Gaza Ceasefire, Trump's Middle East Peace Plan, Letitia James Indicted

0:02This morning, in Gaza, there were no sounds of Israeli airstrikes for the first time in months. President Trump promises a deal he brokered will mean lasting peace. The next 72 hours are key. Why are so many Palestinians skeptical? I'm Leila Faldil. That's A Martinez. And this is Up First from NPR News. President Trump is planning to head to Egypt this weekend. So he'll be there as Israel and Hamas implement the first part of the plan. It's really peace in the Middle East. Now, the deal is still fragile, and there are also questions of what's next and why a small group of U.S. troops are part of that equation.

0:37Plus, New York's Attorney General Letitia James was indicted on bank fraud and false statement charges. Trump has publicly demanded his Attorney General prosecute James and other perceived political foes. Now, the Justice Department is doing just that. Stay with us. We've got all the news you need to start your day.

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1:42Softer than cashmere, warmer than wool, and still breathable, this alpaca fiber hoodie goes from airport to mountain trail to couch without missing a beat. Right now, grab a pack of hoodie and score a free pair of alpaca cruise socks. Moisture-wicking, odor-resistant, and guaranteed for life. Level up your hoodie game at go.pakaapparel.com slash NPR. Code NPR. For the first time in seven months, people in Gaza woke up with no Israeli airstrikes overhead. Today is supposed to mark the start of the first phase of what President Trump says will be a strong and lasting peace. It comes after Israel's government approved Trump's plan for a hostage exchange deal.

2:27We're joined by NPR international correspondent Aya Batraoui in Dubai to explain what's happening. So tell us what the situation now is in Gaza with this ceasefire. Well, this morning, people in Gaza were actually still being fired on by Israeli troops when they tried to walk along a main road leading from the south of Gaza to Gaza City and the north. Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced in recent weeks from that city. But this is what it also sounded like in the center of Gaza City for the few people who are still there. So what you're hearing there is the sound of an Israeli drone buzzing overhead.

3:02And what that means is Hamas has not yet begun retrieving hostages to release them. It won't do that until the drones stop flying. And the drones are supposed to stop when Israel's military completes a withdrawal from deep inside Gaza to a holding line where they would still control about half of the Gaza Strip. Now, an Israeli defense official told NPR on condition of anonymity in order to speak about the operations in Gaza that the army had started to pull back to that agreed-upin line in Gaza and that it would announce today it has completed that initial pullback. But here's the crucial part.

3:36The clock starts ticking on this deal from that moment. Hamas has just 72 hours to release the 20 hostages it holds that are believed to still be alive and any bodies in their possession, but there are others they will need more time to find. And this really kind of points to how delicate these first hours of a ceasefire are. Skepticism around whether Trump's plan will lead to a permanent end of the war. Tell us what you know about the details of the deal that was signed last night. Well, there is skepticism because the two previous U.S.-backed ceasefire deals in which Hamas released hostages were broken and we saw Israel return to war.

4:12But Trump says this deal is about more than Gaza. He says it's about Mideast peace, and he has given his personal guarantees to Egyptian, Turkish, and Qatari mediators and to Hamas that the release of all the Israeli hostages the group holds will coincide with an end to the war. Now, NPR saw a copy of the first page of this deal that was signed in Egypt last night. Mediators and Hamas confirmed to NPR the document, which is circulating online, is legit. It refers to this first phase of the deal, which is focused on releasing hostages. But this document states the war will immediately end upon approval by Israel's government, which we know the cabinet did vote on last night and approve in the presence of White House envoy Steve Witkoff and President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner.

4:56But again, this document only lays out details of the first phase of the ceasefire and not what comes next. And that's where there's still a lot of skepticism and details that need to be worked out. Yeah, sure. So a lot of uncertainty over the next 72 hours. What are you looking to see? Yeah, these are very critical next 72 hours. So beyond the release of Israeli hostages and Palestinian detainees and prisoners, we're also looking to see whether Egypt's border with Gaza opens for heavy machinery to enter. That is going to be needed for Hamas to retrieve some of the bodies of hostages it holds that are buried, I believe, in different parts of Gaza.

