The Times of Israel liveblogged Wednesday’s events as they happened.

Hamas spokesperson Hazem Qassem welcomes what he views as a retreat by US President Donald Trump from his stance on relocating Gazans, urging him to refrain from aligning with the vision of the “extreme Zionist right.”

Earlier today, Trump said “nobody is expelling anyone from Gaza” after a reporter referred to his plan to take over the Strip as an “expulsion” initiative.

When Trump introduced his vision early last month, he said all of Gaza’s residents would be permanently relocated to other countries.

When pressed as to whether he would relocate Palestinians by force, Trump insisted that no people in Gaza actually want to remain there.

Until this afternoon, though, he had never specifically ruled out the notion of expulsion.

China, Iran and Russia have conducted joint naval drills in the Middle East, offering a show of force in a region still uneasy over Tehran’s rapidly expanding nuclear program and as Yemen’s Houthi rebels threaten new attacks on ships.

The joint drills, called the Maritime Security Belt 2025, took place in the Gulf of Oman near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of all crude oil traded worldwide passes. The area around the strait in the past has seen Iran seize commercial ships and launch suspected attacks in the time since President Donald Trump first unilaterally withdrew America from Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers.

The drill marked the fifth year the three countries took part in the drills.

This year’s drill likely sparked a warning late Monday from the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center, which said there was GPS interference in the strait, with disruptions lasting for several hours and forcing crews to rely on backup navigation methods.

“This was likely GPS jamming to reduce the targeting capability of drones and missiles,” writes Shaun Robertson, an intelligence analyst at the EOS Risk Group. “However, electronic navigation system interference has been reported in this region previously during periods of increased tension and military exercises.”

Major trade partners swiftly hit back at President Donald Trump’s increased tariffs on aluminum and steel imports, imposing stiff new taxes on US products from textiles and water heaters to beef and bourbon.

Canada, the largest supplier of steel and aluminum to the US, says it will place 25% reciprocal tariffs on steel products and also raise taxes on a host of items: tools, computers and servers, display monitors, sports equipment and cast-iron products.

Across the Atlantic, the European Union will raise tariffs on American beef, poultry, bourbon, motorcycles, peanut butter and jeans.

Combined, the new tariffs will cost companies billions of dollars, and further escalate the uncertainty in two of the world’s major trade partnerships. Companies will either take the losses and earn fewer profits, or, more likely, pass costs along to consumers in the form of higher prices.

Prices will go up, in Europe and the United States, and jobs are at stake, says European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

“We deeply regret this measure. Tariffs are taxes. They are bad for business, and even worse for consumers,” von der Leyen says.

The EU duties aim for pressure points in the US while minimizing additional damage to Europe. EU officials have made clear that the tariffs — taxes on imports — are aimed at products made in Republican-held states, such as beef and poultry from Kansas and Nebraska and wood products from Alabama and Georgia. The tariffs will also hit blue states such as Illinois, the No. 1 US producer of soybeans, which are also on the list.

Spirits producers have become collateral damage in the dispute over steel and aluminum. The EU move “is deeply disappointing and will severely undercut the successful efforts to rebuild US spirits exports in EU countries,” said Chris Swonger, head of the Distilled Spirits Council. The EU is a major destination for US whiskey, with exports surging 60% in the past three years after an earlier set of tariffs was suspended.

Acting on decades of Republican ambitions, the Trump administration is dramatically scaling back the federal education department, including its civil rights office — which has gone into high gear addressing antisemitism allegations at colleges and public schools.

Staffing at the Office of Civil Rights, which handles complaints filed under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, is among the casualties of the administration’s mass firings. According to Chalkbeat, an education news site, half of the 12 regional civil rights offices are being eliminated. The New York Times reports that only “a skeleton crew” remains in major offices in New York City, Boston and San Francisco.

The Office of Civil Rights handles discrimination claims against schools and has been a central source of recourse for Jewish and pro-Israel students who believed their rights were infringed upon by pro-Palestinian campus protests since October 7, 2023.

