Donald Trump says former President Joe Biden ‘allowed Hamas to become rich’
Donald Trump has made a stunning claim over who he believes is most responsible for the death and destruction in Israel and Gaza.
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Donald Trump said former US President Joe Biden is the one with blood on his hands when it comes to who is most to blame for the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.
Mr Trump made the comments in an interview to Time Magazine to mark his first 100 days in office.
“I would say that the blame for that is Biden more than anybody else, because I had, as you know, Iran was broke, and he allowed them to become rich,” Mr Trump said.
When the journalist asked if Mr Trump laid more blame with Mr Biden than he did Hamas, the president doubled down.
“There was no money for Hamas. There was no money for Hezbollah. There was no money,” Mr Trump said.
“Iran was broke under Trump, and you know that, he knows that, broke. They had no money, and they told Hamas, we’re not giving you any money.
“When Biden came and he took off all the sanctions, he let China and everybody else buy all the oil, Iran developed US$300 billion in cash over a four-year period.
“They started funding terror again, including Hamas.
“Hamas was out of business. Hezbollah was out of business. Iran had no money under me. I blame the Biden administration, because they allowed Iran to get back into the game without working a deal.”
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ISRAELI STRIKES KILL 55 IN GAZA
Gaza rescue teams and medics said Israeli air strikes killed at least 55 people on Thursday, as the military threatened an even larger offensive if hostages were not freed soon.
“If we do not see progress in the return of the hostages in the near future, we will expand our activities to a larger and more significant operation,” Israel’s army chief Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir said.
The warning came as the army issued fresh evacuation orders for northern areas of Gaza ahead of a planned attack.
Earlier in the day, six members of one family – a couple and their four children – were killed when an air strike levelled their home in northern Gaza City, the civil defence agency said in a statement.
Nidal al-Sarafiti, a relative, said the strike happened as the family was sleeping.
“What can I say? The destruction has spared no one,” he told AFP.
Nine people were killed and several wounded in another strike on a former police station in the Jabalia area of northern Gaza, according to a statement from the Indonesian hospital, where the casualties were taken.
“Everyone started running and screaming, not knowing what to do from the horror and severity of the bombing,” said Abdel Qader Sabah, 23, from Jabalia.
Israel’s military said it struck a Hamas “command and control centre” in the area but did not say whether it was the police station.
In another deadly attack, the bodies of 12 people were recovered after the Hajj Ali family home, also in Jabalia, was struck, the civil defence said.
Another 28 people were killed in strikes across the territory, medics and the civil defence agency reported.
PLO TO CREATE VICE PRESIDENT POSITION
The Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) voted on Thursday to establish the position of vice president, potentially paving the way for a successor to Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas.
The move follows years of foreign calls to reform the organisation, and comes as Arab and Western powers envision an expanded role for Abbas’ Palestinian Authority (PA) in the post-war governance of the Gaza Strip.
“A vote was held to create the position of vice president,” Rizq Namoura, a member of the PLO’s central council, said in an interview with Palestine TV, adding the outcome was “almost unanimous” in favour of establishing a number two role for the first time in the organisation’s history.
The Palestinian official news agency Wafa confirmed the vote. Palestinian analyst Aref Jaffal said the new role was created to pave the way for someone to take the reins from Abbas, now 89, “as there are many things the Palestinian situation requires”.
“The Palestinian political system is already miserable, so I believe that all these arrangements are a prelude to creating a successor to Abbas,” Jaffal, the director of the Al-Marsad Election Monitoring Center, told AFP.
In the event of Abbas’s death or resignation, the vice president would be expected to become the acting head of the PLO and of the State of Palestine, which is recognised by nearly 150 countries, according to Palestinian officials.
SPAIN SCRAPS ISRAELI ARMS DEAL AFTER UPROAR
Spain cancelled a contract to buy bullets from an Israeli company following pressure from the Socialist-led government’s far-left coalition partner – a move swiftly condemned by Israel.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, one of the most outspoken critics of Israel’s military operations in Gaza, halted weapons transactions with Israel after the outbreak of the war following Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.
The interior ministry sought to terminate the 6.8-million-euro ($A12.1m) contract with Israeli firm IMI Systems, which was to supply bullets to the Spanish Civil Guard police force.
On Thursday government sources said the contract would be “unilaterally” terminated.
“The investment board for dual-use material will deny this company permission to import this equipment to our country for reasons of general interest and, immediately afterwards, the interior ministry will terminate the contract,” the sources added.
Israel said it “strongly condemns” the decision to cancel the contract, and accused the Spanish government of “sacrificing security considerations for political purposes”.
Spain “continues to stand on the wrong side of history – against the Jewish state that is defending itself from terrorist attacks”, Israel’s foreign ministry said in a statement to AFP.
‘HAND THEM OVER’ PALESTINE LEADER’S HAMAS PLEA
Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has urged Hamas to free all hostages, saying their captivity provided Israel with “excuses” to attack Gaza, as the terror group released a new video showing a captive alive.
