The former leader of Hamas, Khaled Meshaal, called for Muslims across the globe to head to the squares and streets this Friday and protest in support of Palestinians and for neighboring countries to join the battle against Israel.

In a recorded statement sent to Reuters, Meshaal is heard saying, ‘[We must] head to the squares and streets of the Arab and Islamic world on Friday.’

Meshaal is currently based in Qatar and heads Hamas’s diaspora office.

In his statement, he told Muslims the people and government officials in Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan have a responsibility to support Palestinians, as the vast majority of Palestinian refugees call Jordan and Lebanon home.

‘Tribes of Jordan, sons of Jordan, brothers and sisters of Jordan…This is a moment of truth and the borders are close to you, you all know your responsibility,’ he said.

Meshaal rallied the Muslim world after Israel said it would increase its ground offensive following an attack by Hamas.

Israeli forces had already struck over 200 targets in Gaza city the night before, using fighter jets.

The health ministry in Gaza has claimed over 5,000 people were injured, and 950 people were killed during the attacks.

‘To all scholars who teach jihad… to all who teach and learn, this is a moment for the application (of theories),’ Meshaal said.

Reuters contributed to this report.

The sneak attack by Hamas on Israel — the deadliest assault on the Jewish State in decades — instantly rocked the 2024 White House race, altering the conversation on the presidential campaign trail.

While the Republican presidential candidates have tried to one-up each other in placing blame with President Biden for the horrific attack and showcasing their support for Israel, the Hamas assault has also quickly become a wedge issue in the GOP nomination fight.

Hours after Hamas militants swarmed into Israel, former Vice President Mike Pence took aim at Biden, decrying what he called American’s ‘retreat on the world stage.’ 

But the former vice president, on the campaign trail in Iowa, seemed to save his most scathing rebuke for three of his rivals for the nomination.

Pence pointed fingers at ‘voices of appeasement like Donald Trump, Vivek Ramaswamy and Ron DeSantis that I believe have run contrary to the tradition in our party that America is the leader of the free world.’

The growing schism in the Republican Party over America’s role policing the world — evident in GOP fight over continued support for Ukraine in its year and a half long war against Russian aggression — may be spreading to Israel, where Republicans have long showcased their unyielding support for Jerusalem.

It’s no surprise that Pence was the first to take aim at other GOP White House hopefuls and has repeatedly criticized some of his rivals, including his former running mate, over their lack of support for Kyiv.

‘This is also what happens when you have leaders in the Republican Party signaling retreat on the world stage,’ Pence argued. Evoking the late President Ronald Reagan, as he often does, Pence emphasized that ‘it’s time to get back to peace through strength.’

Another part of the rift in the Republican presidential primary between the GOP’s growing isolationist wing and more traditional conservatives pushing for a muscular U.S. role overseas, could be seen in a speech Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina delivered Tuesday afternoon at a think tank in Washington D.C., and in an ensuing interview on the Fox News Channel.

While blasting Biden for having ‘blood on his hands,’ and claiming that the president’s weakness ‘invited the attack’ by Hamas, which was supported by Iran, Scott targeted DeSantis and Ramaswamy.

‘Vivek Ramaswamy has said that the definition of success is reducing America’s support for Israel,’ Scott argued. He accused the multi-millionaire biotech entrepreneur and first-time candidate of proposing ‘that we surrender Taiwan to the Chinese Communist Party as long as we’ve relocated some factories.’

Scott also blasted the Florida governor, noting that ‘DeSantis once dismissed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as just some ‘territorial dispute.’’

‘The last thing we need is a Joe Biden wing of the Republican Party on foreign policy,’ he argued.

Scott, who has been running a positive and uplifting conservative campaign, for months avoided criticizing his rivals, including Trump — the commanding front-runner for the GOP nomination as he makes this third straight White House run. 

But the senator has turned up the volume against his rivals in recent weeks, as his standing in polls has flat lined.

DeSantis, campaigning in Iowa on Monday ahead of the Scott speech, pushed back at Pence.

‘If Mike Pence wants to blame me for what’s happening, I think that most people would just laugh at that. What a joke,’ DeSantis told reporters.

And on Tuesday, the Ramaswamy campaign fired back at Scott.

‘We understand Tim Scott is attempting to gain some semblance of relevance in this race, but lying in the face of these barbaric atrocities isn’t an effective way to do so,’ spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin wrote in a statement. ‘Vivek has offered a clear, rational response that supports Israel while avoiding another U.S.-led disaster in the Middle East.’

Ramaswamy also fired away at former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who served as ambassador to the United Nations during the first two years of the Trump administration.

Haley, who knocked the 38-year-old Ramaswamy at the first Republican presidential nomination debate in August by arguing ‘you have no foreign policy experience, and it shows,’ urged earlier this week that Israel ‘needs to eliminate Hamas without question’ during an interview on Fox News’ ‘Hannity.’

