J STREET GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS NEWS DIGEST | January 31, 2025

January 31, 2025

 

Government Affairs News Digest

I hope you are doing well.

I’m writing as a J Street advocacy leader to share important updates from the region as well as J Street’s statements and resources from this past week. This week, the world welcomed the release of 12 additional hostages held by Hamas; Israel’s laws took effect restricting UNRWA’s operations; President Trump doubled down on his comments proposing Gazans relocate; and Middle East Envoy Steve Witkoff visited the Gaza strip, telling Axios, “What was inescapable is that there is almost nothing left of Gaza.” You can find more on each of these topics below, and as a reminder, you can always find our most recent statements here.

I invite you to reach out to your J Street Public Affairs staff with any questions.

All the best,
Lily


Lily Adelstein
She/Her
Deputy Director of Government Affairs, J Street
Cell: 202-699-2701
J Street’s Congressional Resource Page

This week on j street

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STATEMENT

J Street Urges Further Momentum As More Hostages Freed, Palestinians Return Home

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ISSUE BRIEF

EXPLAINER: IMPLICATIONS OF THE UNRWA CRISIS

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BLOG

Reflecting on the first week of Trump 2.0

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What we’re reading

Trump Middle East envoy says rebuilding Gaza could take 10 to 15 years

The administration is working on concluding implementation of the first phase of the deal between Israel and Hamas to release hostages held in Gaza in exchange for a ceasefire. But the White House is already thinking about the next phases of the agreement and a plan for reconstructing Gaza, which has been decimated by Israeli airstrikes and ground operations during 15 months of war. “What was inescapable is that there is almost nothing left of Gaza,” Witkoff told Axios. “People are moving north to get back to their homes and see what happened and turn around and leave … there is no water and no electricity. It is stunning just how much damage occurred there,” he said.

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International UNRWA staff leave as Israel’s ban on activity takes effect

International staff working for the UN’s main agency serving Palestinians, Unrwa, have been forced to leave after Israel’s ban on the agency came into effect. The UN flag flew above the headquarters in Jerusalem on Thursday morning, but Palestinian staff were also not present at the site because of security concerns. There were plans for a “celebration” by Israeli rightwingers, some of whom later vandalised signs and replaced the UN flag with an Israeli one. The agency said it had received no communications from Israel on how the ban would be implemented, most crucially over the delivery of aid to Gaza. However, Stéphane Dujarric, a spokesperson for the UN chief, António Guterres, said Unrwa would continue working in all Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem.

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Senior Hamas official says group could step away from governing post-war Gaza, willing to enter talks with US on issue

[Senior Hamas politburo official] Abu Marzouk tells Al Arabiya [news outlet] that Hamas leadership is “open to dialogue with all parties besides Israel” when it comes to formulating a plan for future control of the Gaza Strip. He says that the group would be willing to negotiate the makeup of the Strip’s government with the US, as it believes that President Donald Trump “is a serious president” in light of the ceasefire and hostage release deal that he and his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff helped finalize. He nevertheless criticizes Trump for recent comments suggesting that the enclave should be cleared out and its population sent to Jordan and Egypt. “No Palestinian or Arab will accept Trump’s idea of displacement,” he warns. “it will not succeed.”

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For Gazans Returning North, Elation Mixed With Despair

For the first time in over a year, tens of thousands of Palestinians have reached their homes in the northern Gaza Strip, giving way to a mix of elation and despair. On Tuesday, throughout Gaza City, people had emotional reunions with family members who had remained in northern Gaza during the war. But the return home was also shocking and depressing: Israel’s bombing campaign had flattened entire neighborhoods, making them barely recognizable piles of rubble. “We’re overcome with joy — we’re finally in our neighborhood near friends and family after a year living on the sidewalk and the sand,” said Rajab al-Sindawi, 49, a salesman of secondhand clothing from Gaza City who had traveled to Rafah, Deir al Balah and Nuseirat after leaving the north. “But our home is gone and it feels like our future is gone, too.”

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‘They’re gonna do it, okay’: Trump insists on Jordan, Egypt taking in Gazans

US President Donald Trump insists that Jordan and Egypt will support a proposal to resettle Palestinians in their countries rather than in a rebuilt Gaza, despite flat refusals from both countries to consider the move. “They will do it. They will do it. They’re gonna do it, okay? We do a lot for them, and they’re gonna do it,” Trump says when asked about the proposal during a photo op in the Oval Office. Both Egyptian President Abdel Fatah el-Sissi and Jordan’s King Abdullah explicitly rejected the proposal on Wednesday.
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22 reported killed in Lebanon before agreement to extend deadline for Israeli forces to withdraw

Israeli forces in southern Lebanon on Sunday opened fire on protesters demanding their withdrawal in line with a ceasefire agreement, killing at least 22 and injuring 124, Lebanese health officials reported. Hours later, the White House said Sunday that Israel and Lebanon had agreed to extend the deadline for Israeli troops to depart southern Lebanon until Feb. 18, after Israel requested more time to withdraw beyond the 60-day deadline stipulated in a ceasefire agreement that halted the Israel-Hezbollah war in late November…The announcement came hours after demonstrators, some of them carrying Hezbollah flags, attempted to enter several villages to protest Israel’s failure to withdraw from southern Lebanon by the original Sunday deadline… Israel has said that it needs to stay longer because the Lebanese army has not deployed to all areas of southern Lebanon to ensure that Hezbollah does not reestablish its presence in the area. The Lebanese army has said it cannot deploy until Israeli forces withdraw.

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Analysis | How the World Is Reeling From Trump’s Aid Freeze

In Iran, where the work of documenting detentions, executions and women’s rights abuses is done by outside entities funded by the United States, activists say the U.S. pullback now means that there will be few entities holding the Iranian government accountable. A Persian-language media outlet funded by the U.S. government said their employees were working on a voluntary basis to keep the website going for now, but they had fired all their freelancers. Without money, they said they could not keep going. “While Trump campaigned on a promise of maximum pressure on the Iranian government, his decision to cut funding for dozens of U.S.-supported pro-democracy and human rights initiatives does the opposite — it applies maximum pressure on the regime’s opponents,” said Omid Memarian, an expert on Iran’s human rights issues at DAWN, a Washington-based group focused on American foreign policy.

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