Politics
Trump’s Arab American backers hail Gaza deal but worry it won’t hold
Lifelong Democrat Samra’a Luqman became a vocal backer of Donald Trump in 2024, helping to rally support for him among the pivotal Arab American community in Dearborn, Michigan, in the hope that he could end the Gaza war.
Now, after Trump helped to broker a ceasefire deal, Luqman feels thrilled and a bit vindicated after months of backlash from neighbours angry over Trump’s support for Israel.
“It’s almost an ‘I told you so moment,'” said Luqman, who is Yemeni American. “No other president would have been able to force Bibi to approve the ceasefire,” she said, referring to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Luqman and other Arab American Trump supporters who spoke to Reuters expressed guarded optimism about the recently announced agreement, but said they worried that Israel could violate the ceasefire, as it has done in the past in Gaza and Lebanon.
“We’re all holding our breath,” said Mike Hacham, a Lebanese American political consultant and Dearborn resident who campaigned hard for Trump in 2024. “I gotta give credit where credit is due … but this isn’t a peace deal. It’s just the end of a bloody war and those lives that were lost on the Israeli side and the Palestinian side aren’t going to be brought back.”
Guarded optimism over Gaza but mistrust of Israel
Israeli airstrikes in Qatar and other Arab nations in recent months fueled deep mistrust of Israel among Michigan’s more than 300,000 people of Arab heritage. But the agreement is the biggest step yet to end two years of war that Palestinian health authorities have said killed more than 67,000 people in Gaza.
In addition to a ceasefire, the deal calls for releasing the last 20 of 250 hostages seized by Hamas when it started the war with the October 7, 2023, attacks that killed more than 1,200 people, according to the Israeli government.
It comes after months of deepening frustration among Arab Americans over what they see as Trump’s failure to rein in Netanyahu and end the war. Trump’s renewed ban on travel from several majority-Muslim countries and crackdowns on freedom of speech targeting pro-Palestinian protesters have also unnerved many, according to more than a dozen Arab American voters who backed Trump in Michigan last year and spoke to Reuters in recent weeks.
Many of those interviewed also felt disappointed that their community’s support — thousands of votes that helped to push Trump to victory in Michigan — did not translate into more senior high-profile posts for Arab Americans and Muslims in his administration. It remains unclear whether the ceasefire deal will sway sceptical voters as Trump’s Republicans face competitive congressional and gubernatorial elections in Michigan next year, as well as the 2028 presidential election.
Hacham said Trump would be hailed as a “champion of peace” after brokering the Gaza ceasefire, but added that Arab American voters could turn against him and other Republicans if it fails.
“We are willing to abandon the Republicans and move back to the Democrats,” Hacham said. “We’ve shown Donald Trump that we have the power to swing whichever way we want.”
Anger over Gaza fueled switch to Trump
Trump won Michigan by more than 80,000 votes in 2024, reversing his 154,000-count loss to Democrat Joe Biden in 2020. An October 2024 Arab American Institute poll had shown Trump favoured by 42% of Arab Americans nationwide versus 41% for Kamala Harris — down 18 percentage points from Biden’s share in 2020.
In addition to anger over the Gaza war, Trump’s 2024 campaign tapped into concerns raised by some conservative community members about Democrats’ defence of transgender rights, Luqman said. She expected those voters probably would stick with Republicans. But a larger group of Arab Americans voted for Trump in 2024 “out of spite” at Democrats, and their continued support for the Republican Party likely depends on what happens with Gaza, Luqman said.
“I don’t think they’ve found their political home with the Republicans just yet,” she said, adding that Trump’s pressure on Netanyahu could “solidify support for JD Vance in the next election and for the midterms for any Republicans that run.”
Imam Belal Alzuhairi joined Trump on stage in Michigan just days before the 2024 election, alongside 22 other clerics, convinced that he offered the best chance for peace, but he said many Yemeni Americans later grew disenchanted after Trump reimposed a travel ban on many Muslim countries.
“Now, a lot of people are very upset. They are fearing for themselves and their families. There’s a mistrust after the travel ban,” he said.
After facing personal backlash for his endorsement, the Yemeni American cleric says he is pulling out of “soul-consuming” politics to focus on religion and his family.
