Gaza death toll tops 65,000 as Israel continues genocidal war on Palestinians

Health Ministry says nearly 100 killed in past 24 hours; famine deaths rise to 432

Tarek Chouiref |17.09.2025

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/gaza-death-toll-tops-65-000-as-israel-continues-genocidal-war-on-palestinians/3690609

ISTANBUL 

The death toll in Gaza has climbed to 65,062, with 165,697 others injured, since Israel launched its genocidal war on the enclave in October 2023, the Health Ministry said Wednesday.

In its daily update, the ministry reported 98 deaths and 385 injuries in the past 24 hours alone. It warned the figures remain incomplete, as many victims are still trapped under rubble or on roads that rescue teams cannot reach.

Since Israel resumed its attacks on Gaza on March 18, at least 12,511 people have been killed and 53,656 wounded, according to the ministry.

The statement said Israeli forces continued to target Palestinians seeking food aid, with seven people killed and 87 injured in the past day. This brought the total number of aid seekers killed to 2,504, with over 18,381 injured since May 27.

The ministry also confirmed four deaths from famine and malnutrition in the past day, raising the toll since October 2023 to 432, including 146 children.

Since famine was formally declared in Gaza last month, 154 such deaths have been recorded, among them 31 children.

Israel has sealed Gaza’s crossings since March 2, preventing food and aid trucks from entering despite hundreds waiting at the border. The move has exacerbated the humanitarian catastrophe in the enclave, leaving residents without access to basic supplies.

Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.  

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

Spain’s King Felipe condemns ‘unspeakable suffering’ in Gaza amid Israeli offensive

AFP

https://english.alarabiya.net/News/world/2025/09/16/spain-s-king-denounces-unspeakable-suffering-of-gazans

Spain’s King Felipe VI on Tuesday denounced the “unspeakable suffering” of hundreds of thousands of Gazans under Israeli bombardment in the Palestinian territory, in a rare political intervention.

“The latest episode in this conflict... has degenerated into an unbearable humanitarian crisis, the unspeakable suffering of hundreds of thousands of innocent people and the total devastation of Gaza,” the monarch said during a visit to Egypt.

Felipe, who rarely speaks out on international issues, noted his trip “is taking place at a turbulent and tragic time for the region.”

The Spanish government, which recognized the State of Palestine in May 2024, has become one of Israel’s fiercest critics in Europe.

On Sunday, the final stage of the Vuelta cycling race was cancelled because of pro-Palestinian demonstrations that saw some 100,000 people take to the streets of Madrid, according to local authorities.

Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez later expressed his “deep admiration” for the protesters, while also suggesting excluding Israel from sports competitions “as long as the barbarity continues” in Gaza.

Israel has not had an ambassador in Madrid since 2024.

Last week, Spain recalled its ambassador to Israel amid heated exchanges after Sanchez’s government announced measures aimed at stopping “the genocide in Gaza.”

Top UN legal investigators conclude Israel is guilty of genocide in Gaza

Most authoritative report by the UN on genocide paves way for ICJ ruling, authors say

By Sondos Asem

Published date: 16 September 2025 

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/un-concludes-israel-guilty-genocide-gaza

The UN’s top investigative body on Palestine and Israel ruled on Tuesday that Israel is guilty of the crime of genocide in Gaza, in the most authoritative pronouncement to date. 

The 72-page report by the UN commission of inquiry on Palestine and Israel finds Israel has committed four of the five acts prohibited under the 1948 Genocide Convention, and that Israeli leaders had the intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza as a group. 

The finding echoes reports by Palestinian, Israeli and international rights groups that have reached the same conclusion over the past year.

But this is the first comprehensive legal probe by a UN body, serving as an indicator of a judgment by the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which is currently hearing a case by South Africa accusing Israel of genocide. The ICJ case is expected to take several years to be concluded. 