Israeli attacks killed at least 25 people across the besieged territory, while Germany, France and Britain urged Israel to end its blockade on aid.
Israel resumed its military campaign in Gaza on March 18, ending the ceasefire that had largely paused hostilities and saw the release of 33 hostages in exchange for around 1800 Palestinians from Israeli custody.
Talks on a new ceasefire have so far failed to produce any breakthroughs, and a Hamas delegation is in Cairo for renewed negotiations with Egyptian and Qatari mediators.
“Hamas has given the criminal occupation excuses to commit its crimes in the Gaza Strip, the most prominent being the holding of hostages,” Abbas said in Ramallah, seat of the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
“I’m the one paying the price, our people are paying the price, not Israel. My brother, just hand them over.”
“Every day there are deaths,” Abbas said.
“You sons of dogs, hand over what you have and get us out of this ordeal,” he added, levelling a harsh Arabic epithet at Hamas.
Senior Hamas official Bassem Naim called Abbas’s remarks “insulting”.
“Abbas repeatedly and suspiciously lays the blame for the crimes of the occupation and its ongoing aggression on our people,” he said.
Ties between Abbas’ Fatah party and Hamas have been tense, with deep political and ideological divisions for nearly two decades.
Abbas and the PA have often accused Hamas of undermining Palestinian unity, while Hamas has criticised the former for collaborating with Israel and cracking down on dissent in the West Bank.
Since Israel’s military campaign resumed, at least 1890 people have been killed in Gaza, bringing the total death toll since the war erupted to at least 51,266, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.
Hamas’s attack on Israel in 2023 that ignited the war resulted in the deaths of 1218 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.
HAMAS RELEASES VIDEO SHOWING HOSTAGE ALIVE
Hamas’s armed wing released a video showing an Israeli-Hungarian hostage alive in Gaza, speaking in Hebrew and walking through a tunnel.
In the nearly three-minute clip published by the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades on Wednesday, the hostage – who identifies himself as 48-year-old Omri Miran – is seen addressing the camera.
Israeli media confirmed his identity.
AFP was unable to verify when the footage was recorded.
In the video, Miran is also shown sitting in a confined space, acknowledging protesters in Israel who have been demonstrating against the government and demanding the hostages’ release.
He says that hostages are living in constant fear of bombings and urges a deal be reached as soon as possible to secure their release.
Miran was abducted from Kibbutz Nahal Oz on October 7, 2023.
GRISLY FIND AS 17 BODIES PULLED FROM GAZA SHELTER
Gaza’s civil defence agency said its crew recovered charred bodies from a school-turned-shelter for displaced people, as Israeli strikes killed 17 people in the Hamas-turn territory since dawn.
Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said 11 of the victims, which included women and children, died in an air strike targeting the Yafa school building in Gaza City’s Al-Tuffah neighbourhood.
“The school was housing displaced people. The bombing sparked a massive blaze, and several charred bodies have since been recovered,” he said.
On Tuesday, the Israeli military stated that it had targeted approximately 40 “engineering vehicles”, alleging they were being used for “terror purposes”.
ISLAMIST LEADER KILLED IN BEIRUT BY ISRAELI STRIKE
A military leader of Jamaa Islamiya, a Lebanese Islamist group allied with Palestinian group Hamas, was killed Tuesday in an Israeli strike south of Beirut, a security official told AFP.
According to the Lebanese Civil Defence, “an Israeli drone targeted a car” near the coastal town of Damour, about 20 kilometres south of Beirut, and rescuers recovered a man’s body from the vehicle.
The security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the strike killed Hussein Atoui, a leader of Jamaa Islamiya’s armed wing, the Al-Fajr Forces.
ISRAEL CANCELS VISAS FOR FRENCH POLITICIANS
Israel’s government cancelled visas for 27 French left-wing politicians and local officials two days before they were to start a visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories on Sunday, the group said.
The action came only days after Israel stopped two British members of parliament from the governing Labour Party from entering the country.
It also came amid diplomatic tensions after President Emmanuel Macron said France would soon recognise a Palestinian state. Mr Macron has in turn sought to pressure Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over conditions in Gaza amid the Israel-Hamas war.
‘PROFESSIONAL FAILURES’ LED TO MEDICS DEATHS
The Israeli military has said “professional failures” led to the killing of 15 paramedics and first responders in an incident in Gaza last month, according to an investigation released on Sunday local time.
The investigation identified several failures during the incident, as well as breaches of orders and a failure to fully report the incident, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said in a statement.
The IDF said the troops did not engage in “indiscriminate fire” during the incident, but they opened fire on what they believed to be a “tangible threat” amid what the military called “operational misunderstandings”.
– with AFP
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Originally published as Donald Trump says former President Joe Biden ‘allowed Hamas to become rich’
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