5:30It's also needed to recover Palestinians from under the rubble of Israeli airstrikes, including one last night just before this deal was signed that struck a residential building in Gaza City. At least 40 people are missing under the rubble of that Israeli airstrike rescue crew, say. Yesterday, there was also an Israeli soldier killed in North Gaza. So what we're looking to see now is when Israel will allow hundreds of trucks of U.N. aid into Gaza to reverse severe malnutrition and starvation. That could happen as early as Monday. Also, President Trump is expected to visit Egypt and Israel on Sunday.

5:59And the first hostages and prisoners could be released by Monday. I'm sure we'll check in with you on Monday. And NPR international correspondent Ayah Batraoui in Dubai, thank you. Thank you. The U.S. is playing a big role in keeping the ceasefire together as 200 American troops are going to the Middle East to oversee the implementation of the deal. President Trump is going to Egypt to cement the deal he brokered between Israel and Hamas as they're set to carry out the first part of the agreement. I think it's going to be a lasting peace, hopefully an everlasting peace. But senior White House officials are advising that the deal is still fragile and there are still parts of the plan that could go wrong.

6:37NPR White House correspondent Deepa Shivaram joins us now. A lot of elements of this plan are still being sorted through. What are officials worried about? Well, good morning, guys. Senior White House officials said yesterday on a call with reporters that there's still a lot of involvement and work to do to make sure there aren't misunderstandings between the two sides. They said this is a very delicate time. There's a short window here where Israeli troops retreat from parts of Gaza. The hostage release and the Palestinian prisoner release is supposed to take place. But the even bigger question is what happens next and what is the U.S.

7:09involvement going to look like? And like you mentioned, these officials last night said that the U.S. is sending about 200 troops to the region. They're going to be part of what's called an ISF or an International Stabilization Force, which was created in part of Trump's peace plan. So their role is oversight to make sure that there aren't any violations of the agreement, according to White House officials. And they'll be working alongside with Egyptian forces as well as forces from Qatar and Turkey and the UAE and keeping those governments as well as the Israeli government informed about what they're seeing.

7:44Will any of those U.S. troops go to Gaza? White House officials said the U.S. forces are not intended to go into Gaza, but they weren't at this point specific about where troops would be stationed. That plan is still being developed. OK, so in the meantime, what has the president been saying about the agreement? Well, the president's been pretty elated about all of this. He held a cabinet meeting yesterday and talked at length about getting this deal done and repeatedly said that this deal meant peace in the region. It's amazing. I've never seen anything quite like it. I've been very much involved.

8:16I've never seen anything quite like it. But it's it's really peace in the Middle East. And speaking of Trump's involvement, I mean, White House officials said he was involved at many points in the negotiations, that he would even call in himself during the talks to talk with some of the interlocutors. I will say, though, that there are some elements of this agreement that are still a little bit unclear. Yesterday, for example, a reporter asked what would happen if Hamas didn't return all the hostages. Right now, there are believed to be 48 hostages and 20 are believed to be alive. Trump said some of the bodies would be hard to find, but, quote, we're going to do the best we can.

8:55And he didn't really get into what the consequences of what might happen. The other thing that Trump is still a little bit unclear on is how Gaza will be rebuilt. He said that wealthy Arab nations would be part of the rebuilding process. But White House officials said yesterday that no financial commitments have been made yet from those nations. OK, we mentioned earlier that the president plans to travel to the region. What do we know about those plans? Yeah, so Trump said that he's trying to leave on Sunday to travel to the region. It's not exactly clear yet where he's going, but he said he'd most likely be in Egypt where those negotiations are taking place.

9:30And he was also invited by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address Israel's parliament, the Knesset. And Trump said he hopes to be there when the hostages are released, which is potentially Monday or Tuesday. So still firming up some of the details of where and when this trip takes place. But the presence of President Trump on the ground speaks to how much of a heavy hand he's had in this process. That's NPR's Deepa Shiburam. Thanks a lot. Thank you.