“For the finding on Israel's responsibility for its conduct in Gaza, the commission used the legal standard set forth by the International Court of Justice. This is therefore the most authoritative finding emanating from the United Nations to date,” Navi Pillay, the commission's chair, told Middle East Eye.

“Reports generated by the United Nations, including by a commission of inquiry, bear particular probative value and can be relied upon by all domestic and international courts.”

Pillay, a prominent jurist who previously served as the UN’s high commissioner for human rights, said all states had an unequivocal legal obligation to prevent the genocide in Gaza. She also urged the UK government to review its stance on the Gaza genocide, including its refusal to label it as such.

“The obligation to prevent genocide arises when states learn of the existence of a serious risk of genocide and thus states, including the UK, must act without the need to wait for a judicial determination to prevent genocide,” she said.

Another member of the commission, Chris Sidoti, told MEE that states must act now to prevent genocide. “There is no excuse now for not acting,” he said.

“The UN report will remain the most authoritative statement until the International Court of Justice completes and rules on the genocide case brought against Israel.”

The report is due to be presented to the UN General Assembly in October.

It calls on UN member states to take several measures, including halting arms transfers to Israel and imposing sanctions against Israel and individuals or corporations that are involved in or facilitating genocide or incitement to commit the crime.

The report concluded that Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza since 7 October 2023, covering the period from that date until 31 July 2025.

It said that Israel has committed four acts of genocide:

·        Killing members of the group: Palestinians were killed in large numbers through direct attacks on civilians, protected persons, and vital civilian infrastructure, as well as by the deliberate creation of conditions that led to death.
 

·        Causing serious bodily or mental harm: Palestinians suffered torture, rape, sexual assault, forced displacement, and severe mistreatment in detention, alongside widespread attacks on civilians and the environment.
 

·        Inflicting conditions of life calculated to destroy the group: Israel deliberately imposed inhumane living conditions in Gaza, including destruction of essential infrastructure, denial of medical care, forced displacement, blocking of food, water, fuel, and electricity, reproductive violence, and starvation as a method of warfare. Children were found to be particularly targeted.

•    Preventing births within the group: The attack on Gaza’s largest fertility clinic destroyed thousands of embryos, sperm samples, and eggs. Experts told the commission this would prevent thousands of Palestinian children from ever being

Genocidal intent

In addition to the genocidal acts, the investigation concluded that the Israeli authorities and security forces have the genocidal intent to destroy, in whole or in part, the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip

Genocidal intent is often the hardest to prove in any genocide case. But the authors of the report have found “fully conclusive evidence” of such intent. 

They cited statements made by Israeli authorities, including President Isaac Herzog, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant - who served as defence minister for much of the war - as direct evidence of genocidal intent.

It also found that the three leaders have committed the crime of incitement to genocide, a substantive crime under Article III of the convention, regardless of whether genocide was committed. 

Additionally, on the basis of circumstantial evidence, the commission found that genocidal intent was the “only reasonable inference” that could be drawn based on the pattern of conduct of the Israeli authorities. That is the same standard of proof that will be used by the ICJ in its current proceedings against Israel. 

The commission said it identified six patterns of conduct by Israeli forces in Gaza that support an inference of genocidal intent:

·        Mass killings: Israeli forces have killed and seriously harmed an unprecedented number of Palestinians since 7 October 2023, mostly civilians, using heavy munitions in densely populated areas. By 15 July 2025, 83 percent of those killed were civilians, the report found. Nearly half were women and children.
 

·        Cultural destruction: The systematic leveling of homes, schools, mosques, churches, and cultural sites was cited as evidence of an effort to erase Palestinian identity.
 

·        Deliberate suffering: Despite three provisional orders from the ICJ and repeated international warnings, Israel continued policies knowing Palestinians were trapped and unable to flee, the commission said.
 

·        Collapse of healthcare: Israeli forces targeted Gaza’s healthcare system, attacking hospitals, killing and abusing medical personnel, and blocking vital supplies and patient evacuations.
 