Ramaswamy on Tuesday emphasized that ‘I am disappointed and deeply concerned by the remarks of certain presidential candidates including Nikki Haley who have irresponsibly called the Hamas attack an ‘attack on America’ and rabidly shout ‘FINISH THEM!!’ repeatedly without offering a pragmatic path forward.’

Doug Heye, a veteran Republican strategist and communicator, offered that blowup of warfare in the Mideast was an unexpected development on the campaign trail.

‘I think that there’s sort of a figuring it out as we go along part of this because clearly what happened this weekend was a surprise to everyone,’ Heye, who’s neutral in the 2024 GOP presidential nomination race, said. 

Heye noted that the ‘candidates can take swipes at each other, but this is an opportunity for them to demonstrate leadership as well.’

‘I look at this as an opportunity for candidates with foreign policy experience to shine,’ he said. And Heye pointed to Haley and Pence ‘as the two obvious examples.’

Former President Trump’s endorsement for the new House speaker failed on Wednesday when the GOP picked House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., as their nominee for top House lawmaker.

Trump endorsed House Judiciary Committee chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, to be the new House speaker last week, which many expected could push Jordan over the finish line.

Jordan received a lot of public support and endorsements from his House colleagues, but any expectations that he would cruise to the nomination over Scalise were dashed on Wednesday.

Scalise took the nomination over Jordan in a secret ballot, drawing questions about the strength of the former president’s endorsement.

Democrat Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota — a moderate member — told Fox News Digital on Wednesday that he thinks ‘on the surface’ the pick of Scalise over Jordan ‘seems like a pretty clear repudiation of Trump, and a fairly public one.’

Phillips said he thinks ‘supporters of Mr. Scalise would probably have to think twice about [that] before they actually make that vote for reasons’ that people would ‘understand.’

Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, seemed to dismiss the idea that Scalise’s victory was a repudiation of Trump’s endorsement. 

‘Well, you got some people in the conference that obviously have some issues with Donald Trump,’ Nehls told reporters after the GOP conference. ‘But I would probably say to those in the Republican conference that have problems with Donald Trump, get over yourself, because Donald Trump is the leader of our party. Make no mistake.’

When pressed on what it means that Trump’s preferred candidate failed to win a majority of the GOP votes, Nehls said: ‘But he also got 99 votes. Jim Jordan did get 99. That’s a significant number.’

Trump’s campaign did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

Since the nomination, Jordan said he plans to vote for Scalise for speaker and is even expected to give a nominating speech on the House floor whenever a vote is held.

Jordan has also been encouraging his supporters to back Scalise once the nomination hits the House floor for a vote.

Some Republicans, including Reps. Chip Roy and Marjorie Taylor Greene have said they will not vote for Scalise.

The news comes as Republicans look to mint a new House speaker after former Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s historic ouster last week.

McCarthy has since backed Scalise, his former number two, for the speakership.

Fox News’s Elizabeth Elkind and Kelly Phares contributed reporting.

A top adviser to President Biden is facing criticism over a comment he made shortly before the Hamas attacks on Israel.

Biden’s National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that the Middle East was the calmest it has been in decades, bringing to the forefront other controversial foreign policy decisions the Biden adviser has been involved with over the last decade.

‘What we said is want to depressurize, de-escalate, and ultimately integrate the Middle East region,’ Sullivan said at ‘The Atlantic Festival’ on September 29. 

‘The war in Yemen is in its 19th month of truce, for now the Iranian attacks against U.S. forces have stopped, our presence in Iraq is stable, I emphasize for now because all of that can change and the Middle East region is quieter today than it has been in two decades,’ he said.

Eight days later, Hamas launched an attack on Israel that killed at least 1,200 Israelis causing many conservatives to blast Sullivan’s comments on social media.

‘We are less safe with this Biden team,’ former Trump Acting Director of the United States National Intelligence Richard Grenell posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, in response to Sullivan’s comment. 

Matthew Brodsky, senior fellow at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, wrote on X that Sullivan’s comment was an ‘outright lie at the time he said it.’

Sullivan has been at the center of several controversies in recent years, many of which have been brought up by conservatives on social media in light of his Middle East comment, including the Biden administration’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan.

In the days following the Biden administration’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, Sullivan and the State Department were criticized for being unable to say exactly how many Americans had been left behind. 

On August 22, 2021, more than a week after frenzied scenes of evacuating Afghans at the Kabul airport began to surface, Sullivan admitted that the administration did not know how many Americans were still in Afghanistan.

‘We cannot give you a precise number,’ Sullivan told CNN. ‘We believe it is several thousand Americans who we are working with now to try to get safely out of the country.’

At one point, it was believed that nearly 450 Americans were still stuck in the country two months after the U.S. withdrawal. 