Trump administration moves to tamp down frustration
Special envoy Richard Grenell, a Michigan native tapped by Trump to lead his outreach to Arab American and Muslim voters, returned to the Detroit area last month for his first in-person meetings with community leaders since November. His mission? To tamp down the mounting frustration and prevent Arab Americans from swinging to the Democratic Party, as they did after Republican President George W Bush’s invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Alzuhairi, Luqman and a dozen others grilled Grenell at a coffeehouse in Dearborn over the travel ban and US arms sales to Israel. At a separate session, he was asked why the administration is not doing more to help Christians in Iraq.
Grenell, former acting director of intelligence during Trump’s first term, told Reuters the dialogue was important.
“I continue to believe that the Arab and Muslim communities in Michigan are the key to winning the state,” Grenell said. “I know these leaders well and they want and deserve access to political decision makers.”
Although Grenell faced tough questions from Arab American leaders during four events in the Detroit area, he said he would remain closely engaged, and emphasised Trump’s commitment to peace around the world.
“You can’t show up right before an election and expect to be a credible voice for any community,” he told Reuters.
Ali Aljahmi, a 20-year-old Yemeni American who helped to galvanise young Arab Americans for Trump with a video viewed nearly 1 million times on X, credited him for coming to Dearborn twice during the 2024 campaign. But it’s too soon to predict the next election, said Aljahmi, whose family operates four restaurants in the Detroit area.
“Trump promised a lot,” he said. “Okay, you came and showed your face, but I still think it’s a mixture. Three years from now, we’ll see what they’re doing.”
- Cairo “studying” request for Sisi to join board, says FM.
- Canadian PM intends to accept Trump’s invitation: aide.
- Argentine president says it will be an ‘honour’ to join initiative.
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump’s so-called “Board of Peace” for postwar Gaza began to take shape Saturday, with the leaders of Egypt, Turkey, Argentina and Canada asked to join.
The announcements from those leaders came after the US president named his Secretary of State Marco Rubio, former British prime minister Tony Blair, and senior negotiators Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff to the panel.
Trump had already declared himself the chair of the body, as he promotes a controversial vision of economic development in the Palestinian territory, which lies in rubble after two-plus years of relentless Israeli bombardment.
The moves came after a Palestinian committee of technocrats meant to govern Gaza held its first meeting in Cairo which was attended by Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law who has partnered with Witkoff for months on the issue.
In Canada, a senior aide to Prime Minister Mark Carney said he intended to accept Trump’s invitation, while in Turkey, a spokesman for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said he had been asked to become a “founding member” of the board.
Egypt’s Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty said Cairo was “studying” a request for President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to join.
Sharing an image of the invitation letter, Argentine President Javier Milei wrote on X that it would be “an honour” to participate in the initiative.
In a statement sent to AFP, Blair said: “I thank President Trump for his leadership in establishing the Board of Peace and am honoured to be appointed to its Executive Board.”
Blair is a controversial figure in the Middle East because of his role in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Trump himself said last year that he wanted to make sure Blair was an “acceptable choice to everybody.”
Blair spent years focused on the Israeli-Palestinian issue as representative of the “Middle East Quartet” – the United Nations, European Union, United States and Russia – after leaving Downing Street in 2007.
The White House said the Board of Peace will take on issues such as “governance capacity-building, regional relations, reconstruction, investment attraction, large-scale funding and capital mobilisation.”
The other members of the board so far are World Bank President Ajay Banga, an Indian-born American businessman; billionaire US financier Marc Rowan; and Robert Gabriel, a loyal Trump aide who serves on the US National Security Council.
Trump has created a second “Gaza executive board” that appears designed to have a more advisory role.
It was not immediately clear which world leaders were asked to be on each board.
The White House, which said Friday that additional members would be named to both entities, did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
Israel strikes
Washington has said the Gaza plan had gone on to a second phase – from implementing the ceasefire to disarming Hamas, whose October 2023 attack on Israel prompted the massive Israeli offensive.
On Friday, Trump named US Major General Jasper Jeffers to head the International Stabilization Force, which will be tasked with providing security in Gaza and training a new police force to succeed Hamas.