·        Sexual violence: Investigators documented sexualised torture, rape, and other forms of gender-based violence, describing them as tools of collective punishment.
 

·          Targeting children: Children were shot by snipers and drones, including during evacuations and at shelters, with some killed while carrying white flags.

“Israeli political and military leaders are agents of the State of Israel; therefore, their acts are attributable to the State of Israel,” the report read. 

“The State of Israel bears responsibility for the failure to prevent genocide, the commission of genocide and the failure to punish genocide against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.”

Who are the UN investigators?

The three-member commission of inquiry was established in May 2021 by the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council (HRC) with a permanent mandate to investigate international humanitarian and human rights law violations in occupied Palestine and Israel from April 2021. 

The commission is mandated to report annually to the HRC and the UN General Assembly. Its members are independent experts, unpaid by the UN, on an open-ended mandate. 

The commission’s reports are highly authoritative and are widely cited by international legal bodies, including the ICJ and the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Over the past four years, it has produced some of the most groundbreaking reports on international law breaches in Israel and Palestine.

Since 7 October 2023, the commission has issued three reports and three papers on international law breaches by different parties.

Previous reports have concluded that Israeli forces have committed crimes against humanity and war crimes in Gaza, including, among others, extermination, torture, rape, sexual violence and starvation as a method of warfare. They also concluded that two acts of genocide had been committed in Gaza. 

Its three members are eminent human rights and legal experts.

Pillay served as UN high commissioner for human rights from 2008 to 2014. She previously served as a judge in the ICJ and presided over the UN’s ad hoc tribunal for Rwanda.

Miloon Kothari served as the first UN special rapporteur on adequate housing between 2000 and 2008, while Sidoti is the former Australian human rights commissioner and previously served as a member of the UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar from 2017 to 2019.

Big, Beautiful trillion-dollar war budget!

House passes key policy bill, which could lead to historic defense spending, and for what?

William Hartung

Sep 12, 2025

https://responsiblestatecraft.org/trillion-dollar-defense-budget/

The House of Representatives on Wednesday passed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), paving the way for upwards of $848 billion in Pentagon spending. This, combined with additional funding contained in the so-called “Big, Beautiful Bill,” would push the Defense Department budget past $1 trillion for the first time.

That’s far more, adjusted for inflation, than peak levels reached at the height of the Cold War or the War in Vietnam.

And if the NDAA authorizations are turned into actual appropriations, huge sums of money will be wasted — on dysfunctional or obsolete systems like F-35s and $13 billion aircraft carriers that are increasingly vulnerable to high tech missiles. And the potentially most wasteful program of all would be President Trump’s “Golden Dome,” a costly pipe dream that most scientists who are not on the payroll of the Pentagon or the arms industry will tell you can never work.

Despite being a policy bill, the NDAA passed by the House is also silent about our misguided, dangerous “cover the globe” military strategy, which is more likely to draw us into unnecessary wars than it is to defend U.S. residents or anyone else.

House Armed Services Committee Chair Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) marketed the NDAA under the tired old slogan of “Peace Through Strength.” As research by the Costs of War Project at Brown University has demonstrated, America’s wars (and record Pentagon budgets) of this century have brought neither peace nor strength. Instead, they have cost at least $8 trillion, hundreds of thousands killed and displaced on all sides, and a devastating impact on veterans, including a huge number of physical and psychological injuries.

Activities that the bill amply funds include keeping troops in the U.S.-Mexico border. It also gives lip service to “cutting red tape” in the purchase of weapons, but that may include weakening the Pentagon’s independent testing office, one of the few sources of trustworthy analysis of the cost and performance of major arms systems. The House NDAA also endorses increased military cooperation with Israel, and replenishing war reserves that have been used to fuel Israel’s ongoing civilian slaughter and destruction of Gaza and attacks on Iran and Qatar.

