the war took a vast material toll on the country already reeling from a multi-year economic crisis.
About 10 percent of the homes in Lebanon – some 163,000 units – were damaged or destroyed, to say nothing of the more than $1bn in infrastructure damage.
Most observers, and the new government formed in February, say Lebanon will again need foreign aid, as it did after a previous war with Israel in 2006.
But that aid has been slower to arrive than in 2006, with donor attention divided between Lebanon, Syria, and Gaza, and major donors like the United States pushing for the Hezbollah group’s disarmament as a precondition.
Hezbollah, until recently the most powerful political and military force in the country, suffered severe blows during the war and has seen its power curtailed, although many Lebanese continue to support it.
The country’s south, east, and Beirut’s southern suburbs bore the brunt of Israel’s offensive. Together, they are home to most of Hezbollah’s constituents, so restoring their homes and livelihoods is a priority for the party.
That translates into leverage for foreign donor states.
The problem
Politically connected companies overcharged the state’s main infrastructure buyer, the Council for Development and Reconstruction (CDR), by 35 percent between 2008 and 2018, a 2022 study by local think tank The Policy Initiative found.
And the primary contracting regulation was so riddled with exceptions that as little as 5 percent of tenders were under the Central Tenders Board’s oversight.
All that came to a head in 2020, when a huge blast in Beirut’s port tore through much of the capital and donors decided they wanted nothing to do with the state, according to Khalil Gebara, economist and former World Bank consultant who previously advised the Lebanese government.
“Donors stopped transferring money to national authorities or to the treasury,” he said, because they had “a total lack of trust in national mechanisms”.
Instead, donors controlled spending directly or via a World Bank-managed trust fund, or worked through NGOs, Gebara added.
That year, the state, which was stalling on implementing International Monetary Fund conditions in exchange for a partial bailout, spent just $38m on its physical investments, down from more than $1.1bn in 2018, the year before the economic collapse, according to Ministry of Finance data.
(Al Jazeera)
Trying for solutions
A year later, Lebanon passed what many considered a landmark reform to state contracting, one of the few reform laws passed in recent years.
It dragged virtually the entire public sector into one unified framework, abolished a classification system that had frozen out contractors without political connections, and created a new regulator – the Public Procurement Authority (PPA).
As crisis-ridden state agencies were corralled into the new system, public investment continued to fall, hitting below $10m in 2022.
“Procurement is going to be a big thing … and absolutely the test for the procurement system and for the regulatory authority,” said Lamia Moubayed, head of an in-house research and training institute at Lebanon’s Finance Ministry.
Rana Rizkallah, a procurement expert at the same institute, says the law is solid, but it’s up to the government to implement what it promised, adding that a crucial part of that is staffing the regulator.
The PPA is supposed to be a board of five members backed by a team of 83 staffers but, three years after the law went into effect in 2022, it has a single member and five employees overseeing 1,400 purchasing bodies.
A four-member complaints board that the law established also has yet to be formed, so complaints still go to Lebanon’s slow, overburdened courts.
Jean Ellieh, the regulator’s president and sole member, says the state doesn’t have the “logistical capacity” to recruit dozens of regulators in one fell swoop, but he’s put in a request for new hires.
“We will work with determination and resolve, regardless of our capabilities,” Ellieh told Al Jazeera. “We will not give anyone an excuse to evade the application of the law.”
He added that donors have expressed “satisfaction” with the PPA’s abilities.
Bonanzas to the well-connected
After several lean years in which the state had to keep spending to a bare minimum, the contracting scene remains dominated by the large companies that built up enough resources from earlier rounds of investment to stay afloat.
Wassim Maktabi, economist and co-author of the 2022 report on cartel behaviour in construction contracting, said it would be a tall order to ensure that reconstruction isn’t another bonanza for the well-connected.
“Rest assured that these political elites will not let this slip,” he said.
In addition, years of high-value contracts mean politically connected firms have accumulated the capital to be, in most respects, bigger and more experienced than competitors.
“Even if political influence was not a factor and you awarded these contracts purely based on merit,” he said, these firms “would still get a large piece of the pie”.
Despite a ceasefire, Israel has continued attacking Lebanon, increasing the damage (Al Jazeera)
Regardless, Maktabi says, reconstruction is simply too important to stall in pursuit of perfection.
Al Jazeera has identified 152 reconstruction contracts totalling more than $30m that are already under way, via the PPA’s online portal. Of the top four contract winners in dollar terms, two have political connections mentioned in media reports.