10:02The Justice Department followed President Trump's public calls and brought charges against his top rivals. Yeah, New York Attorney General Letitia James was indicted on bank fraud and false statement charges. This comes after the same office indicted former FBI Director James Comey. President Trump replaced the top federal prosecutor there with one of his former lawyers. And that's the person who secured this indictment. NPR Justice correspondent Ryan Lucas joins us now. Ryan, so what more can you tell us about the charges against James and the prosecutors who are bringing this case on? Well, as Layla just mentioned, James faces two charges here, one kind of bank fraud, one kind of false statements to a financial institution.

10:41and the indictment alleges that James bought a house in 2020 in Norfolk, Virginia, but prosecutors say she falsely claimed it as a second residence to get better terms on her mortgage. And the indictment says with those more favorable terms, she would have saved a total of almost$19 ,000 over the life of the loan. Okay. Now the indictment was handed up by a grand jury in the Eastern District of Virginia. So that's the same place where the former FBI Director James Comey was indicted just a few weeks ago. That's right. And there's been a huge amount of turmoil in that U.S. attorney's office there in the past few weeks because of the Comey case and this case against James.

11:13The career DOJ attorney who had been the top prosecutor there had basically concluded after lengthy investigations that the evidence in the separate cases against Comey and James was too weak to bring charges. The White House didn't like that. They pushed that prosecutor out. In his place, President Trump installed Lindsey Halligan, an insurance lawyer who had once served as Trump's personal attorney, but she has no prosecutorial experience. Days later, Halligan secured the indictment against Comey. And now a few weeks on, she presented the case yesterday against James to the grand jury. Now, these two indictments against Letitia James and James Comey came after President Trump publicly called on the Justice Department to prosecute them.

11:52And that has alarm bells ringing that Trump is using the Justice Department, weaponizing it to target his perceived political enemies. Now, nationwide, people might know who James Comey is, but maybe not Letitia James as much. So what is Trump's issue with Letitia James? So when James campaigned to become New York's attorney general, she vowed to investigate Trump. Once she was in office, she did exactly that. Ultimately, she sued Trump and his company for inflating the value of some of their assets. She won that case in court, a massive$450 million judgment, although that financial penalty was later tossed out on appeal.

12:24But Trump has repeatedly lashed out at her during the presidential campaign last year, for example. He said that she should be arrested and punished. And then in a social media post last month, Trump urged the attorney general, Pam Bondi, to go after James and other political foes, saying that they were guilty and that justice must be served. Has James said anything in response to all this? She put out a video on social media. She called the indictment a continuation of Trump's weaponization of the justice system. She also said this. These charges are baseless, and the president's own public statements make clear that his only goal is political retribution at any cost.

13:00James said she's being targeted because she did her job as New York State Attorney General. She said she stands behind her office's investigation in the civil fraud suit against Trump. And she said she's not afraid and that she is going to continue to do her job. That's NPR justice correspondent Ryan Lucas. Ryan, thanks. Thank you.

13:19And that's Up First for Friday, October 10th. I'm Amy Martinez. And I'm Leila Faldil. President Trump campaigned on a promise of mass deportations. And since he took office in January, ICE have carried out some dramatic and shocking raids to try to meet that goal. Things have shifted in a way unlike anything I've seen in the 20 years that I've been doing this work. This weekend on the Sunday story from Up First, how immigration enforcement is changing under the Trump administration. Listen to the Sunday story right here in the Up First podcast. Today's episode of Up First was edited by Rebecca Rossman, Jerry Holmes, Anna Yukoninov, Mohamed El-Bardisi, and Martha Ann Overland.

13:58It was produced by Ziad Butch, Nia Dumas, and Christopher Thomas. We get engineer support from Stacey Abbott, and our technical director is Carly Strange. Our executive producer is Jay Shaler. Join us again on Monday. Hey, it's Friday, guys. I just realized.

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