The appropriations committees occasionally trim back the NDAA’s spending recommendations but doing that in the prevailing climate in Washington would be an uphill climb.

 

A Nation of Narcissists

Patrick Lawrence • September 10, 2025

https://www.unz.com/plawrence/a-nation-of-narcissists/

All those malign authoritarians, more than 20 of them, who gathered in Tianjin at the end of August for a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization: This was a festival of anti–Americanism, you need to know.

No other way to understand it. Making it all worse, Xi Jinping then invited more than two dozen heads of state to Beijing to mark the 80th anniversary of the 1945 victory.

How dare the Chinese president organize an elaborate military parade to celebrate China’s role in the historical defeat of the Imperial Japanese Army. How dare he stir pride in the People’s Republic’s determination to defend its sovereignty while refuting the revisionism — nonsensical but prevalent — that airbrushes the Chinese Communist Party out of the Second World War’s history.

The temerity of this man to suggest it was other than the Americans and their corrupt clients, the Chinese Nationalists, who did the fighting and won the war. Let us not, for heaven’s sake, make any mention of the 12 million to 20 million Chinese — there is no precise figure — who died in consequence of Imperial Japan’s aggressions.

No, nothing to honor in any of this. Between the S.C.O. and the festivities in Beijing it was all faintly demonic, a thinly veiled challenge to what the United States and the rest of the West insists is a “rules-based order.”

I keep a file labeled “Sentences to love in The New York Times.” From it: “It shows how Mr. Xi is trying to turn history, diplomacy and military might into tools for reshaping a global order that has been dominated by the United States.”

The mainstream reporting on the S.C.O. and the subsequent gathering in Beijing went on obsessively for days. You would think the Chinese were on the brink of starting another Pacific War and “invading” Taiwan—“invading” in quotation marks because a nation cannot invade territory that historically belongs to it.

As I read through the coverage I marveled at the wall-to-wall West-centricity of it. The Chinese, the Russians, the Indians, various others, even the North Koreans: They think of nothing and do nothing that does not arise from their all-consuming animosity toward the United States and altogether the West. So you read in the reporting of these events.

Then along came Donald Trump, who addressed Xi on his Truth Social platform with this, referencing the Russian and North Korean leaders as he watched the proceedings live: “Please give my warmest regards to Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un as you conspire against the United States of America.”

There is no beating the Trumpster when it comes to stating the case forthrightly. The mainstream press can strike the pose of objectivity all it likes, but Trump, the id of the late-phase imperium, comes right out and says it: The non–West is against us. Anti–American animosity is its sole motivation, its very raison d’être.

I write here not of our dissolute press, whose mission these past two dozen years — I take the events of September 11, 2001, as the point of departure — has been to prevent Americans from seeing and understanding the 21st century’s realities. Neither is the blunt instrument now lodged in the White House my topic.

No, the press and the president are merely exhibits, symptoms of a national failing that transcends either of these. This is the problem of America’s self-absorption, the pervasive narcissism that, it now becomes evident, is a primary cause of our troubled republic’s increasingly hostile relations with others and, so, its swift descent into isolation.

In Ovid’s Metamorphosis, Narcissus is a youth of transcendent beauty who spurns Echo, the nymph who loves him, and becomes infatuated with his own reflection in a pool of water. He thereafter takes to rejecting all admirers.

Narcissus is thus blind, but not only to others: He is also blind to himself. This fulfills the prophecy Tiresias made on his, Narcissus’s, birth: He will live long, the mythical seer said, “so long as he never knows himself.”

Narcissism is the open-and-shut condition of the elites who fashion and execute American foreign policy. They see only themselves when they look abroad at others. And they are utterly incapable of seeing themselves as they are or their country as it is.

It is dangerous to be America’s enemy, Henry Kissinger once remarked in an often-quoted comment, but it is fatal to be America’s friend. This is the United States as run by the narcissistic cliques who set the imperium’s course. Nothing and no one matters beyond their own power.