Sullivan said on August 16 that ‘the president did not think it was inevitable that the Taliban were going to take control of Afghanistan’ and that the situation devolved at ‘unexpected speed.’

‘He should’ve lost his job after the botched Afghanistan withdrawal,’ Abigail Jackson, press secretary for GOP Senator Josh Hawley, posted on X on Sunday.

In 2021, the top oversight Republican in Congress called for the removal of Sullivan from his position due to his position at the ‘epicenter’ of failed foreign policy decisions over the last ten years including the Benghazi terror attack that killed 3 American contractors and a U.S. Ambassador. 

Sullivan served as former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s former deputy chief of staff and policy adviser at the State Department during the 2012 attack on U.S. Embassy in Benghazi, Libya.

‘From Benghazi to the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, Jake Sullivan has been at the epicenter of the worst foreign policy crises and decisions over the past decade,’ Ranking Member on the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, Kentucky Rep. James Comer, told Fox News Digital at the time. ‘Given this administration’s tendency to create self-inflicted crises, it’s no surprise Jake Sullivan has been given a top post at the Biden White House.’

A source involved in Libya policy in Washington throughout Clinton’s tenure, speaking on background, told Fox News Digital in 2020 that Sullivan was a prominent — albeit quiet — player in the controversial U.S. overthrow of Libya with Clinton’s unflinching support.

Republicans also raised questions about Sullivan this past summer, Fox News Digital reported, after it was revealed that Sullivan served with Hunter Biden on the board of the Truman National Security Project, a liberal foreign policy think tank, for roughly two years before Sullivan joined the Biden campaign in 2020.

During the Clinton presidential campaign, Sullivan also notoriously pushed the Trump-Russia collusion narrative to reporters. He told members of the House Intelligence committee in a December 2017 interview that prior to the 2016 election he briefed reporters on his suspicions. 

‘[B]asically we sat with them and walked through what we understood to be the case from — in terms of the DNC hack and leak, what we believed to be the case with respect to Russian involvement,’ Sullivan said, ‘and then what we thought the upshot of this was, which is you now have the start of a much more aggressive phase of an intelligence-led operation by foreign power, and there’s likely to be more as we go forward, and people should really pay attention to this.’

‘Jake Sullivan has a lot to answer for,’ GOP Sen. Josh Hawley, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, told Fox News Digital earlier this year. 

‘He has repeatedly lied for perceived political gain – whether that be about the Russia Collusion hoax or the Hunter Biden laptop. And now he’s Biden’s national security adviser? He should resign immediately.’

Sullivan was recently accused by former White House official Mike McCormick of being a ‘conspirator’ in the Biden family’s ‘kickback scheme’ in Ukraine when Biden was vice president.

Sullivan denied the allegations, telling reporters that he had nothing to do with such an operation. 

Sullivan has also been criticized in the past for his involvement in the U.S. foreign policy dealings in Syria and Myanmar. 

During a 2019 interview with the New Yorker, Sullivan said it was ‘a great regret of mine’ that ‘we were not able to more effectively play a role in stopping hundreds of thousands of people from dying in Syria and millions and millions more losing their homes.’

The National Security Council did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital. 

Fox News Digital’s Cameron Cawthorne and Jessica Chasmar contributed to this report.

House Republicans are likely to meet behind closed doors on Thursday to try and hash out their differences ahead of a chamber-wide vote to elect the next speaker.

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., won a closed-door conference vote on Wednesday afternoon to become the Republican majority’s next candidate for speaker.

But any confidence in a quick House vote to seal the deal dissipated quickly as several GOP lawmakers publicly announced they would not support him in a chamber-wide vote.

‘They knew I was with [Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio] in the room, and I thought I might go with Scalise if everybody was gonna get behind Scalise, that was fine, but it’s just not that way,’ said Rep. Barry Moore, R-Ala., after emerging from a meeting with the hardline-right House Freedom Caucus. ‘There’s just people that are not on his team.’

Scalise netted 113 Republican votes on Wednesday while Jordan won 99.

Some members said they were frustrated by Scalise allies voting down an earlier measure aimed at raising the threshold to elect a speaker candidate to 217 — a majority of the House.

‘I put the amendment forward this morning to say, let’s figure this out, because I can count votes. I’m not a whip, but I can count votes,’ said Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, who led the amendment that was backed by a significant number of GOP lawmakers.

‘I was just making it very clear that if you rush this to the floor, I’m a hard no. So we’ll go now have some conversations and go figure out where we’re gonna go.’

‘But I did not want this to go to the floor before we’re united, and we should have done that this morning,’ Roy said.

The tension among the fractured GOP caucus was palpable. When leaving a meeting with GOP leaders, Rep. Dusty Johnson, R-S.D., the pragmatic leader of the Main Street Caucus, said the discord ‘does not look good for the House or for the country.’