The top four companies, Beta Engineering and Contracting, Elie Naim Maalouf Company, Al Bonyan Engineering and Contracting, and Yamen General Trading and Contracting, have won contracts totalling $10.6m, $4.7m, $1.8m, and $1.4m, respectively – 60 percent of the total amount awarded in the PPA contracts examined.
Pushing for reformist credibility
The new government is negotiating with the World Bank on a $980m plan, known as LEAP, to kick-start reconstruction and be funded by a World Bank loan and foreign assistance.
But LEAP would only take care of a fraction of the total reconstruction costs.
The government also started hiring for a long-stalled electricity regulatory board and new faces on the CDR board.
A woman walks through the damage an Israeli airstrike caused, in Beirut on April 1, 2025 [Mohamed Azakir/Reuters]
Moubayed says refreshing the CDR board is a World Bank requirement to approve LEAP, which would be a vital win for a government pushing to gain reformist credibility.
The World Bank declined to comment on whether refreshing the CDR board is a requirement.
It’s still unclear how the programme might be structured, but the government has endorsed the creation of a trust fund for post-war reconstruction, “characterised by transparency”.
But, Beirut residents were unhappy with a similar model used in 2020 for the Port blast reconstruction, architect and urbanist Abir Saksouk of Public Works Studio says.
A lack of equity between residents, based on which organisation took over repairing each area, further eroded a sense of shared citizenship, she says, calling it an experience that shouldn’t be repeated.
She is one of many calling for an inclusive reconstruction process led by all stakeholders, including people who have suffered damages, and with the involvement of relevant ministries, because they are a vital part of the process.
“We need a reconstruction framework where state institutions are present… But we also need other representation,” she said.
Oman says it brokers truce between Washington and Houthis, says neither side will target the other.
President Donald Trump has announced the United States is abandoning its daily bombing campaign of Yemen based on an understanding with the Houthis as Oman confirms that it has brokered a ceasefire between Washington and the armed group.
“The Houthis have announced to us that they don’t want to fight any more. They just don’t want to fight, and we will honour that, and we will stop the bombings,” Trump told reporters in the White House on Tuesday during a meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.
Trump claimed that the Iran-aligned Yemeni group “capitulated” and has promised not to carry out attacks on shipping. It launched those attacks in October 2023 shortly after the war in Gaza started, saying the attacks were in support of Palestinians.
“I will accept their word, and we will be stopping the bombing of Houthis, effective immediately,” the US president said.
Omani Foreign Minister Badr Albusaidi said the two sides have agreed to a ceasefire.
“Following recent discussions and contacts conducted by the Sultanate of Oman with the United States and the relevant authorities in Sana’a, in the Republic of Yemen, with the aim of de-escalation, efforts have resulted in a ceasefire agreement between the two sides,” he wrote in a post on X.
“In the future, neither side will target the other, including American vessels, in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandab Strait, ensuring freedom of navigation and the smooth flow of international commercial shipping.”
Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, a member of the Houthis’ Supreme Political Council, wrote in a post on X that “Trump’s announcement of a halt to America’s aggression against Yemen will be evaluated on the ground first.”
“Yemen operations were and still are a support for Gaza to stop the aggression and bring in aid,” he added, suggesting that the group would not halt its attacks on Israel.
Reporting from Washington, DC, Al Jazeera’s Mike Hanna said that the US State Department clarified that the agreement did not relate to the conflict between Israel and the Houthis.
“It was made very clear by the US State Department that the deal relates directly to Houthi operations in the coast of Yemen, specifically in regard to US shipping,” he said.
The ceasefire announcement comes hours after the Israeli military launched air strikes on the airport in Sanaa, inflicting devastating damage and rendering it inoperable.
Dozens of Israeli warplanes also launched several waves of large-scale overnight strikes on Yemen’s vital port of Hodeidah in what Israel said was a response after the Houthis hit the perimeter of Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion International Airport with a ballistic missile.
The US military has been launching daily air strikes across Yemen for nearly two months, destroying infrastructure and killing dozens of people, including children and civilians.
Al Jazeera’s Ali Hashem said it was “possible” that Iran helped to convince the Houthis to de-escalate their attacks.
“The Omanis have also been the main mediators between the US and Iran, and now the Houthis and the Americans. There are indications that the nuclear talks are advancing, with a framework shaping over sanctions lifting in exchange for nuclear restrictions,” he said.