I think too much of Americans to assign this condition to them out of hand. No, it is the media’s task to impose this condition on Americans. Consider again how the press covered Tianjin and Beijing: We are encouraged in every sentence to see our reflections in those events, for they were all about us.

Read a few of these pieces carefully, I urge. You find correspondents in this or that bureau abroad who rarely quote Chinese or Russian or even European sources in support of the reporting. No, they call reliably conformist scholars or think tank denizens back in the States to tell them how to think about what is going on in China or Russia or wherever it may be.

See what I mean? Journalism this flaccid is a new one on me. If it is not American narcissism as it is in practice I do not know what else to call it.

Did you read anything in the American press about Xi’s proposal for a “Global Governance Initiative” to assist in the pursuit of a more just and equitable world order?

What about the Chinese leader’s announcement in Tianjin of a new S.C.O. development bank, grants of 2 billion renminbi, $280 million, to S.C.O. members, and an additional 10 billion renminbi, $1.4 billion, in loans?

Or his speech calling for the historical record of the Pacific War — corrupted precisely as the West cravenly erases the Soviet Union’s decisive role in defeating the Reich — to be corrected?

Let me help you out. No, no, and no. The policy cliques are indifferent to these things and you are meant not to see them, blindness to our world the preferred condition. The policy people in Washington have been captivated by their own reflections ever since they set out to achieve global dominance almost immediately after the 1945 victories.

And so long as American power was hegemonic this did not matter. Diplomacy, as Boutros Boutros–Ghali memorably remarked after the United States forced him as out as the U.N.’s sec-gen, is for the weaker nations; the strong have no need of it.

There is need of it now, to state the obvious. And we find America to be self-blinded, stumbling, uncomprehending, and altogether incapable in this, a century of swift and momentous change.

Washington’s prevalent narcissism renders proper statecraft more or less impossible, as there has been, just as Boutros–Ghali astutely observed, no need of it for most of the past eight decades. And we cannot put this down to Donald Trump alone: This has been less obviously but just as true of the administrations that preceded his.

At this point the late-phase imperium is more or less entirely dependent on force as its mode of expression in the community of nations.

Parenthetically, this is how I read the Trump regime’s stunning decision to rename the Defense Department the War Department, just as it was called until 1949, when it was judged necessary to veil the arriving era of America’s imperial aggressions.

Military force, increasingly vicious varieties of coercion, sanctions that amount to collective punishment, in the case of Palestinians the refusal of visas: It is all Washington can think of doing as it responds so defensibly to the 21st century. It will, of course, lead nowhere but to further isolation and decline.

At a press conference in Beijing last Tuesday, as the days of diplomacy and celebration drew to a close, a correspondent asked Vladimir Putin what he thought of Trump’s “Say hello as they conspire against us” remark on Truth Social. The Russian president’s reply was a model of statesmanship and clear thinking:

“The president of the United States is not devoid of humor — everything is clear, everyone knows it well….

I can tell you, and I hope he will hear it as well: It may seem strange, but during these four days of negotiations, both informal and formal, no one has ever expressed any negative opinions about the current American administration….

The activities of the SCO and those of our partners, including our strategic partners, are not aimed at fighting anyone, but rather at finding the best ways to develop ourselves, our countries, our peoples, and our economies.”

It is a point that cannot be made too often, so commonly is it missed. The emergence of the non–West as a bloc of nations has not a shred of anti–Americanism in it. These nations would indeed welcome the United States, with its capital, its technologies, and so on, to participate fulsomely in building the new world order to which they are dedicated.

Only hegemons are unwelcome in this decidedly ecumenical undertaking. Only narcissists. Whether or not America can at last stop staring at its own reflection to see the world around it will determine its fate in our evolving century.

