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Trump Says Gaza Talks Advancing Rapidly, First Phase Should Be Completed This Week 

US President Donald Trump delivers remarks during the US Navy's 250th anniversary celebration, "America's Navy 250: Titans of the Sea - A Salute to the Fleet", at Naval Station Norfolk Pier 14 in Norfolk, Virginia on October 5, 2025. (AFP)
US President Donald Trump delivers remarks during the US Navy's 250th anniversary celebration, "America's Navy 250: Titans of the Sea - A Salute to the Fleet", at Naval Station Norfolk Pier 14 in Norfolk, Virginia on October 5, 2025. (AFP)
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Trump Says Gaza Talks Advancing Rapidly, First Phase Should Be Completed This Week 

US President Donald Trump delivers remarks during the US Navy's 250th anniversary celebration, "America's Navy 250: Titans of the Sea - A Salute to the Fleet", at Naval Station Norfolk Pier 14 in Norfolk, Virginia on October 5, 2025. (AFP)
US President Donald Trump delivers remarks during the US Navy's 250th anniversary celebration, "America's Navy 250: Titans of the Sea - A Salute to the Fleet", at Naval Station Norfolk Pier 14 in Norfolk, Virginia on October 5, 2025. (AFP)

US President Donald Trump said on Sunday talks with Hamas to end Israel's war in Gaza and release hostages held by the Palestinian group were advancing rapidly.

"These talks have been very successful, and proceeding rapidly. The technical teams will again meet Monday, in Egypt, to work through and clarify the final details. I am told that the first phase should be completed this week, and I am asking everyone to MOVE FAST," Trump said in a social media post.

Hamas officials arrived in Egypt on Sunday ahead of talks with Israel that the US hopes will lead to a halt in fighting and the freeing of hostages in Gaza, with Washington's top diplomat saying the next days are critical.

Israeli negotiators led by Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer were to travel to Egypt on Monday for negotiations in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh about the release of hostages, part of Trump's plan to end the nearly two-year Gaza war.

"We will know very quickly whether Hamas is serious or not by how these technical talks go in terms of the logistics," US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told NBC News' "Meet the Press" on Sunday about the release of 48 remaining hostages in Gaza, 20 of whom are alive.

The first phase deals with the release of hostages in exchange for the release of Palestinian prisoners.

A Hamas delegation, led by the group's exiled Gaza chief, Khalil Al-Hayya, landed in Egypt late Sunday to join representatives of the US and Qatar for talks over the implementation of the most advanced effort yet to halt the conflict.

It was the first visit by Hayya to Egypt since he survived an Israeli strike in Doha, the Qatari capital, last month.

Trump has promoted a 20-point plan aimed at ending the fighting in Gaza, securing the release of remaining hostages, and defining the territory's future. Israel and Hamas have agreed to parts of the plan.

Hamas on Friday accepted the hostage release and several other elements but sidestepped contentious points, including calls for its disarmament, which it has long rejected.

The plan has stirred hopes for peace among Palestinians, but there was no let-up of Israeli attacks on Gaza on Sunday. Planes and tanks pounded areas across the enclave, killing at least 19 people, local health authorities said.

Israel began attacking Gaza after the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel in which some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, were killed and 251 taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies. Israel's campaign, which has killed more than 67,000 people in Gaza, most of them civilians, according to Gaza health authorities, has led to its international isolation.

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Arab World

Assad Curses Ghouta, Mocks Syrian Troops in Leaked Videos

Bashar al-Assad was overthrown after 24 years in power. (EPA)
Bashar al-Assad was overthrown after 24 years in power. (EPA)
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Assad Curses Ghouta, Mocks Syrian Troops in Leaked Videos

Bashar al-Assad was overthrown after 24 years in power. (EPA)
Bashar al-Assad was overthrown after 24 years in power. (EPA)

As Syrians gear up to mark the one-year anniversary of the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad's regime on Monday, Al Arabiya television released videos of the toppled leader recorded a few years ago showing him cursing the region of al-Ghouta and mocking his own troops even amid the civil war.

The videos released on Saturday showed Assad as he was driving his car through Damascus with his late media advisor Luna al-Shibl. The videos are undated but suspected to have been recorded around 2018 after opposition fighters were forced out of Ghouta. They were filmed by a third person in the vehicle with Assad and Shibl.

In one video, Assad is heard cursing Ghouta, saying: “To hell with it.” Other shots showed him mocking his own soldiers when they would kiss the president’s hands in a show of loyalty.

At one point, Shibl asked Assad how he feels about seeing posters of himself on the streets of Syria, to which he replied that he feels “nothing” about them.

On the situation in war-torn Syria, Assad said he was “not only ashamed but disgusted.”

Assad at one point mocks even his family name, which translates to “lion” in Arabic, saying maybe he should change it to “some other animal.”

Assad and Shibl even mocked Lebanon's Hezbollah that had sent its fighters to Syria to prop up the regime.

Commenting on the leaks, Syrians dismissed them, while other said they were further evidence of his lack of loyalty to forces that had stood by him during the war.

Journalist Wael Youssef said he did not care about the leaks, saying Assad and Shibl were now part of the past.

He added that he was disturbed even hearing their voices. “Personally, I could never listen to Bashar when he was delivering an allegedly important speech. If it was really important, I would get a copy of it to read. Today they are now behind us, thank God.”

Assad's late media advisor Luna al-Shibl.

Radwan, a resident of Damascus’ Jobar neighborhood that was destroyed by regime forces during the war, described Assad as an “idiot, which is why we rose up against him”.

“When he would bomb us with planes, we would often wonder how he could possibly call himself Syrian because he has an unnatural animosity to Syria and its people,” he said. “The videos are evidence of this.”

