Dread in Israel as Trump aims to seal Iran deal
The Times of Israel Daily Briefing
The Times of Israel
4.5 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 27 May 2026
⏱️ 20 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Welcome to The Times of Israel's Daily Briefing, your 20-minute audio update on what's happening in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world.
ToI founding editor David Horovitz joins host Jessica Steinberg for today's episode.
As US President Donald Trump seeks to finalize an agreement with Iran that would reopen the Strait of Hormuz but won't limit the regime's ballistic missile program, thwart its nuclear ambitions or constrain its capacity to wage terrorism around the world, Horovitz discusses Israel’s absence from the negotiations and its need to assert its independent capacity to defend itself.
After National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir taunted hundreds of detainees from the latest flotilla and received only a light rebuke from Netanyahu, Horovitz recalls that the prime minister just a few years ago said that the hawkish Ben Gvir didn't represent Israel's values and would never have a seat in his government.
Ben Gvir is in charge of the prisons that New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof has accused of carrying out the strategic sexual assault of Palestinian detainees. Israel, however outraged, will not end up suing the publication, Horovitz assesses, explaining why.
Check out The Times of Israel's ongoing liveblog for more updates.
For further reading:
With Trump conflicted and Iran emboldened, vital bid to end regime’s nuclear drive is being botched
Trump’s emerging Iran deal forces Israel to seek guarantees, not victory
Netanyahu needs to fire Ben Gvir after his flotilla provocation, but of course he won’t
Subscribe to The Times of Israel Daily Briefing on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. This episode was produced by Yitzchak Ledee.
IMAGE: Times of Israel founding editor David Horovitz joins host Jessica Steinberg for today's Daily Briefing. (ToI)
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, welcome to the Times of Israel's Daily Briefing. It's Wednesday, May 27th. I'm Jessica Steinberg, |
| 0:08.8 | here with Times Visual founding editor David Horowitz. David, good morning. |
| 0:13.1 | How you doing, Jessica? I am okay. Good. How are you? Fine, thanks. |
| 0:16.9 | Good. Before we get started, just want to mention until the end of May, we have this wonderful Times of Israel bag, one of our tote bags, and you can get it if you join the Times of Israel community. That's at timesavisrael.com slash join. Just until the end of the month. Okay, let's turn to the headlines for a moment. |
| 0:42.3 | Hamas military chief Mohamed Odeh, was killed by Israel in Gaza. That's 11 days after his predecessor was slain. |
| 0:45.3 | Meanwhile, defense minister Yusral Katz says that Israel is advancing a plan for, quote, |
| 0:51.3 | voluntary emigration from Gaza. Northern Israel was targeted overnight by |
| 0:57.7 | Chazbalah rocket fire during this extremely fragile ceasefire. We're going to turn to some other |
| 1:03.8 | headlines this morning. We're going to talk about where U.S. President Donald Trump is going |
| 1:08.7 | with this Iran deal, what is the direction |
| 1:11.1 | that is being taken? |
| 1:12.6 | We'll also talk about something that's been in the headlines. |
| 1:16.6 | National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvier, his treatment of the flotilla activists, |
| 1:22.6 | tormenting them, receiving a rebuke from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. |
| 1:28.8 | We'll also talk about the New York Times, the newspaper's defense of columnist Nicholas |
| 1:34.6 | Christoph and his column detailing alleged systematic sexual abuse of Palestinian security prisoners. |
| 1:42.3 | Stay with us. |
| 1:54.3 | Thank you. of Palestinian security prisoners. Stay with us. David, let's turn to the Iran deal, |
| 1:56.7 | which of course is front of our minds right now. |
| 2:02.0 | There hasn't been tremendous changes |
| 2:05.6 | since yesterday when Ben and I spoke about this, |
| 2:09.5 | but of course there's always changes all the time. |
... |
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