“It is possible that the Iranians have helped in convincing the Houthis to de-escalate, especially if we see this reflected on the Iranian-American talks. It could have been an incentive for the nuclear talks to be done quicker.”
Israel’s military unleashed a second wave of attacks on Yemen, claiming to have “fully disabled” Sanaa’s airport in response to a Houthi missile that targeted Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport on Sunday.
It has been 19 months now since the start of the Israeli war on Gaza. The International Court of Justice is investigating a “plausible genocide”, while the International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes. Scholars of genocide, major human rights organisations, and United Nations experts have identified what is going on in Gaza as genocide. People across the world have marched to call on their governments to act to stop it.
There is a single power that stands in the way of putting an end to this genocide: the United States. One administration has handed over to another, and yet there has been no change in policy. Unconditional support for Israel seems to be a doctrine that the US political establishment is unwilling to touch.
Various analyses have suggested that at the root of this “special relationship” are Judeo-Christian values and a shared democratic path; others have argued that it has to do with the two-party system and the donor class dominating US politics.
But the reality is far simpler. The US views Israel as a critical ally because it helps promote US global supremacy at a time when it is facing inevitable decline. Israel’s survival in its current settler-colonial form – the US elites believe – is closely tied to maintaining US supremacy.
The supremacy of US empire
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, the US has been leading a unipolar world as the sole superpower.
As a continuation of Western imperial global dominance, the US empire holds much sway over global economic, political, and cultural matters, often with devastating consequences for the lives of millions of people around the world.
Like all empires, the US solidifies and expands its position of supremacy and hegemony in the world through its overwhelming military force. Through the US infrastructure of organised imperial violence, it is able to secure access to and control of resources, trade routes, and markets. This, in turn, guarantees continuous economic growth and dominance.
But in recent years, we have seen signs that US supremacy is being challenged. The momentum to do so built up in the aftermath of the 2008-2009 US financial crisis, which turned into a global one. It demonstrated the negative impact of US supremacy on the world economy and motivated powers such as China and India to take action to protect themselves from it. The BRICS coalition of economies emerged as their shared response on the economic front.
In the following years, various US foreign policy mishaps, including the US failure in Afghanistan, its waning influence in Africa and its inability to prevent the Russian invasion of Ukraine, also demonstrated the limits of US global power.
The rise of US President Donald Trump and far-right populism in the United States reflected the fact that cracks were appearing in the very core of the US-led so-called liberal order.
No empire has ever easily accepted its decline, and neither will the US. It intends to hold onto its status as the unquestionable superpower, and for that, it needs imperial outposts to stand loyally by its side.
Israel – the most reliable imperial ally
Throughout the Cold War, Western Europe and Israel stood as the US’s junior partners in its confrontation with the Soviet Union in Europe and the Middle East. Today, while the decades-old transatlantic alliance seems to somewhat falter, the US-Israeli relationship appears as strong as ever.
Israel has demonstrated loyalty as an imperial outpost. It has played a key role in supporting US imperialism in two ways.
First, Israel helps the US secure its access to and control over one of the most critical markets for any empire: the energy market. The Middle East is an important force in the global energy trade, and its oil and gas policies can have a tremendous impact on the world economy.
What the US fears the most is losing its dominance in the global energy markets to a competing power, which is why it wants to secure its interests by establishing a regional order in the Middle East that overwhelmingly favours its imperial power. This new order is about giving the US a major advantage over any competitor seeking to make inroads into the region, namely China.
For the administration of former US President Joe Biden and its successor, the Trump administration, the Israeli genocide of Palestinians and aggression against neighbouring countries are about establishing this new security reality in the region by eliminating hostile groups and governments. That is why US support for them has not stopped.
Second, Israel plays a critical role in advancing US military supremacy. The US provides Israel with billions of dollars in aid, which is in fact a form of self-investment in developing military capabilities and expanding sales. The Israeli state uses these funds to buy weapons from US arms manufacturers, which then use Israel’s deployment of that weaponry in the Middle East as testing and marketing tools. The US military-industrial complex is thus able to sell more weapons and continue to innovate and grow to ensure the US has a military edge over its rivals.
In this sense, Israel is one of the most critical parts of the US imperial machinery. Without it, the US would find it challenging to maintain its imperial power in the Middle East. It is for this reason that Biden once famously proclaimed that if Israel did not exist, the US would have to invent it.
