Trump has created a monster: Gaza Board of Peace – Not a ceasefire Day 101

Trump has created a monster: Gaza Board of Peace – Not a ceasefire Day 101

Compilation of news reports – IAK staff

(While a “ceasefire” is ostensibly in place, Israel has continued its assault on Gaza without interruption. If Americans Knew considers the war to be ongoing, and in its 828th day.)

At least one Palestinian was killed, and another succumbed to earlier injuries, on Sunday in Gaza.

Since the “ceasefire” began on October 11, Israel has killed at least 465 Palestinians. At least 1,287 have been injured. Death toll figures are tentative. 

At least 25 Palestinians in Gaza have died due to the extreme cold, including 21 children, since the start of Israel’s genocidal war in October 2023. At least 8 Palestinian children have died of extreme cold this winter.

Israel has so far violated the 11 October ceasefire deal in Gaza at least 1,193 times (as of Jan. 9, 2026). More statistics below.

A family member carries 65-year-old Palestinian Haji Nabila Halawa, who lost one leg and was seriously injured in the other after the Israeli attack on her home, as she is unable to move on her own in Gaza City, Gaza on January 12, 2026.
A family member carries 65-year-old Palestinian Haji Nabila Halawa, who lost one leg and was seriously injured in the other after the Israeli attack on her home, as she is unable to move on her own in Gaza City, Gaza on January 12, 2026. (Khames Alrefi – Anadolu Agency)

GAZA NEWS & HEADLINES:

(For some basic info on the Palestine-Israel conflict, go here. For more critical context, skim thisthis, and this. To read about a remarkable but underreported, 20-month-long peaceful protest in Gaza against Israel, go here.

Israeli ceasefire violations on Sunday – all in a day’s genocide

The following are some of the violations on Sunday, typical of Israel’s actions during the “ceasefire.” Israel has so far violated the 11 October ceasefire deal in Gaza at least 1,193 times (as of Jan. 9, 2026). More statistics below.

  • Several injured people were brought to Al-Maamadani Hospital after a suicide drone targeted a group of civilians at the car market east of Gaza City.
  • Two injuries, including a child, from Israeli gunfire in the Mawasi area of Khan Younis.
  • Injuries from Israeli drone fire in the Zaitoun neighborhood, southeast of Gaza City.
  • Israeli military vehicles advancing around Dar al-Arqam School, east of Salah al-Din Street, in eastern Gaza City.
  • Israeli artillery shelling east of Khan Younis.
  • Israeli military vehicles firing intensively around Al-Batsh Cemetery, east of Gaza City.
  • Israeli military vehicles firing intensively in the Shuja’iya neighborhood, east of Gaza City.
  • Israeli military vehicles firing intensively in Beit Lahia, north of the Gaza Strip.
  • Israeli artillery targeting east of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza.

+++

‘When will Baba come back?’ Gaza’s widows and orphans struggle to survive

The suffering of Palestinian women and children widowed and orphaned by Israel’s genocide is exacerbated by the destruction of traditional support systems.

+++
 

Israel releases seven more Palestinian prisoners in Gaza

According to Palestinian data, more than 9,300 Palestinians are currently held in Israeli prisons, including at least 3,385 held in administrative detention without charge or trial.

+++

Gaza hospitals struggle to maintain medical services amid restricted access

Rahaf, 13, walks by her tent near Gaza City
Rahaf, 13, walks by her tent near Gaza City (Abdelhakim Abu Riash/Al Jazeera)

GAZA “BOARD OF PEACE” NEWS & HEADLINES:

Trump demands $1bn fee from states joining Gaza ‘Board of Peace’: Report

US President Donald Trump has demanded that countries seeking to join his ‘Board of Peace’ for Gaza must pay $1 billion, according to reports in Hebrew and western media. 

“Each Member State shall serve a term of no more than three years from this Charter’s entry into force, subject to renewal by the Chairman (Trump),” says the text of the board’s charter, obtained by Times of Israel

“The three-year membership term shall not apply to Member States that contribute more than USD $1,000,000,000 in cash funds to the Board of Peace within the first year of the Charter’s entry into force,” it added (continue reading here).

RELATED: Tony Blair distances himself from $1bn fee for Trump-led Peace Board membership

+++

Beneath the Bombast, Trump’s Cease-fire Plan in Gaza Is on the Rocks

If neither Hamas nor Netanyahu want the Gaza cease-fire, why would grand announcements and vague plans, against the backdrop of the immense geopolitical chaos wrought by Trump, change anything on the ground?

+++

Dozens of leaders must decide whether to participate in destroying the old world and subjugating the new world to Trump. Those invited can either take it or leave it. Netanyahu, still recoiling from the bitter surprise, is left to wave from afar.

