KOENIG

Multiple reports Monday indicated that talks in Qatar for a ceasefire-hostage deal in Gaza had achieved a significant breakthrough overnight, with Israeli officials speaking to several Hebrew media outlets saying an agreement could be close.

Speaking to Reuters on Monday morning, an unnamed official briefed on the negotiations said Doha had handed both parties a “final” draft of the agreement, following a breakthrough in the early hours of the morning in talks between Israel’s negotiating team, Qatar’s prime minister, and US President-elect Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy, who recently joined the negotiations.

In a follow-up report later in the day, an Israeli official told Reuters that Jerusalem had yet to receive a draft proposal from Qatar. But Israel’s Channel 12 reported that the draft was received by Israel overnight and that it was broadly acceptable to Israel. It said the draft had been approved by Hamas leaders abroad, and “everything” now depended on the agreement of Muhammad Sinwar, Hamas’s de facto leader in Gaza.

Israel and Hamas are close to a hostage and ceasefire deal that will likely be announced Monday night or Tuesday morning, in which 33 hostages will be released during the first phase, with a staged withdrawal of IDF forces from Gaza other than an undefined security perimeter, diplomatic sources told The Jerusalem Post.

The sources noted that on the 16th day of the ceasefire, negotiations would start regarding the later stages of the hostage exchange with the goal of releasing all the hostages and regarding IDF withdrawals, but did not mention a definite time frame, though some sources expect the first phase of the deal to last 42 days.

Trump's statement that hell will break loose if hostages are not released by Inauguration Day carries specific consequences, FOX News learned in an interview with Vance. "It means enabling the Israelis to knock out the final couple of battalions of Hamas and their leadership," Vance said, according to FOX News.

U.S. President Joe Biden spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the phone on Sunday to discuss the ongoing hostage negotiations with Hamas, the White House and the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office announced.

Washington said the two “discussed the fundamentally changed regional circumstances following the ceasefire deal in Lebanon, the fall of the Assad regime in Syria, and the weakening of Iran’s power in the region.”

Biden “stressed the immediate need for a ceasefire in Gaza and return of the hostages with a surge in humanitarian aid enabled by a stoppage in the fighting under the deal,” the U.S. readout continued.

US President-elect Donald Trump is set to issue more than 100 executive orders on the first day of his presidency, January 20, according to a report from the AP news agency overnight between Saturday and Sunday. The executive orders will focus on border security, mass deportations, and other political priorities, aiming to signal immediate change and reflect the priorities of his upcoming administration.

According to the report, Trump briefed Republican senators in a private meeting on plans that include completing the construction of the wall along the US-Mexico border, establishing detention centers for undocumented immigrants, and carrying out widespread deportations of those without legal residency. Senior advisor Stephen Miller presented the senators with the immediate steps to be taken. Among the measures, there will be a return to policies from Trump's first term, such as requiring asylum seekers to file their applications in other countries and wait outside US borders while their requests are processed.

The Israel Air Force reportedly carried out strikes in southern Lebanon, according to the Hezbollah-owned Al Manar TV and the Hezbollah-affiliated Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar on Sunday night. 

The reports claimed four strikes targeted the areas of Deir El Zahrani and Houmine El Faouqa in the Nabatiya region of southern Lebanon. 

Additional strikes were reportedly carried out in the area of the Bekaa Valley, near the Syrian border, Al Manar claimed.

• Strong winds calmed somewhat Friday, allowing Los Angeles firefighters to contain some of the wildfires ravaging the area.

• As of Saturday morning, the Palisades Fire is 11% contained, while the Eaton Fire is 15% contained, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

• Firefighters have contained 80% of the Kenneth Fire, 76% of the Hurst Fire and all of the Lidia Fire.

• The ferocious blazes have destroyed more than 12,300 homes and buildings and left at least 16 dead in their wake, a number officials expect to rise.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office announced Saturday evening that he had decided to send a high-level delegation to Qatar to join efforts to seal a hostage-ceasefire deal with the Hamas terror group.

The team departing Saturday night will include Mossad chief David Barnea, Shin Bet director Ron Bar, IDF hostage point man Maj. Gen. (res.) Nitzan Alon, and Netanyahu’s political advisor Ophir Falk.

The decision was made after Netanyahu held a situation assessment on the ongoing hostage talks. He was joined at the meeting by Defense Minister Israel Katz, Israel’s security chiefs, and officials from the Biden administration and incoming Trump administration. He met with Trump’s incoming US Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff in Jerusalem earlier in the day.

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff will meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday, an Israeli official said, amid efforts to secure a hostage deal and ceasefire in Gaza.

A second Israeli official said some progress had been made in the indirect talks between Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas, mediated by Egypt, Qatar and the United States, to reach a deal in Gaza.

The mediators are making new efforts to reach a deal to halt the fighting in the enclave and free the remaining Israeli hostages held there before Trump takes office on Jan. 20.

Israeli fighter jets hit Houthi terror targets on Yemen’s western coast and inland in the country on Friday, the Israel Defense Forces stated.