Free Palestine and global decolonisation
Over the past year, we have witnessed an unprecedented attack on the Palestine solidarity movement in the US, which has affected all public spheres, including education and healthcare. We have also seen an intensification of US threats against states, such as South Africa, for their support for Palestine.
Based on the magnitude of the resources and energy that the US empire expends on the elimination and subjugation of Palestinians, one has to wonder, what is it about a stateless people with no economic and diplomatic capital or military power that terrifies the world’s sole superpower?
The answer is that the US empire views a free Palestine as the beginning of its own end.
The US is actively working to prevent the world from doing the right thing and isolating the Israeli state economically and politically because it fears what may come next. Such isolation would make it difficult for Israel to continue its existence as a settler colonial project, and ultimately could lead to a decolonisation process. The end result of that would be Palestinians and Israelis living together under a new decolonial political system that would be integrated into the region and would no longer serve imperial power.
A decolonised entity in Palestine/Israel would be a major step in the decolonisation of the world order itself and its liberation from US imperial power. And this is what the US dreads.
In this sense, it is in the self-interest of the overwhelming majority of the world’s nations to follow this path. The future of Palestinians, who are facing the real threat of elimination and total subjugation today, depends on this. And the future of many other nations, if they wish to avoid the current unspeakable brutalities that Palestinians are facing all on their own, also depends on this.
As much as the US needs a settler colonial Israel to stave off its decline, the world, particularly the Global South, needs a decolonised Palestine to hasten US decline. Palestine, not just metaphorically but literally, stands in the way of US and Western imperialism’s onward march towards continued global supremacy.
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
Smoke rises over the city of Sanaa, on 6 May, following an Israeli air strike
The Israeli military has said it “fully disabled” Yemen’s main airport in the capital Sanaa, which is controlled by the Houthis.
Tuesday’s strikes targeted three civilian planes, the departures hall, the runway and a military air base, airport sources told Reuters. An official told AFP that the airport had been “completely destroyed”.
The Houthis said at least three people had been killed and vowed to respond.
It comes two days after the Iran-backed Houthis fired a missile that landed near Israel’s main airport, forcing it to close briefly.
Israel began responding on Monday by striking the Yemeni port city of Hudaydah, then targeted Sanaa airport the next day.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that anyone targeting Israel would be held “accountable”.
In a video statement, Netanyahu said whoever attacks Israel “bears responsibility for his own blood”.
“Our choice of when to respond, how to respond and on which targets to respond is a consideration that we make every time,” he added.
Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, a member of the Houthis’ top political body, meanwhile told Houthi-linked TV that Israel’s attacks were “failed terrorism”.
“Support for Gaza continues, the response is coming, and Netanyahu must prepare his resignation,” he said.
The airport official said the three destroyed planes belonged to Yemenia Airlines.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it had attacked runways, aircraft and “infrastructure” at Sanaa airport. It alleged the Houthis were using the airport to “transfer weapons and operatives”.
Israel’s military said it also struck power stations in Sanaa, which it described as “significant electricity supply infrastructure” for the Houthis – as well as the al-Imran cement factory in the north of the city.
EPA
Israel hit multiple sites in the Yemeni capital on Tuesday
Monday’s attack on Hudaydah also included strikes on a different cement factory.
The port is the second-largest in the Red Sea after Aden, and is the entry point for about 80% of Yemen’s food imports.
At least four people were killed and 35 others were wounded during Monday’s attack, the Houthis said.
The group blamed the US and Israel jointly for the attack, but a US defence official told the AFP news agency that their forces did not participate.
The Houthi missile fired towards Ben Gurion airport, near Tel Aviv, on Sunday landed next to an access road near the main terminal. Six people were injured, Israeli emergency services said.
Following the strike, the Houthis said they would impose “a comprehensive aerial blockade” on Israel by targeting airports in response to Israel’s plans to expand its military operations in Gaza.
Israel has launched several previous rounds of strikes against the Houthis in Yemen, including targeting a power plant and ports in January. It previously attacked Sanaa airport in December.
Israeli army claims ‘fully disabling’ the civilian facility, saying it also hit a concrete factory and power stations.
Israel has hit the main international airport of Yemen’s rebel-held capital Sanaa, “fully disabling” the civilian facility, according to the Israeli army.
Tuesday’s attacks that also targeted a concrete factory and several power stations in and around Sanaa came in response to Sunday’s ballistic missile strike near Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion International Airport, the Israeli military statement said.