Trump with Netanyahu before departing Israel in October.
Trump with Netanyahu before departing Israel in October. ( Photo: Chip Somodevilla)

+++

Trump Invites Putin to Board of Peace, EU States to Decline Invitation, Diplomats Say

The establishment of the board, to which only some European countries have been invited so far, is not only directed against the UN but also against the European Union, one diplomat told Haaretz. Putin is also unlikely to join, another diplomat said.

+++

Trump appoints Blair, Rubio, Kushner as Gaza ‘Board of Peace’ chairs

The US president invited the Egyptian and Turkish presidents to join the so-called ‘peace council,’ while excluding any Palestinian political figures.

+++

Who Is Yakir Gabay, the Israeli Billionaire Named to Trump’s Gaza Executive Council?

From building a €30 billion real estate empire in Europe to advising Washington, the Israeli tycoon joins a new U.S.-led council shaping Gaza’s postwar future.

+++

‘Gaza Is Ours’: Smotrich Calls to Cancel Trump’s Board of Peace, Israel to Resettle Gaza

Speaking at a ceremony to inaugurate a new settlement in the northern West Bank, the far-right minister called to dismantle the U.S.-led Civil-Military Coordinating Center in southern Israel late last year, ‘to remove hostile countries such as Egypt and Britain.’

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich shakes the hand of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the Prime Minister's office in Jerusalem, Jan. 25, 2023.
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich shakes the hand of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the Prime Minister’s office in Jerusalem, Jan. 25, 2023. (photo)

OCCUPIED WEST BANK/EAST JERUSALEM NEWS & HEADLINES:

(Every day, Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem endure dozens of incidents like the ones below, at the hands of Israeli soldiers and/or settlers. For background on the West Bank, read this and thisFor information on the significance of Israeli settlers in the West Bank, read this and this.)

Freed but not free: Ex-Palestinian prisoners face Israeli surveillance and harassment

After 15 years in an Israeli prison, Salama Qatawi’s big day had finally arrived. However, on the morning of his wedding, Israeli forces raided his home in the occupied West Bank town of Birzeit and re-arrested him.

He was released 14 hours later, just before the ceremony was due to begin. Outside the wedding hall, soldiers set up a military checkpoint, delaying arriving guests.

Such harassment has become routine for Qatawi since his release in February, as part of the second phase of a prisoner exchange agreement with Hamas. Over the past year, Israeli forces have raided his home more than 15 times and repeatedly summoned him for questioning (continue reading here).

+++

‘Enormous pain in my heart’: Palestinian evictions mount in East Jerusalem

Legal appeals by Palestinians facing largest-scale evictions in occupied East Jerusalem since 1967 were denied in the new year.

+++

Palestinian Workers Enter Second Month With No Salaries

Israeli sanctions on the Palestinian Authority, which governs the 5 million Palestinians in the West Bank and the 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza, have prevented the Authority from paying nearly 200,000 workers their salaries for over a month. Hundreds of thousands of pensioners have also been deprived of their elder security payments.

The Israeli government is required by law to pass on to the Palestinian Authority all tax revenues and other financial payments collected by Israeli that are due to the Palestinians – and this provides the livelihood for hundreds of thousands of municipal employees and retirees – including teachers, electrical and water engineers and inspectors, healthcare workers and other local government employees (continue reading here).

+++

Israeli Paramilitaries Ramp Up Attacks in West Bank Sunday 

West Bank Invasions and Abductions Intensify

Israeli forces detain two Palestinians and besiege a mosque during a raid in Nablus, West Bank on January 11, 2026.
Israeli forces detain two Palestinians and besiege a mosque during a raid in Nablus, West Bank on January 11, 2026. (Issam Rimawi – Anadolu Agency)

ISRAEL NEWS & HEADLINES:

(Israel is a tiny country, about the size of New Jersey, with a population smaller than the US state of Georgia – about 10 million (of which about 20 percent are Palestinians), yet it is in the news constantly. As has been demonstrated again and again, however, mainstream media rarely covers Israel accurately. IAK passes along only factual reporting.)

Far-right members of Israel’s governing coalition on Sunday rejected a US-backed plan for postwar governance in Gaza, criticizing their prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for failing to annex the Palestinian territory and establish new Israeli settlements in the territory.

After the announcement of the White House’s pick of world leaders who will join the so-called Gaza “board of peace”, which includes representatives of Turkey and Qatar, both of which have been critical of Israel’s war in the strip, Israeli far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, described Netanyahu’s “unwillingness to take responsibility for Gaza” as “the original sin”.

According to Smotrich, himself a settler in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the Israeli prime minister should instead “establish a military government there, to encourage immigration [of Palestinians] and settlement [of Israelis], and in this way to ensure Israel’s security for many years” (continue reading here).

