International Glance
At the inaugural Board of Peace meeting in Washington on Feb. 19, 2026, Yakir Gabay laid out a 10-year plan to turn Gaza into a “Mediterranean Riviera” with 200 hotels and possibly artificial islands.
The proposal also includes schools, hospitals, factories, agriculture, rail lines, water and energy plants, tech hubs, sports facilities, plus a seaport and airport. He cited the need to clear 70 million tons of rubble and miles of tunnels, projecting “hundreds of thousands of jobs” under a “free economy” model backed by a Gaza sovereign fund.
All development, he said, depends on the complete disarmament of Hamas.
The Jerusalem Post has reported that within days of the Oct. 7 attacks, Gabay began drafting the reconstruction plan that now underpins the U.S. Board of Peace framework. Trump appointed him to the body on Jan. 17.
Gabay, 59, is known for close ties to Jared Kushner, Israeli media reported, and is the son of former Justice Ministry Director-General Meir Gabay. He previously led Bank Leumi’s underwriting arm and worked at the Israel Securities Authority. Later, he founded Aroundtown SA, a Frankfurt-listed real estate giant with a roughly $30 billion portfolio where he is currently Deputy Chairman of the Advisory Board.
A low-profile Israeli-Cypriot real estate billionaire began sketching Gaza’s future within days of Oct. 7.
$75M Russian Air Defenses Downed as Ukraine Strikes Multiple Russian Positions in Zaporizhzhia
The Unmanned Systems Forces (USF) destroyed three Russian Tor-M1 air defense systems, worth a total of $75 million, in the early hours of Friday, Feb. 20, according to USF chief Robert “Madyar” Brovdi.
“All three TORs are in the occupied part of the Zaporizhzhia region. The operation was carried out simultaneously by the Birds of the 1st Separate Center of the Unmanned Systems Forces,” Brovdi said, sharing on Telegram a video of the operation lasting more than 90 seconds.
Kyiv Post could not independently verify the video’s time and location.
Brovdi emphasized that systematically identifying and destroying components of enemy long-, medium-, and short-range air defense remains a USF priority.
“Overnight minus ~75 million dollars, but first of all - a strike on the near echelon of the worm air defense, which always causes significant trouble. Someday those costly scabies will end,” he wrote.
The Tor-M1 is a short-range air defense system capable of detecting and striking multiple targets simultaneously with a maximum range of 12 kilometers (7.5 miles), at an estimated cost of $25 million per unit.
US envoy Mike Huckabee says it would be ‘fine’ if Israel took all Middle East land
The US’s ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, has contended to the podcaster Tucker Carlson that Israel has a biblical right to take over the entire Middle East – or at least the lion’s share of it.
“It would be fine if they took it all,” Huckabee said to Carlson during an interview posted on Friday. The Trump administration appointee and former Arkansas governor discussed with Carlson interpretations of Old Testament scripture within the US Christian nationalist movement.
Carlson – who recently made disputed claims that he was detained at Tel Aviv airport in Israel – asked Huckabee about a biblical verse in which God promises Abraham that his descendants will receive land “from the wadi of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates – the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites, Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites, Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites”.
Carlson pointed out that this area in modern geography would include “like, basically the entire Middle East”.
“The Levant … Israel, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon – it’d also be big parts of Saudi Arabia and Iraq,” Carlson said.
Huckabee said: “I’m not sure it would go that far, but it would be a big piece of land.”
He continued: “Israel is a land that God gave, through Abraham, to a people that he chose. It was a people, a place and a purpose.”
In a thrilling comeback win, U.S. women take home Olympic hockey gold over Canada
With Olympic gold on the line, with just over two minutes to play in regulation of Thursday's final match, it was the U.S. women's hockey team's two biggest stars who kept their dream alive.
The 22-year-old phenom Laila Edwards, a Day 1 starter in her first career Olympic Games, launched a rocket toward the goal, where the 36-year-old captain of Team USA, Hilary Knight, tipped the puck into the net — sending Milan's Santagiulia Arena into roars and the gold medal match into overtime, where the Americans prevailed 2-1.
The equalizer by Knight, with an assist by Edwards and Megan Keller, represented the essence of this U.S. team — the energy of its young stars combined with the calm experience of its veteran leadership.
Then, just over four minutes into a thrilling, fast-paced overtime period, Keller was the hero, maneuvering the puck around Canadian defender Claire Thompson for the game-winner.
Settler activists, including far-right MK, illegally cross into Gaza; IDF troops called to scene
“We were privileged, with thanks to the blessed God, to enter the Gaza Strip, together with the Nachala movement and dozens of families, women, men, and children,” the Otzma Yehudit lawmaker writes on social media.
The activists from the ultra-nationalist Nachala settlement organization say they crossed the Gaza border with vehicles and planted trees in the area.
The IDF has not yet commented on the incident, but in previous similar cases has said that crossing the Gaza border “is dangerous and disrupts the activity of security forces in the area.”
Former Prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor Arrested
Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested Thursday by a local U.K. police force on suspicion of misconduct in public office, an extraordinary development as the former royal faces intense scrutiny over his ties to late sex predator Jeffrey Epstein.
He is the first senior member of the royal family to face arrest in nearly 380 years.
Thames Valley Police issued a statement announcing that they detained “a man in his sixties from Norfolk” The police statement did not name the former prince, but the report is consistent with Andrew’s alleged misconduct.
The agency had previously said it was evaluating a complaint that Andrew may have shared confidential information with Epstein.
After about 12 hours in the Aylsham Police Investigation Centre, a black Range Rover came to gather the former prince. The BBC reported that Andrew attempted to lie down in the back seat, but was not able to do so before he could be snapped by a photographer. were “carrying out searches at addresses in Berkshire and Norfolk.”re
‘Jordan is next’: West Bank annexation signals ‘silent transfer’
For decades, the “alternative homeland” – the notion that Jordan should become the Palestinian state – was dismissed in Amman’s diplomatic circles as a distant nightmare or a conspiracy theory.
Today, under the shadow of a far-right Israeli government and a devastating genocidal war in Gaza, that nightmare has become an operational reality.
The alarm in the Hashemite Kingdom reached a fever pitch on Sunday, following the Israeli cabinet’s approval of measures to register vast swaths of the occupied West Bank as “state land” under the Israeli Ministry of Justice. The move, described by Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich as a “settlement revolution”, effectively bypasses the military administration that has governed the occupied territory since 1967, treating it instead as sovereign Israeli soil.
For Jordan, this bureaucratic annexation is the final signal that the status quo is dead. With the Israeli military’s “Iron Wall” operation crushing refugee camps in Jenin and Tulkarem, Jordan’s political and military establishment is no longer asking if a forced transfer is coming, but how to stop it.
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