The army claimed that “the airport served as a central hub for the Houthi terrorist regime to transfer weapons and operatives”.
“The operation was approved by the Commander of the Air Force and the Chief of Staff,” it said. The military added that it would “continue to act and strike with force” any group that poses a threat to Israel.
Reporting from Sanaa, Al Jazeera’s Mohammed al-Attab said the results of the attacks were not yet clear.
“So far, we don’t know the impacts of this aerial bombardment on Sanaa International Airport or on the power station. We haven’t yet received any reports about casualties or impacts on the infrastructure,” he said.
‘Pure vandalism’
Sultan Barakat, a professor in public policy at Hamad Bin Khalifa University in Qatar, says Sanaa International Airport is “not a big strategic target” and that Israeli claims it is being used to receive supplies from Iran are “simply not true”.
“I think it’s pure vandalism, to be honest. The airport in Sanaa is not a normal airport. It’s under a huge restriction from the United Nations, from the Saudis, from the coalition – it’s under sanctions,” Barakat told Al Jazeera.
He added that attacking the airport will only hinder the operations of the United Nations and humanitarian agencies in one of the poorest countries in the world.
Footage of the aftermath of the airport attack, verified by Al Jazeera’s Sanad fact-checking unit, shows large clouds of dark smoke rising into the air over the capital.
Earlier, the Houthi-affiliated Al Masirah TV confirmed that among the sites targeted is a cement factory to the north of the capital and a power station in the Bani al-Harith area.
The attacks come less than 24 hours after Israel bombed the country’s key Hodeidah port, killing at least one person and wounding 35 others.
The Houthi media office said at least six strikes hit the crucial Hodeidah port. Others hit a cement factory in the district of Bajil, 55km (34 miles) northeast of Hodeidah, the group added.
The Israeli military said the strikes sought to undercut the Houthi military industry, claiming the factory is an “economic resource” for the Houthis and “used to build tunnels and military infrastructure”.
Since November 2023, the Houthis, also known as Ansar Allah, have launched more than 100 drone and missile attacks targeting vessels they said are linked to Israel in the Red Sea. The group says that it acts in support of the Palestinians in Gaza and that its attacks will stop only when there is a permanent ceasefire in the enclave.
Although the Houthis paused attacks during a fragile ceasefire in Gaza this year, they resumed their operations after Israel cut off humanitarian aid to Gaza and resumed its offensive in March.
The United States military under US President Donald Trump has launched an intensified campaign of air strikes on war-torn Yemen since March 15.
Israel has repeatedly struck Yemen, killing dozens of people, including women and children.
Israel’s security cabinet reportedly voted in favoer of a plan to increase its military operations in Gaza. File Photo by Mohammed Saber/EPA-EFE
May 5 (UPI) — Israel’s security cabinet voted over the weekend to reportedly increase military operations in Gaza, and to establish a permanent presence.
Sources familiar with plan shared details and the results of the vote with CNN, NBC News and ABC News.
An Israeli official told CNN the new plan for Israel’s war in Gaza involved “the conquest of territory and remaining there,” to displace the Palestinian population to southern Gaza and conduct “powerful strikes” against Hamas.
Officials also said the expansion of the conflict will be implemented gradually and provide opportunities for a new cease-fire and hostage release deals before U.S. President Donald Trump visits the region later this month. Trump is slated to land in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar next week, but Israel is not part of the planned itinerary.
The cabinet meeting also reportedly involved a possible lift on the blockade Israel has placed on humanitarian aid deliveries into Gaza, which has been in place for over eight weeks.
Both an Israeli source and a U.S. State Department official told CNN the United States and Israel have discussed a method to deliver aid to Gaza that would bypass Hamas, and that a related announcement could be made “in the coming days.”
The Palestinian Ministry of Health says over 52,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the Israel-Hamas war began, which includes more than 2,400 since mid-March when a cease-fire that had been in place for two months was broken.
Israel has launched 50 air strikes on Yemen’s Hodeidah region and a cement factory to the east. Houthi-linked media report two people were killed and 42 injured. The strikes follow a missile attack from Yemen that hit Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Sunday.
Air strikes come a day after the Iran-aligned Houthis fired a missile that struck near Israel’s main airport.
The Israeli military says it has carried out air strikes on targets at Yemen’s Hodeidah port, claiming the sites were used to support Houthi operations against Israel.