Jeffers, from special operations in US Central Command, in late 2024 was put in charge of monitoring a ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel, which has continued periodic strikes aimed at Hezbollah.
Gaza native and former Palestinian Authority deputy minister Ali Shaath was earlier tapped to head the governing committee.
Trump, a real estate developer, has previously mused about turning devastated Gaza into a Riviera-style area of resorts, although he has backed away from calls to forcibly displace the population.
- Private carrier admits misjudgement, planning gaps.
- Regulator orders IndiGo to relieve senior office bearers.
- Operational meltdown linked to new policy of pilot rest.
India’s civil aviation regulator on Saturday imposed a fine of $2.45 million on IndiGo, the country’s biggest airline, for poor roster planning that led to large-scale flight cancellations in December.
Airports across India were thrown into disarray late last year, with the private carrier admitting “misjudgement and planning gaps” in adapting to a new policy of pilot rest.
Over 4,000 mostly domestic flights were either cancelled or delayed for over a week across the country, stranding hundreds of thousands of passengers.
The operational meltdown came even though IndiGo had two years to prepare for the new rules aimed at giving pilots more rest periods in between flights to enhance passenger safety.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) said it was levying the penalty for several lapses, including “failure to strike (a) balance between commercial imperatives and crew members’ ability to work effectively”.
The regulator ordered IndiGo to relieve its senior vice president of its operations control centre of his responsibilities, according to a statement released on Saturday.
It also issued warnings to senior officials at the company, including CEO Pieter Elbers “for inadequate overall oversight of flight operations and crisis management”.
There was no immediate response from IndiGo to the fine.
IndiGo, which commands 60% of India’s domestic market, operates more than 2,000 flights a day.
The crisis was one of the biggest challenges faced by the no-frills airline that has built its reputation on punctuality.
India is one of the world’s fastest growing aviation markets. In November 2024, IndiGo reached a daily level of 500,000 passengers for the first time.
- Khamenei terms wave of protests “American conspiracy”.
- Iran’s supreme leader says will not spare domestic criminals.
- DPM Dar expresses hope for peace and stability in region.
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday accused US President Donald Trump of being responsible for “casualties” during a protest wave in the country.
“We hold the American president guilty for the casualties, damages and accusations he has levelled against the Iranian nation,” he told a crowd of supporters during an address marking a religious holiday.
“This was an American conspiracy,” he said, adding that “America’s goal is to swallow Iran… the goal is to put Iran back under military, political and economic domination”.
He further said authorities “must break the back of the seditionists” after a crackdown on the protest wave.
“We do not intend to lead the country to war, but we will not spare domestic criminals… worse than domestic criminals, international criminals, we will not spare them either,” he added.
“By God’s grace, the Iranian nation must break the back of the seditionists just as it broke the back of the sedition.”
It is pertinent to mention here that more than 3,000 people have died in Iran’s nationwide protests, rights activists said on Saturday, while a “very slight rise” in internet activity was reported in the country after an eight-day blackout.
The protests erupted on December 28 over economic hardship and swelled into widespread demonstrations calling for the end of clerical rule in the country, culminating in mass violence late last week.
Tensions in Iran, however, subsided after three weeks of protests under an internet blackout. The capital Tehran, however, has been comparatively quiet for four days, said several residents reached by Reuters.
Drones were flying over the city, but there were no signs of major protests on Thursday or Friday, said the residents, who asked not to be identified for their safety.
Separately, Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar held telephonic conversation with Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi today.
They discussed the current situation in Iran and the wider region.
DPM Dar expressed hope for peace and stability, and both sides agreed to continue bilateral consultations on matters of mutual interest.
Earlier, US President Donald Trump thanked Iran’s leaders for cancelling what he said were hundreds of planned executions of protesters after a crackdown.
Taking to his social media platform, he said the mass hangings had been called off and praised Tehran for the move.
US President Donald Trump, whose repeated threats to act had included a vow to “take very strong action” if Iran executed protesters, said Tehran’s leaders had called off mass hangings.
“I greatly respect the fact that all scheduled hangings, which were to take place yesterday (Over 800 of them), have been cancelled by the leadership of Iran. Thank you!” he posted on social media.
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Trump invites more leaders to join Gaza ‘Board of Peace’
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