The Times of Israel is liveblogging Sunday’s events as they unfold.
Netanyahu’s return flight to Israel delayed by at least 30 minutes due to ice on wings
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s flight back to Israel has been delayed by at least half an hour because of ice on the plane’s wings.
Crews are currently working to clear the wings.
Netanyahu hails Trump’s Gaza plan, says only those who renounce terror will be allowed to return
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calls US President Donald Trump’s plan to relocate Palestinians from Gaza the “first fresh idea in years.”
“It has the potential to change everything in Gaza,” says Netanyahu, speaking to Fox News’ Mark Levin in a pre-recorded interview.
It is the third interview granted to a friendly media outlet during the six-day trip to Washington, DC, while avoiding speaking to almost all accompanying Israeli journalists.
“Not forcible eviction,” says Netanyahu, explaining the plan Trump presented last week.
“Not ethnic cleansing. Getting out from what all these countries and all these do-gooders say is an open-air prison. Why do you want to keep them in prison?”
Netanyahu says that Gazans will eventually be able to return home, something Trump initially said would not happen.
“Give them an option to relocate temporarily while we rebuild the place physically and while we also rebuild it in terms of radicalization. You want to come back? You have to disavow terrorism, but you can come back.”
The main challenge, says Netanyahu, is where to send the Gazans.
He calls it a “novel approach, and the correct approach… a very very good, new approach.”
Netanyahu denies that US special envoy Steve Witkoff “muscled” him into the ongoing hostage release deal with Hamas: “We had a real, not only friendly, but eye-to-eye conversation, and what happened was, I accepted this deal months ago. Hamas refused the deal.”
The prime minister says he appreciated the “initial support” from Joe Biden’s administration early in the war.
But, according to Netanyahu, as pressure built on Biden to change his position on Israel, the White House said that if Israel goes into Rafah, “we’ll stop the weapons.”
According to the premier, some in his cabinet wanted to end the war in Gaza given the US opposition.
“If we become a vassal state, we will not survive,” he warns.
Netanyahu and his wife board Wing of Zion ahead of return flight from US to Israel
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu boards the Wing of Zion plane ahead of his return flight from Washington, DC, to Ben Gurion Airport.
His wife Sara joins him, after spending over two months in the US while her husband underwent prostate removal surgery.
Netanyahu set to depart US, heading back to Israel after a week
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to take off from Andrews Air Force Base near Washington, DC, at around 10 p.m. local time (5 a.m. Israel time).
He will be heading back to Israel after a week in the United States.
Netanyahu’s office releases a photo of a Friday night situational assessment ahead of the release of three hostages.
Trump revokes security clearances for Blinken, other top Biden administration officials
US President Donald Trump has revoked security clearances for Antony Blinken, the former secretary of state, and Jake Sullivan, the former national security adviser, White House officials say.
The move comes a day after Trump said he had revoked the security clearance for his predecessor Joe Biden, stopping his access to daily intelligence briefings.
Trump also revoked security clearances for Biden’s Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, who helped coordinate the Department of Justice’s response to the January 6, 2021, attacks on the US Capitol, the officials say.
He also removed the clearances of the New York Attorney General Letitia James and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg who led cases against Trump, the officials say.
British PM ‘dismayed’ at freed hostage Eli Sharabi’s condition, says he’s met his UK relatives
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer says he’s relieved at today’s release from Hamas captivity of Eli Sharabi, but “dismayed to see his frail condition and the circumstances of his release.”
Sharabi was freed Saturday morning after 491 days in captivity in Gaza, looking visibly emaciated and forced to answer questions on a Hamas stage while terror operatives with guns surround him.
Sharabi’s British-Israeli wife Lianne and teenage daughters Noiya and Yahel were murdered in Hamas’s October 7, 2023, onslaught. He didn’t know they were dead until after his release. Eli’s brother Yossi was also taken hostage and later killed.
Starmer says he has met Sharabi’s relatives, presumably his wife’s Wales-based parents and siblings, adding: “I appreciate the deep pain they have endured and my thoughts are with them.”
The UK leader says all hostages must go free after being “ripped away from their lives in the most brutal circumstances and held in appalling conditions.”
He urges the ongoing deal seen through all its phases alongside the “continued increase of aid into Gaza.”
My statement on the release of Eli Sharabi. pic.twitter.com/OuZ7qf8lJY
— Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) February 8, 2025
IDF set to withdraw from Netzarim Corridor in central Gaza, per ceasefire-hostage deal with Hamas
The IDF is set to withdraw overnight from its remaining positions in the Netzarim Corridor of central Gaza as part of the ceasefire-hostage deal with Hamas.
Israeli forces withdrew from their positions in the northern portion of the Netzarim Corridor last week, as Israel allowed displaced Gazans to return to the Strip’s north on foot via the coastal road and by vehicles on the Salah a-Din road.
The IDF maintained some posts on the eastern side of Salah a-Din road, closer to the border with Israel.
Per the outline of the agreement, on day 21 of the ceasefire, Israel will withdraw from the entire corridor that bisects the Strip and only maintain a presence in a buffer zone of up to around one kilometer inside Gaza.
Israeli forces are also still deployed to the Philadelphi Corridor, the Egypt-Gaza border area. Under the deal, Israel needs to complete its withdrawal from the Philadelphi Corridor on day 50 of the ceasefire.