According to the Israeli army, fighter jets struck infrastructure on Monday linked to the Houthis, including a concrete factory east of Hodeidah that it described as “an important economic resource” used in building tunnels and military infrastructure.
“The Hodeidah seaport serves as a hub for the transfer of Iranian weapons and equipment for military needs,” the Israeli army said in a statement. The claim could not be independently verified.
Houthi-run Al Masirah TV reported that six Israeli strikes hit Hodeidah’s port and blamed both Israel and the United States.
Axios journalist Barak Ravid quoted a senior US official who said the air raids were coordinated between Israel and the US.
A US defence source told Al Jazeera that “US forces did not participate in the Israeli strikes on Yemen today” but did not deny nonlethal support may have been provided.
The attack was carried out after a ballistic missile fired from Yemen on Sunday struck close to Ben Gurion International Airport outside Tel Aviv.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had pledged retaliation for the Houthi attack, the first known missile to avoid interception since the Yemeni group began targeting Israel in November 2023.
‘New phase’ in Israeli attacks on Yemen
Al Jazeera correspondent Ali Hashem reported that about 30 Israeli warplanes took part in Monday’s operation, which was overseen by Netanyahu and Defence Minister Israel Katz from a command centre in Tel Aviv.
Hashem said the strikes mark a “new phase” in Israeli attacks on Yemen.
Since US President Donald Trump returned to power in January, the US has embarked on a more aggressive assault on Yemen “which is related directly to Israeli interests”, Hashem added.
This is not the first time Israel has bombed targets in Yemen. In December, air raids struck the Ras Isa oil terminal and other sites in Hodeidah province, killing at least nine people.
While most Houthi-launched projectiles have been intercepted, Sunday’s attack was the “most significant strike”, Hashem said, since the group launched its campaign in November 2023, which it said is in response to Israel’s war on Gaza and to show solidarity with Palestinians. A drone had previously hit a building in Tel Aviv last year.
Since November 2023, the Houthis, also known as Ansar Allah, have launched more than 100 drone and missile attacks targeting vessels they said are linked to Israel in the Red Sea.
Although the Houthis paused attacks during a ceasefire in Gaza this year, they resumed their operations in March after Israel cut off humanitarian aid to Gaza and resumed its offensive.
US President Donald Trump says he wants to work with his Turkish counterpart to end Russia’s war in Ukraine.
United States President Donald Trump says he has had a “very good and productive” telephone conversation with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and they have discussed a wide range of topics, including how to end Russia’s war in Ukraine, Syria and Israel’s war on Gaza.
During the call on Monday, Trump said Erdogan had invited him to visit Turkiye and he had extended an invitation for the Turkish leader to visit Washington, DC. No dates were announced.
A readout of the call from the Turkish presidency confirmed Erdogan invited Trump for a visit.
The Republican president, who described his relationship with Erdogan as “excellent” during his first tenure at the White House, said the two countries would cooperate on ending the war in Ukraine.
“I look forward to working with President Erdogan on getting the ridiculous but deadly, War between Russia and Ukraine ended – NOW!” Trump said in a post on Truth Social, his social media platform.
NATO member Turkiye has sought to maintain good relations with both of its Black Sea neighbours since the Russian invasion of Ukraine and has twice hosted talks aimed at ending the war.
“Noting that he supports President Trump’s approach toward ending wars, President Erdogan expressed appreciation for the efforts exerted to maintain the negotiation process with Iran and stop the war between Russia and Ukraine,” Turkiye’s Directorate of Communications said in a statement posted on X.
Erdogan also raised the urgent need for a ceasefire in Gaza, warning that its humanitarian crisis had reached a “grave level”, the directorate said.
The Turkish president also stressed the importance of the “uninterrupted delivery of humanitarian aid and the urgent end to this tragic situation”.
On neighbouring Syria, Erdogan reaffirmed Turkiye’s commitment to preserving its territorial integrity and restoring lasting stability.
He said US efforts to ease sanctions on Syria and its new government would help move that process forward and contribute to regional peace.
Regarding bilateral ties, Erdogan said Ankara remained committed to strengthening cooperation with Washington, particularly in the defence sector.
Trump is due to visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates next week.
Washington, DC – A bill in the United States Congress that aims to penalise the boycotting of countries friendly to the US is facing opposition from allies of President Donald Trump over free speech concerns, putting its passage in jeopardy.
According to Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, a vote in the House of Representatives on the proposal, previously scheduled for Monday, has been cancelled.
