Senior White House advisor Jared Kushner on Thursday pitched an ambitious plan to transform war-ravaged Gaza into a Mediterranean resort hub, telling global business and political elites at the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos that reconstruction could be completed within three years if Hamas fully disarms under the next phase of President Donald Trump’s peace plan. Speaking at a signing ceremony for Trump’s newly announced “Board of Peace,” Kushner said Gaza’s rebuilding would depend entirely on demilitarization. “Without that, we can’t rebuild,” he said, adding that Hamas’s...

A fractious global debate over the newly proposed Gaza “Board of Peace” has intensified as countries publicly declare whether they will participate in a U.S.-led body that its proponents say could oversee Gaza’s post-war reconstruction and, potentially, broader conflict resolution. European powers have split sharply over involvement, Middle Eastern governments are lining up to join, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reversed an earlier refusal to participate, agreeing to take Israel’s seat. French, Scandinavian, and other Western European governments have been among the most vocal in...

President Donald Trump has threatened to hit French wine and champagne with a 200 percent tariff after France signaled it would not join his proposed “Board of Peace” for Gaza. “I’ll put a 200 percent tariff on his wines and champagnes, and he’ll join, but he doesn’t have to join,” he told reporters. France’s agriculture minister Annie Genevard called the threat “blackmail” and said it was shocking because it sought to force compliance. A senior French official said Paris does not intend to join the board because its charter extends beyond Gaza and could undermine the United Nations....

Russia and Israel are the latest governments asked to join President Donald Trump’s expanding “Board of Peace,” the body he says will implement his plan for Gaza and mediate conflicts worldwide. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed on Monday that Russian President Vladimir Putin has received an invitation even as Russia’s nearly four‑year war on Ukraine continues. Israel has also been invited but the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered no comment on whether it will participate. While France was a recent invitee to the board, sources close to French President Emmanuel...

A Nigerian activist’s disputed statistics, adopted by several US Republicans and echoed by President Donald Trump, have come under fresh scrutiny after they were used to justify American airstrikes on Christmas Day. Emeka Umeagbalasi, a screwdriver salesman who runs the International Society for Civil Liberties and the Rule of Law out of his home in Onitsha, Nigeria, claims that more than 125,000 Nigerian Christians have been killed since 2009. He admits he rarely visits attack sites or confirms victims’ religions, instead relying on local media, advocacy groups, and Google searches. Yet...

In a statement released Monday, officials in Greenland said they will intensify efforts to make sure the Arctic territory’s defense is handled through the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and that they “can in no way accept” President Donald Trump’s plan to take control of the Danish autonomous territory. The rebuke follows weeks of increasingly bellicose rhetoric from Trump, who told reporters that he’d prefer to strike a deal for the island but that ‘We are going to do something on Greenland, whether they like it or not.” European leaders are backing Copenhagen and Nuuk, and a...