Yielding to external coercion will only make Mexico more passive: Global Times editorial

By Global Times Published: Sep 13, 2025

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202509/1343385.shtml

The Mexican government has recently submitted a legislative proposal to Congress, seeking to impose tariffs of up to 50 percent on a wide range of imports from countries that do not have a free trade agreement with Mexico. Statistics show that the measure covers 19 sectors and 1,463 tariff fractions, accounting for about 8.6 percent of Mexico's total imports. If enacted, this tariff adjustment would raise Mexico's average tariff rate to 33.8 percent - more than double the current level. The move has drawn considerable international attention.

It is clear to any keen observer that the real driver behind Mexico's latest tariff adjustment is the heavy political pressure and geopolitical coercion coming from Washington. Many international media outlets have noted that the proposal was announced at a time when the US is exerting enormous pressure on Mexico. By leveraging the upcoming review of the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) next year, Washington has thrust Mexico into the eye of the storm, attempting to force the Mexican government to sacrifice its own interests in order to serve US geopolitical strategies.

For an economy heavily dependent on foreign investment and exports, protectionism is not a shield, but the beginning of a domino effect. Mexico's growth has long relied on the global division of labor in supply chains, especially foreign investment in manufacturing and access to export markets. Yet today, the Mexican government's repeated resort to tariffs in response to external pressure sends a signal of regulatory volatility and policy uncertainty. This undermines Mexico's reputation as a "reliable production base" and weakens investor expectations in the long-term allocation of capital, technology, and high-end capacity. Should investment shift toward more open and stable Latin American neighbors, Mexico would not only see its industrial foundation eroded, but also risk falling into passivity and marginalization in regional competition.

Ultimately, it is ordinary Mexicans who will pay the price of high tariffs. When essential consumer goods such as automobiles, home appliances, clothing, and footwear are hit with hefty duties, the costs will inevitably pass on to buyers, fueling broad-based price increases and inflation. Mexico's own business community has already warned that raising tariffs will "generate inflationary pressures in Mexico." 

Tariff-raising policies may offer temporary relief to certain industries in the short term, but their long-term effect is to increase manufacturing costs, weaken the competitiveness of small and medium-sized enterprises, and impact overall social welfare. 

Moreover, foreign investment and production cooperation in Mexico have long helped create jobs locally and promote industrial upgrading. If Mexico chooses to set up trade barriers, it will only cut off this valuable momentum for development. This tariff-raising move by Mexico, if implemented, will be a typical case of sacrificing the economy for political purposes, which is regrettable.

At present, the US government continues to instrumentalize economic and trade issues, brandishing the "tariff stick" without justification, intimidating and threatening other countries, and seriously distorting global trade development. 

As a member of the World Trade Organization, Mexico is supposed to abide by the principles of free trade and non-discrimination. 

Now, however, by drastically raising tariffs specifically against countries without free trade agreements, Mexico is in effect abandoning the commitment to an "open economy" before the international community and is compelled to cater to the backward tide of protectionism.

Pursuing a beggar-thy-neighbor policy will not yield "bargaining chips"; instead, it will only cement Mexico's own passive position. 

"Appeasing the US" brings no benefit to Mexico itself. It makes Mexico appear "susceptible to coercion," raises doubts about the independence of its policymaking, and encourages the pressuring side to demand even greater concessions. At the same time, it risks provoking doubts from harmed businesses and consumers and shrinking the country's own development space. It may also risks losing support from the international community, eroding Mexico's ability to "counter unilateralism with rules," and damaging the ecosystem of multilateral cooperation.

"China hopes Mexico will exercise caution and think twice." This deserves serious reflection from the Mexican side. 

When formulating major policies that concern the national economy and people's livelihoods, a country must remain clear-headed and rational, making decisions independently. Industrial upgrading relies on technological innovation, institutional frameworks, and market dynamism, not on artificially blocking competition. In response to related questions, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum stated that "we don't want a conflict" with the countries on which Mexico plans to increase tariffs.