Although Trump’s Republican Party has been leading legislative efforts to crack down on boycotts of Israel, over the past days, several conservatives close to the US president voiced opposition to the bill, dubbed the International Governmental Organization (IGO) Anti-Boycott Act.
“It is my job to defend American’s rights to buy or boycott whomever they choose without the government harshly fining them or imprisoning them,” Greene said in a social media post on Monday.
“But what I don’t understand is why we are voting on a bill on behalf of other countries and not the President’s executive orders that are FOR OUR COUNTRY???”
Charlie Kirk, a prominent right-wing activist and commentator, also said that the bill should not pass.
“In America you are allowed to hold differing views. You are allowed to disagree and protest,” Kirk wrote on X on Sunday. “We’ve allowed far too many people who hate America move here from abroad, but the right to speak freely is the birthright of all Americans.”
Steve Bannon, a former Trump adviser and influential right-wing media personality, backed the comments of Kirk and Greene, writing on the social media platform Gettr, “Fact check: True” and “Agreed” in response to their statements, respectively.
IGO Anti-Boycott Act
The proposed legislation was introduced by pro-Israel hawks in the US Congress, Republican Mike Lawler and Democrat Josh Gottheimer, in January, and it has been co-sponsored by 22 other lawmakers from both major parties.
The bill would expand a 2018 law that bans coercive boycotts imposed by foreign governments to include international governmental organisations (IGOs).
The original legislation prohibits boycotting a country friendly to the US based on an “agreement with, a requirement of, or a request from or on behalf” of another nation. It imposes penalties of up to $1m and 20 years in prison for violations.
Expanding the legislation to include IGOs risks penalising individuals and companies in the US that boycott firms listed by the United Nations as doing business in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank.
While the bill itself does not explicitly mention Israel, its drafters have said that it targets the UN and the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) Movement, which calls for economic pressure on the Israeli government to end its abuses against Palestinians.
“This change targets harmful and inherently anti-Semitic BDS efforts at IGOs, such as the UN, by extending protections already in place for boycotts instigated by foreign countries,” Lawler’s office said in January.
States and the federal government have been passing anti-BDS laws for years, raising the alarm about the violation of free speech rights, which are guaranteed by the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
Numerous legal cases have challenged these laws, and some judges have ruled that they are unconstitutional, while others have upheld them.
Rights groups and Palestinian rights advocates have argued that anti-boycott laws aim to shut down the debate about Israel and criminalise peaceful resistance against its violations of international law.
Anti-BDS crackdown
Over the years, leading UN agencies and rights groups, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, have accused Israel of war crimes and crimes against humanity, including imposing apartheid on Palestinians.
But supporters of anti-BDS laws say the measures are designed to combat discrimination against Israel and regulate trade, not speech.
Such laws have mainly faced opposition from progressive Democrats, but the IGO Anti-Boycott Act has generated anger from right-wing politicians, too.
“Americans have the right to boycott, and penalizing this risks free speech. I reject and vehemently condemn antisemitism but I cannot violate the first amendment,” Congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna, a Florida Republican, wrote on X.
The right-wing rejection of the Lawler-Gottheimer bill comes as the Trump administration continues with its push to target criticism of and protests against Israel, especially on college campuses.
Since Trump took office, the US government has revoked the visas of hundreds of students for activism against Israel’s war on Gaza.
Several students, including legal permanent residents, have been jailed over allegations of anti-Semitism and “spreading Hamas propaganda”.
Rumeysa Ozturk, a Turkish graduate student at Tufts University, has been detained since March, and the only known allegation against her is co-authoring an op-ed calling on her college to honour the student senate’s call for divesting from Israeli companies.
Trump has also frozen and threatened to freeze federal funding for several universities, including Harvard, over pro-Palestine protests.
Israel’s political and military leaders have approved plans to expand the Gaza offensive and take over aid deliveries to the devastated and starving enclave.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Security Cabinet unanimously approved plans to call up reservists and put the Israeli military in charge of food and other vital supplies to the 2.3 million people suffering under its blockade of the Palestinian territory.
Newswires reported unnamed Israeli officials suggesting that the plans include the “conquest” and occupation of the entire Gaza Strip.
The expanded offensive “could go as far as seizing the entire enclave”, the Reuters news agency reported.
“The plan will include, among other things, the conquest of the Gaza Strip and the holding of the territories, moving the Gaza population south for their protection,” a source told the AFP news agency.