The office has opened dozens of Israel-related civil rights investigations since then, including several since President Donald Trump’s inauguration, amid vows by both the Biden and Trump administrations to protect Jewish students on campus.

Just this week, the office sent letters to 60 colleges and universities warning them that they could face consequences if they did not fulfill their responsibility to protect Jewish students.

A US judge has extended his order blocking federal authorities from deporting a detained former Columbia University student, in a case that has become a flashpoint of the Trump administration’s pledge to deport some pro-Palestinian college activists.

US District Judge Jesse Furman had temporarily blocked Mahmoud Khalil’s deportation earlier this week, and extended the prohibition on Wednesday in a written order following a hearing in Manhattan federal court to allow himself more time to consider whether the arrest was unconstitutional.

Even before Furman blocked it, there was no indication Khalil’s deportation was imminent. Khalil has the right to plead his case to avoid deportation before a separate judge in immigration court, a potentially lengthy process.

Hundreds of ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students from a seminary that receives tens of millions of shekels annually in state funds were filmed last night gleefully singing their refusal to enlist in the Israeli army of the “infidels.”

The Ateret Shlomo students were attending the wedding of a fellow student in the Ma’ale Adumim settlement and had filled bleachers outside the hall afterward to sing.

Singer Arale Samet led the crowd in a raucous rendition of a famous Toldos Aaron song, but changed the words to say, “We don’t believe in the government of infidels and we won’t show up to their (army) recruitment offices.”

Hundreds in the crowd can be seen joining Samet in belting out the adapted line in a clip that quickly went viral, sparking uproar across the political spectrum.

The IDF has launched a manhunt after an Israeli civilian was shot and moderately wounded near the West Bank settlement of Ariel.

According to a military source, it is unclear where exactly the shooting took place. The victim reached Ariel’s industrial park after coming under fire, where he met up with security forces and medics.

Troops are blocking roads and using aerial surveillance amid the searches for the assailant, the source says.

US envoy Steve Witkoff is going to Moscow this week for talks on a Ukraine ceasefire, the White House says, after US President Donald Trump said negotiators were headed to Russia.

“Mr. Witkoff is traveling to Moscow later this week,” Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt tells reporters, referring to the former property developer who has become a key conduit for talks with Russia.

A group of around 100 senior figures from Syria’s Druze are expected to visit the Israeli Golan Heights on Friday, members of the community say, in a further sign of Israel’s support for the minority group.

The group is expected to meet Sheikh Mowafaq Tarif, spiritual leader of the Druze community in Israel, as well as other members of the community and to visit a shrine.

There is no immediate confirmation of the visit from the Israeli Foreign Ministry.

The Druze, an Arab minority present in Syria, Israel and Lebanon, practice a faith that originated in Islam but which has a distinct identity.

In Israel, many Druze serve in the military and police, including during the war in Gaza, and some have reached high rank.

Friday’s visit is the latest sign of Israeli support for the Druze since a ceasefire in Lebanon and the shock overthrow of former President Bashar al-Assad in Syria towards the end of last year.

Israel has called repeatedly for the rights of Syrian minority groups including the Druze to be protected.

This week Defense Minister Israel Katz said Druze from across the separation line would be allowed to enter the Golan Heights for work and even that Israel would be ready to defend the community, following days of violence in Syria.

Israeli ministers have expressed deep mistrust of the new Syrian government of President Ahmed al-Sharaa, describing his Hayat Tahrir al-Sham movement as a Jihadist group. The group was formerly affiliated with Al Qaeda but later renounced the connection.

The IDF says it is responding to reports of a shooting near the West Bank settlement of Ariel.

According to medics, one Israeli man is wounded by gunfire in the incident.

With a hostage negotiating team in Doha, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu calls his top political partners and security chiefs together for a situational assessment.

According to office of one of the principals, Netanyahu is joined by IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar, Mossad Director David Barnea, National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi, Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, Defense Minister Israel Katz and Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar.

Bar’s presence is sure to raise eyebrows, as Netanyahu has been trying to push him out, and the two reportedly had a tense meeting last week in which the prime minister tried to convince him to step down.