It is hoped that Mexico will return to the correct path of openness and cooperation, uphold multilateralism and the principles of free trade, and make policy decisions based on its long-term national interests rather than acting as a vanguard for any other country. Only in this way can Mexico earn global respect and promote economic prosperity and sustainable development.

Trump response to Israel’s Qatar attack undermines US credibility: Analysts

Experts say Trump’s failure to rein in Israel raises questions over the US role as a military partner in the Gulf region.

By Ali Harb

Published On 11 Sep 202511 Sep 2025

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/11/trump-response-to-israels-qatar-attack-undermines-us-credibility-analysts

Washington, DC – The Israeli attack against Hamas leaders in Qatar has prompted familiar headlines in the United States about the president being unhappy with Israel.

Over the past two years, as the US has provided Israel with billions of dollars to help fund the war on Gaza, there have been numerous stories about the White House – under both Joe Biden and Donald Trump – being frustrated with Israeli conduct.

But the attack on a US partner that works closely with Washington on various issues and hosts one of the largest US military bases in the Middle East was a major escalation.

Still, Trump’s response has so far been muted. On social media, he said he felt “very badly” about the location of the attacks and later told reporters he was “not thrilled” by Israel’s actions.

It took the White House hours to address the assassination attempt on Tuesday, and when it did, it stopped short of condemning the attack. “Unilaterally bombing inside Qatar, a sovereign nation and close ally, does not advance Israel or America’s goals,” White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said. “However, eliminating Hamas, who have profited off the misery of those living in Gaza, is a worthy goal.”

Experts say Trump’s failure to take a firmer position will likely further erode Washington’s credibility in the region and raise questions about the broader ties between the US and the Gulf.

“The response was contradictory, did not make sense, lacked in diplomacy and it lacked in substance,” said Khalil Jahshan, the executive director of the Arab Center Washington DC. “It is not befitting a superpower.”

Trump later reiterated Leavitt’s statement, saying he promised Qatar’s emir that such an attack would not happen again.

But less than 24 hours later, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his envoy to the US both appeared to threaten Qatar with further attacks.

As of Wednesday afternoon, the State Department still has not commented on the attack, despite the status of Qatar as a major non-Nato ally of the US.

Red lines crossed

The White House initially said the US informed Qatar of the attack before it happened, but after Doha quickly denied the claim, Trump later acknowledged that by the time his envoy Steve Witkoff spoke to Qatari officials, it was “too late”.

The assassination attempt failed to kill Hamas’s top leaders but killed six people, including a Qatari security officer.

Doha described the Israeli attack as “treacherous”, noting that the Hamas leaders who were targeted were discussing Trump’s own ceasefire proposal, and their meeting was not a secret.

Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, fellow for the Middle East at the Baker Institute, said the Israeli attacks cast doubt over the US role as a broker in the region, noting that Washington was similarly negotiating with Tehran when Israel attacked Iran in June.

“Certainly, the US as a state that can negotiate in good faith is being called into question,” he told Al Jazeera.

Coates Ulrichsen stressed the significance of the Israeli attacks, which he said crossed “strong red lines” that will be difficult to uncross.

He said the Israeli attacks upended the assumption that Gulf countries are beyond Israel’s military reach due to their defence partnerships with the US.

Coates Ulrichsen drew parallels between the Israeli assassination attempt in Doha and the 2019 drone attacks on Saudi oil facilities, which Riyadh blamed on Iran – a charge Tehran denied.

Trump, then during his first term, did not come to Saudi Arabia’s help after that attack, prompting several Gulf states to de-escalate tensions with Iran, culminating in the restoration of diplomatic relations between Riyadh and Tehran in 2023, brokered by China.

“We have to wait and see what the consequences of this attack will be, but they could be just as consequential potentially if they contribute to the perception in the Gulf that the US security umbrella and deterrence is in question,” Coates Ulrichsen said.

