The White House has announced that Israel has accepted a new U.S. proposal for a temporary ceasefire with the terrorist group Hamas. Trump's special envoy, Steve Witkoff, has expressed optimism about brokering an agreement to halt the Israel-Hamas war and return more of the hostages captured in the attack that ignited it.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that Israel "backed and supported" the new proposal. The sticking point appears to be the terrorists who are demanding a full Israeli withdrawal. Hamas has offered to give up power to a committee of politically independent Palestinians to oversee reconstruction.
Hamas is still holding 58 hostages. Around a third are believed to be alive, though many fear they are in grave danger the longer the war goes on, The Associated Press reports. Thousands of Palestinians have been killed since Israel renewed its airstrikes and ground operations after ending a ceasefire in March.
The dispute over whether there should be a temporary ceasefire to release more hostages — as Israel has called for — or a permanent one — as Hamas wants — has bedeviled talks brokered by the U.S., Egypt and Qatar for more than a year and a half, and there's no indication it has been resolved.
Jan Markell is founder and director of Olive Tree Ministries and host of Understanding the Times on American Family Radio. She says the parties trying to negotiate peace are ignoring a key resource.
"The problem is in our nation's leadership from Donald Trump to Steve Witkoff on down, none of them are dealing with the biblical perspective. Probably the only one who does is Mike Huckabee.
But Markell says beyond Huckabee, who is U.S. Ambassador to Israel, the others don't know the Bible.
"They don't know the Bible's warnings. They're not even curious, I'm assuming to be apprised of the Bible's warnings, or if they are apprised, I don't think they're paying any attention.
“So, I think that we're possibly on some dangerous ground, maybe a little bit early, but I'm concerned. I absolutely am."