*NOTE: Forced population transfer is a crime against humanity, and a form of ethnic cleansing. If world leaders truly want to offer Gazans a good life outside Gaza, the just solution would be to return them to their homes in historic Palestine.

Bezalel Smotrich, Israeli far-right lawmaker and leader of the Religious Zionism party, speaks during a rally with supporters, Sderot, Israel, Oct. 26, 2022
Bezalel Smotrich, Israeli far-right lawmaker and leader of the Religious Zionism party, speaks during a rally with supporters, Sderot, Israel, Oct. 26, 2022 (photo)

NEWS & HEADLINES FROM ISRAELI MEDIA:

(You can learn a lot about a country from its headlines. Get a glimpse inside this country that is rife with turmoil and contradictions that receives $63 million a day from America.)

Trump Is Being Played. He Needs to Prepare for the Day After Netanyahu

Netanyahu has perfected his manipulations of U.S. presidents over decades, and he is using it on this president, too. If Trump seeks an Israeli partner aligned more closely with his positions on Gaza and the West Bank, then he should invest in Israel’s opposition, not its extremists.

+++

What Is Happening to Mothers and Babies in Gaza Should Leave Us Deeply, Collectively Ashamed

As maternal mortality surges in post-war Gaza, and newborns face cold, infection and malnutrition, pregnancy and childbirth are daily fights for survival. Women and their babies, universally noncombatants, are suffering disproportionately – and serve as a measure of our moral failure.

Relatives mourn for Palestinians, including children, who were killed when Israeli forces targeted a tent sheltering displaced people in the Nasr neighborhood in Gaza on August 30, 2025.
Relatives mourn for Palestinians, including children, who were killed when Israeli forces targeted a tent sheltering displaced people in the Nasr neighborhood in Gaza on August 30, 2025. (Abdalhkem Abu Riash – Anadolu Agency)

OTHER NEWS & HEADLINES:

Judicial review launched against UK National Health Service for adopting ‘weaponized’ anti-Semitism definition

The British civil liberties organization Right to Protest Limited has initiated a judicial review against NHS England for its formal adoption of the controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of anti‑Semitism, arguing that the policy unlawfully curtails freedom of expression and shields certain political viewpoints from legitimate criticism.

The definition is part of its anti‑harassment framework.

Kenneth Stern, the American attorney and scholar who took the lead in drafting the IHRA definition in 2005, has repeatedly warned that the framework is being misused. Warning that the IHRA has been “weaponized”, Stern stated that the definition was originally designed simply to help European data‑collectors compare reports of anti‑Jewish hostility across borders and time, not to serve as a policy enforcement tool or legal instrument (continue reading here).

+++

‘We consider Trump a criminal’: Khamenei


ICYMI, A SELECTION OF YESTERDAY’S HEADLINES:

Israeli Soldiers Kill 14-year-old Palestinian, Say He Ran Towards Troops Holding a Stone

Israeli settlers* raid West Bank village, set fire to property

(Read yesterday’s daily update here.)

Palestinians gather to pray over the small body of an infant who died as a result of severe cold weather in Deir al Balah, Gaza on January 13, 2026.
Palestinians gather to pray over the small body of an infant who died as a result of severe cold weather in Deir al Balah, Gaza on January 13, 2026. (Stringer – Anadolu Agency)

STATISTICS OCTOBER 7, 2023 – JANUARY 18, 2026*:

  • At least 72,657 Palestinians killed, 182,365 injured – including:
  • At least 71,550 killed in Gaza (~22,000 children, 33,000 women and girls)
  • At least 1,107 killed in the West Bank (~230 children)
  • At least 171,365 injured in Gaza
  • About 11,000 injured in the West Bank

*NOTE: Thousands of those killed in Gaza have yet to be identified, and an estimated 10,000 more are still buried under rubble. Additionally, the numbers of injured and starved are very conservative estimatesOnly the dead who are brought to hospitals are included in the official fatality count.

Reported Israeli death toll from October 7, 2023 – January 18, 2026: ~1,661 – including ~1,139** on October 7, 2023 (~36 children), 471 military forces since the ground invasion began in Gaza, about 52 military and civilians (by one count, there have been 59 victims) in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel. 

By one count, Israeli attacks have killed approximately 275 Palestinian journalists and media workers; Palestinians have killed 4 Israeli journalists (other groups have tallied between 215 and 328 Palestinian journalists killed – depending on the criteria used).

**NOTE: It is unknown at this time how many of the deaths and injuries of Israelis on October 7 were caused by Israeli soldiers.

Hover over each bar for exact numbers. Source: IsraelPalestineTimeline.org

Enter your email address below to receive our latest articles right in your inbox.