Trump visited the Gulf region in May, and heaped praise on Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, as he said he secured trillions of dollars in investments from the three countries.

During the visit, Trump rebuked US military interventions and portrayed himself as a peace president.

The Doha attack, however, and the US response to it “contradict” Trump’s promises to the region, Jahshan said.

“What Trump put in jeopardy is whatever is remaining – which is not much, by the way – of US credibility,” Jahshan told Al Jazeera.

Netanyahu lauds Trump

Despite the official line that the US is irked by the attack on Doha, Netanyahu joked about the strikes during a ceremony at the US embassy in Israel shortly after they took place.

He said he had planned to be at the event earlier but was “otherwise engaged”, referring to overseeing the air attacks in Qatar.

On Thursday, Netanyahu appeared for a photo-op with US Ambassador Mike Huckabee to name a beach promenade in a coastal town in Israel after Trump.

The Israeli prime minister also appeared to praise Trump’s call for ethnically cleansing Gaza and turning it into the Riviera of the Middle East.

“President Trump spoke to me several times about beachfront property. He said to me, you have wonderful beachside properties here. He’s talking about one that’s a bit to the south here, in Gaza,” he said, according to his office.

He later renewed his threat to target Hamas leaders in Qatar.

“I say to Qatar and all nations who harbour terrorists, you either expel them or you bring them to justice – because if you don’t, we will,” he said.

Who knew what when?

Washington has failed to reveal when or how exactly it knew the attacks were happening. Trump said his administration was notified by the military, suggesting he did not pre-approve the attacks.

But Jahshan said it would not have been possible politically or militarily for Israel to carry out the attack without a US green light.

The US military has military assets, radars and air defences across the Middle East. And both Israel and Qatar are part of the US military’s Central Command area of responsibility.

Jahshan noted that the building struck by Israel is less than 20 miles (32km) away from the largest US airbase in the region – Al Udeid in Qatar.

“They must have cleared it with the US. Netanyahu is aggressive, but he is not that stupid,” he told Al Jazeera.

For his part, Coates Ulrichsen highlighted that the public reporting indicates that the US did not give prior blessings to the attacks, but he said the issue will likely be a key point of discussion between Washington and the Gulf.

“Behind the scenes, conversations today between Gulf leaders and US counterparts will be really honing in on who knew what and when, and what precisely was the chain of events,” he said.

“Were there to be any suggestion that the US either had full knowledge of Israel’s plans or somehow greenlit them, that would be incredibly damaging to US-Gulf security and defence and political relations.”

‘Opportunity for peace’?

Despite the global outcry, Trump said the attack on Doha could serve as an “opportunity for PEACE”. And Jahshan said he did not disagree.

He said any escalation can potentially be an off-ramp to end conflict, but he stressed that the Trump administration does not appear to be ready, or even capable, of engaging in the necessary diplomacy to use the Doha attacks to end the war on Gaza.

The problem, he said, is the “asymmetrical” nature of the US-Israel relationship, where Washington remains committed to unconditional support for Israel no matter what it does.

“The US has hundreds of allies around the world, but none has this predicament where the national interest of the client state supersedes the national interest of the superpower,” Jahshan told Al Jazeera.

Trump himself had said that attacking Qatar does not serve US interests.

Matt Duss, executive vice president at the Center for International Policy, underscored that the US continues to provide Israel with arms to conduct its wars across the entire region.

“Striking a major non-NATO US ally like this, in the midst of negotiations that are being supported and brokered by the United States, against officials who are being hosted in Qatar originally at the request of the United States, is a level beyond anything even I expected,” Duss told Al Jazeera in a TV interview.

“There is, of course, a route to dealing with this for Donald Trump, just as there was a route to dealing with this for Joe Biden if they chose it, and that is to cut off the US supply of weapons. Israel cannot continue to prosecute this war without a steady supply of US weapons.”