Lawyer Nibal Hamdoun said she was not surprised by Assad’s comments in the leaks. “We had experienced his sentiments during 14 years of killing and destruction during the war,” she remarked.

“If he believes Syria is disgusting, then it is because of his corrupt rule and the corruption of his father (late President Hafez al-Assad),” she stressed, adding that he should be ashamed of himself.

Another Syrian, Badr Rahmeh said he was curious to learn how Assad feels in his Moscow exile as he watches Syria prepare to celebrate a year since his ouster.

“Will he watch as we trample posters of his image that he allegedly didn’t like to see on the streets where we were forced to hang them?” he wondered.

“I want to know how the supporters Shibl had called on to persevere during the war now feel as they watch these videos that mock their loyalty,” he went on to say.

Shibl had died in mysterious circumstance in 2024. The official story was that she died in a car accident, while skeptics say that the accident was deliberate and staged by the regime after she had fallen afoul of it.

She had worked for years as the director of the presidency media office before being promoted to Assad’s media advisor.

Arab World

Abbas Calls on Hamas to Disarm, Israel to Withdraw from Gaza

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. (dpa)
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. (dpa)
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Abbas Calls on Hamas to Disarm, Israel to Withdraw from Gaza

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. (dpa)
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. (dpa)

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said on Saturday that the second phase of US President Donald Trump’s ceasefire plan in Gaza demands Israel’s withdrawal from the enclave and for Hamas and other armed groups to turn over their weapons to his Palestinian Authority.

Speaking during a telephone call with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Abbas added that his priority now lies in implementing Trump’s plan to end the war, stop the bloodshed and ease the suffering of the Palestinian people in Gaza and prevent their displacement.

The implementation of the second phase will pave the way for the deployment of Palestinian police and the international stabilization force in Gaza and the launch of the reconstruction phase in an organized and effective manner, he explained.

Parallel steps must be carried out in the occupied West Bank to put an end to Israeli measures that are undermining the two-state solution, Abbas continued.

He demanded an end to Israeli settler violence against the Palestinian people, an end to settlement expansion and annexation policies, and an end to Israeli policies that are harming the Palestinian economy and government’s ability to meet its commitments to the people.

Abbas reiterated his condemnation of Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack, saying the movement “must end its rule in Gaza and hand over its weapons.”

He renewed Palestine’s commitment to recognize Israel and the two-state solution, “so that an independent Palestinian state can coexist side by side by Israel in peace and security.”

Abbas and Merz held their call hours before the German leader arrived in Israel on an official visit.

Arab World

Sudanese Paramilitary Drone Attack Kills 50, Including 33 Children in Kordofan

FILE - Sudanese soldiers from the Rapid Support Forces unit patrol during a rally for Dagalo, in Garawee town, north of Sudan, Saturday, June 15, 2019. (AP Photo)
FILE - Sudanese soldiers from the Rapid Support Forces unit patrol during a rally for Dagalo, in Garawee town, north of Sudan, Saturday, June 15, 2019. (AP Photo)
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Sudanese Paramilitary Drone Attack Kills 50, Including 33 Children in Kordofan

FILE - Sudanese soldiers from the Rapid Support Forces unit patrol during a rally for Dagalo, in Garawee town, north of Sudan, Saturday, June 15, 2019. (AP Photo)
FILE - Sudanese soldiers from the Rapid Support Forces unit patrol during a rally for Dagalo, in Garawee town, north of Sudan, Saturday, June 15, 2019. (AP Photo)

A drone attack by the Sudanese paramilitary forces hit a kindergarten in south-central Sudan, killing 50 people, including 33 children, a doctors’ group said.

Paramedics on the scene in the town of Kalogi in South Kordofan state were targeted in “a second unexpected attack," Sudan Doctors’ Network said in a statement late Friday.

Emergency Lawyers, a rights group tracking violence against civilians in Sudan reported in a statement Saturday the second strike on paramedics treating survivors in Kalogi and said “a third civilian site near the previous two” was also attacked, reported The Associated Press.

The group condemned the attack, blaming the paramilitary group, the Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, for the strikes, calling them “a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law, including the protection of civilians, especially children, and vital civilian infrastructure.”

The death toll is expected to be higher, but communication blackouts in the area have made it difficult to report casualties.

Thursday's attack is the latest in the fighting between the RSF, and the Sudanese military, who have been at war for over two years. It is now concentrating in the oil-rich Kordofan states.

“Killing children in their school is a horrific violation of children’s rights,” said UNICEF Representative for Sudan Sheldon Yett in a statement Friday.

“Children should never pay the price of conflict,” said Yett.

He said UNICEF urges all parties “to stop these attacks immediately and allow safe, unhindered access for humanitarian assistance to reach those in desperate need.”

Hundreds of civilians were killed throughout the Kordofan states in the last few weeks as intensified fighting shifted from Darfur after the RSF took over the besieged city of el-Fasher.

Sudanese military aerial strikes on Sunday killed at least 48 people, mostly civilians, in Kauda, South Kordofan.

UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk warned that Kordofan could face new atrocities like those in el-Fasher.

Separately, the RSF condemned in a statement Friday a drone strike on the Chad-Sudan border, accusing the Sudanese military of being behind it and posted a video showing billowing black smoke. This couldn't be independently verified and it is unclear whether there were casualties in this strike. There was no immediate comment from the Sudanese military.

RSF’s violent takeover of el-Fasher was marked with executions of civilians, rapes and sexual assaults, and other atrocities. Thousands escaped and thousands more are feared killed or trapped in the city.

The RSF and the Sudanese military have been fighting for power over Sudan since 2023. More than 40,000 people were killed in the war, according to the World Health Organization, and 12 million displaced. However, aid groups say the true death toll could be way higher.