The source added that Netanyahu “continues to promote” United States President Donald Trump’s plan for the voluntary departure of Palestinians from the enclave.
The plan also includes the possibility of Israel taking over the provision of humanitarian aid in Gaza.
The Israeli government has rejected claims from aid groups that famine is stalking the enclave, despite having blocked the entrance of all supplies on March 2 –16 days before it resumed its war against Hamas.
Citing an unnamed Israeli official, The Times of Israel said the plan would involve “international organisations and private security contractors [handing] out boxes of food” to families in Gaza.
Israeli soldiers would provide “an outer layer of security for the private contractors and international organisations handing out the assistance”, the outlet said.
Heated
Earlier, the Israel Hayom newspaper and The Times of Israel cited sources as saying the plan would include the occupation of Gaza.
The revelations have stirred significant tension inside Israel.
Netanyahu again asserted that the goal was to “defeat” Hamas and bring back several dozen captives held in Gaza.
However, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, an Israeli campaign group, said in a statement on Monday that the plan is “sacrificing” those still held in the Palestinian territory.
Heated disagreements also reportedly erupted during the cabinet meeting between the political and military echelons.
Army chief Eyal Zamir reportedly warned that Israel could “lose” the captives in Gaza if it pushed ahead with a full-blown military offensive.
Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said that, as Israel has done in the past two months, it should continue to block all food, water, medicine, fuel and other aid from entering Gaza to starve the population.
He also advocated for “bombing food warehouses and generators” so there are no more supplies and electricity is fully cut off.
But Zamir warned this would “endanger” Israel as it would expose the country to even more allegations of violations of international law.
“You don’t understand what you are saying. You are endangering us all. There is an international law, we are committed to it. We cannot starve the Strip, your statements are dangerous,” Samir said, according to Israel’s national broadcaster, Kan.
In an interview with Israeli Army Radio, opposition leader Yair Lapid questioned Netanyahu’s decision to mobilise tens of thousands of reservists, saying the prime minister was calling up troops and extending their service without setting a goal for the operation.
Another opposition figure, Yair Golan, said Netanyahu was only trying to save his government from collapsing as the plan “serves no security purpose and does not bring the release of the hostages closer”.
Aid in security zones as ‘military strategy’
Ben-Gvir was reportedly the only member of the Security Cabinet who opposed the plan for Israel to bypass existing aid routes by international organisations.
Israel reportedly plans to use US security contractors to control the flow of aid into Gaza.
However, the plan is not expected to come into effect immediately, as Israeli officials believe there is enough food in Gaza for now, even as Palestinians are starving to death.
The Israeli plans also envisage the establishment of a new “humanitarian zone” in southern Gaza that would work as a base for aid.
The Humanitarian Country Team (HCT), a forum that includes United Nations agencies, said on Sunday that Israeli officials were seeking its consent to deliver aid through what it described as “Israeli hubs under conditions set by the Israeli military, once the government agrees to re-open crossings”.
In a statement, the HCT said such a plan would be dangerous and would “contravene fundamental humanitarian principles and appears designed to reinforce control over life-sustaining items as a pressure tactic – as part of a military strategy”.
Palestinian children queue for a meal at a charity kitchen at the Nuseirat refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on May 4, 2025 [Eyad Baba/AFP]
The coalition said the UN would not participate in this scheme as it does not adhere to the global humanitarian principles of humanity, impartiality, independence and neutrality.
The humanitarian organisations said their teams “remain in Gaza, ready to again scale up the delivery of critical supplies and services: food, water, health, nutrition, protection and more”.
They urged world leaders to use their influence to lift the blockade so that “significant stocks” waiting at the border could be delivered.
In February 2024, more than 100 Palestinians were killed when Israeli soldiers opened fire on desperate Palestinians waiting for trucks delivering food, in what has become known as the “flour massacre“.
The Israeli military acknowledged that it had coordinated the convoy with private contractors, rather than the UN or other humanitarian aid organisations with experience delivering food aid safely.
The US military also tried to build a $230m floating pier in May 2024, as an alternative way to deliver aid to Gaza. But the trouble-prone structure was closed months later, after only bringing in the equivalent of about one day’s worth of pre-war food deliveries.
Five people were killed in March 2024 in one of several efforts to deliver food by air drops. Humanitarian groups have said that airdrops are not able to replace the quantities needed to deliver food to more than 2 million people living in Gaza.