The family of Avinatan Or says it has received the first confirmation that the 32-year-old is alive, Hebrew media reports.

It is not immediately clear what the sign of life is or how it was obtained.

He is being held in central Gaza in difficult conditions, according to the Ynet news site.

Or, 32, was abducted from the Nova festival and separated from his girlfriend, Noa Argamani, who was rescued by Israeli soldiers in June 2024.

Later that day, a Hamas video of Or and Argamani was posted on Telegram, showing Argamani on an all-terrain vehicle, as she calls in fear, crying, “Don’t kill me!” reaching out her arms to Or, who is being marched away from her, surrounded by at least three terrorists.

Or who grew up in the West Bank settlement of Shilo, is an electrical engineer who works for Nvidia. Before his abduction, he lived in Tel Aviv, where he and Argamani were planning to move in together.

Former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte was handed over to the International Criminal Court (ICC) earlier today, it says, after issuing a warrant for his arrest over his deadly crackdown on drugs.

“Mr Rodrigo Roa Duterte… was surrendered to the custody of the International Criminal Court,” the ICC says in a statement. “He was arrested by the authorities of the Republic of the Philippines in accordance with an arrest warrant issued… for charges of murder as a crime against humanity.”

The International Court of Justice will hold hearings next month on Israel’s humanitarian obligations towards Palestinians, amid claims the Israeli government is blocking aid access to Gaza.

The United Nations General Assembly approved a resolution in December requesting that the world body’s top court give an advisory opinion on the matter.

The hearings will open on April 28 at the court’s seat in The Hague, it says in a statement.

The resolution, submitted by Norway in October, was adopted by a large majority.

It calls on the ICJ to clarify what Israel is required to do to “ensure and facilitate the unhindered provision of urgently needed supplies essential to the survival of the Palestinian civilian population.”

Although the ICJ’s decision are legally binding, the court has no concrete means to enforce them.

But they increase the diplomatic pressure on Israel.

Norway’s initiative was triggered by an Israeli law banning from the end of January the UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA from operating on Israeli soil and coordinating with the Israeli government.

The military releases footage showing Monday night’s wave of airstrikes in southern Syria.

The Israeli Air Force strikes had targeted radars and other intelligence-collecting systems, along with military headquarters and weapon depots, belonging to the former Syrian regime, the IDF says.

In all, some 40 targets were hit by some 60 munitions dropped by 22 IAF fighter jets, according to the military.

Arab foreign ministers have agreed to continue consultations with US special envoy to the Mideast Steve Witkoff regarding Egypt’s plan for the post-war management of Gaza.

The group of top Arab diplomats met with Witkoff earlier today and issued a joint statement about their plan to continue talks with him shortly afterward.

Notably joining the foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Egypt and Jordan is Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s top aide Hussein al-Sheikh.

Sheikh met with Witkoff in Riyadh in January.

A US judge orders that a detained Columbia University student be allowed to have private phone calls with lawyers challenging his arrest by immigration authorities.

Mahmoud Khalil’s case has become a flashpoint of the Trump administration’s pledge to deport pro-Palestinian college activists. Khalil’s lawyers argue the arrest violated his right to free speech under the US Constitution’s First Amendment, and have urged his release.

At a hearing in Manhattan federal court, Khalil’s lawyer Ramzi Kassem says his client had been allowed just one call with his legal team from immigration detention in Louisiana. Kassem says the call was cut off prematurely and was on a line recorded and monitored by the government.

US District Judge Jesse Furman rules that Khalil, 29, and his lawyers should have one phone call today and another one tomorrow covered by attorney-client privilege, meaning the government would not have access to their conversation.

Furman on Monday temporarily blocked Khalil’s deportation.

Furman says the calls would help Khalil’s lawyers prepare a revised petition challenging the constitutionality of his arrest on Saturday evening by Department of Homeland Security agents outside his university residence in Manhattan.

“Mr. Khalil was identified, targeted, detained and is being........

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