“The Houthi terrorist regime has repeatedly attacked the State of Israel, its citizens and civilian infrastructure in Israel,” including using drones and surface-to-surface missiles, the Israeli military stated. “The State of Israel has the right and obligation to defend itself.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated on Friday afternoon that “just as we promised, the Houthis are paying, and will continue to pay, a heavy price for their aggression against us,” according to an English translation of his remarks provided by his office.

Arab media outlets reported an unprecedented military operation Friday, marking the first coordinated strikes by US, British, and Israeli forces since the escalation of regional hostilities. According to international sources, the operation comprised three waves of strikes targeting critical infrastructure across Houthi-controlled territories.

Has God sent us not 1, not 2, not 3 – but FOUR dramatic signs on New Year’s Eve as a warning of things to come, of America’s future, and what we need to do now? And can we afford to ignore them? Check out the new prophetic message by Jonathan Cahn.

Lightning bolts struck the Washington Monument, the Capitol, the Empire State Building, and the World Trade Center on New Year's Eve 2024.

President-elect Trump and former President Obama had an extended friendly exchange as they sat next to each other at the funeral services for former President Carter on Thursday.

Cameras captured Trump and Obama at Washington National Cathedral exchanging pleasantries, with Obama laughing at something the incoming president was saying. They appeared to chat for several minutes before the funeral services began.

Iran’s former top general in Syria has revealed that Tehran pushed the since-deposed Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad to open an additional front against Israel as it battled terror groups Hamas and Hezbollah over the past 15 months.

In a recording cited by the New York Times on Wednesday, Brig. Gen. Behrouz Esbati said ties with Assad had been strained prior to the Syrian regime’s collapse at the beginning of December, over his refusal to let Iran-backed militias open a new front against Israel from Syria.

Iran had presented Assad with detailed plans to use Iranian resources in Syria to attack Israel, but despite multiple requests, he refused to let them go ahead, Esbati said.

Maj. Gen. Ori Gordin, commander of the Israel Defense Forces’ Northern Command, has expressed doubts about the ability of the Lebanese Armed Forces to uphold the truce agreement and warned that Hezbollah’s influence and rocket fire near the border remain a significant threat, Channel 12 News reported on Wednesday.

Despite plans for northern Israeli residents to return home by March 1, Gordin admitted that while efforts are underway, the IDF cannot prevent Hezbollah operatives and other Lebanese citizens from returning to villages near the border.

Earlier this month, Jerusalem unveiled a 3.4 billion shekel ($928 million) plan to encourage the return of around 60,000 residents who were evacuated from at-risk areas near the Lebanon border after Hezbollah joined the war in support of Hamas on Oct. 8, 2023.

French President Emmanuel Macron warned on Monday that Iran’s nuclear program is rapidly approaching the “point of no return.”

Speaking at the annual conference of French ambassadors in Paris, the French president described Iran as “the main strategic and security challenge” for the European Union.

He emphasized the shrinking window for Western nations to act and called for the swift implementation of broad sanctions against Tehran.

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff was scheduled to be in Doha, Qatar, on Wednesday to advance multilateral negotiations aimed at securing the release of the hostages being held by Hamas in Gaza.

During a press conference on Tuesday at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, Witkoff, a Jewish businessman and longtime friend of the president-elect, expressed optimism about the ongoing discussions.

The U.S. military on Wednesday said its forces struck weapons depots used by the Iran-backed Houthi terrorist group in Yemen to target naval warships and merchant vessels in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. 

"U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) forces conducted multiple precision strikes against two Iranian-backed Houthi underground Advanced Conventional Weapon (ACW) storage facilities within Houthi-controlled territories of Yemen," CENTCOM said in a statement. 

The military command confirmed there were no injuries to U.S. personnel and no U.S. equipment was damaged in the strike. It did not confirm whether any Houthi terrorists were killed or injured in the attack

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump again issued a stern warning regarding American hostages held by Hamas in Gaza, saying in a recent podcast that there will be “hell to pay” if they are not released by the time he returns to office in two weeks. 

When pressed by American political commentator Hugh Hewitt on the specific meaning behind his warning, Trump elaborated with characteristic intensity: “If those hostages aren’t released by the time I get into office, there will be hell to pay.

“I don’t think I have to go into it. … But it won’t be the word ‘don’t,’ you know. I heard the word ‘don’t,’ you can add that into it, but that would just be a small part of it. … Those hostages have to get out. They have to get out now.”

Christian leaders in Syria meet with the country's new head of government but remain uncertain about its intentions, according to reports, which say no firm commitments emerged from the gathering, leaving the community uneasy about its role in a rapidly changing political landscape.

Church representatives, including Franciscan friars and other clergy, met with Ahmad al-Sharaa–also known by his wartime alias Abu Mohammed Al Jolani, who leads the transitional administration that overthrew the previous regime on Dec. 8, 2024, at the People's Palace in the capital last week, Catholic New Agency reported Saturday.

The attendees included Fr. Ibrahim Faltas, deputy custodian of the Holy Land, and Father Rami Elias, SJ, and they deliberated on matters concerning the Syrian Constitution, democracy and equality.