‘Frankly, I think it would be easier in a political environment where people understood that governing requires some give and take,’ Johnson said. ‘ I never get everything I want in any negotiation. There are a lot of people around here who don’t understand that, and it makes it hard to govern. It is not a problem unique to the Republican Party, but it is on full display in our party today.’

Asked if Republicans need to huddle together in a room to settle their differences, Johnson joked: ‘I would like to be able to have the power to lock some people in some places, for sure.’

With the current makeup of the House, a GOP speaker candidate can afford to lose only four votes to win the gavel without Democratic support. As of Wednesday evening, at least 11 Republicans have said they will not vote for Scalise. 

It’s likely that Scalise allies will look to hold a vote as soon as viably possible — but it’s not immediately clear how soon that will be.

One Republican lawmaker who spoke with Fox News Digital said ‘Seems like we are a long ways off’ when asked if a vote could be expected Thursday.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken landed in Israel Thursday morning as a show of support for the longtime ally following Hamas’ terrorist attacks on the country on Saturday.

Blinken was greeted by Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen and other officials after departing the plane at the Ben Gurion Airport in Lod, which is on the outskirts of Tel Aviv.

Deputy Special Envoy for Hostage Affairs Steve Gillen also traveled to Israel with Blinken to prioritize the mission to urge Hamas to release all hostages immediately.

Blinken will meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Isaac Herzog, and other senior Israeli officials, and will ‘reiterate his condolences for the victims of the terrorist attacks against Israel and condemn those attacks in the strongest terms,’ a statement from his office said Tuesday. He is also expected to meet with the team at the US embassy in Jerusalem.

According to the Secretary of State website, Blinken is scheduled to travel to Jordan before his scheduled departure on Friday, Oct. 13.

Prior to his departure from Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on Wednesday, Blinken denounced the terrorism displayed by Hamas and reiterated America’s plans to ‘ensure Israel gets everything it needs to defend itself and provide for the security of its people.’

‘We stand resolutely against terrorism. We’ve seen the almost indescribable acts committed by Hamas against Israeli men, women, and children,’ Blinken told reporters. ‘Every day we’re learning more, and it is simply heartbreaking.  Not since ISIS have we seen this kind of depravity, and we will continue to stand very resolutely against it.’

Israel has launched a counteroffensive and bombarded the Gaza Strip, which is controlled by Hamas, with airstrikes in what many believe will precede a ground operation.

In addition to military aid, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin announced on Sunday that the USS Gerald R. Ford Carrier Strike Group was moving to the Mediterranean to reinforce deterrence in the region. 

Fox News Digital’s Louis Casiano contributed to this report.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog defended his country’s attack on Hamas during a fiery news conference Thursday, saying Israel was ‘fighting terror’ and that they would spare no expense in eliminating those who committed the worst attack on Israel in its 75-year history.

‘We are fighting terror,’ Herzog said. ‘Humanity has to decide: are we accommodating terror or are we fighting terror? We saw the worst atrocities possible. We are seeing the worst atrocities possible by a whole campaign of a movement, which has major support from our neighbors.’

Herzog continued: ‘I agree, there are many, many innocent Palestinians who do not agree with this [ideology], but unfortunately, in their homes, there are missiles shooting at us, at my children, on the entire nation of Israel. We have to defend ourselves. We have the full right to do so. It’s about time the whole world understands it, this is the tragedy of using terror. There is no mercy to terror.’

The president’s remarks come as Israel continues to launch destructive airstrikes in Gaza, flattening entire city blocks. Israel’s army is preparing a ground offensive in Gaza, although officials have said it would not invade unless authorized by the government to do so. It would likely result in a surge of casualties on both sides.

During the press conference, the Israeli president specified that his country was at war with Hamas and was not intentionally targeting civilians, but said the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) would fire at civilian targets if terrorists use the sites to target Israel first.

He also expressed frustration with the people in Gaza who allowed Hamas to come into power and remain in power as it continued its hate campaign against Israel.

‘This rhetoric about civilians not aware and not involved is absolutely not true. They could have risen up, they could have fought against that evil regime that took over Gaza in a coup d’État,’ Herzog said.

Militants in Gaza are holding an estimated 150 people taken hostage from Israel — soldiers, men, women, children and older adults — and they have fired thousands of rockets into Israel over the past five days.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Hamas terrorists, who were responsible for Saturday’s massacre, have engaged in atrocities, including binding boys and girls and shooting them in the head, burning people alive, raping women and beheading soldiers.

Rescue workers and witnesses have described horrifying scenes, including the slaughter of elderly people and finding bloody rooms crowded with massacred civilians.

The 2.3 million residents of Gaza are densely packed into a strip of land only 25 miles long. Israel has halted the entry of food, water, fuel and medicine into the territory, with Herzog saying this will continue until the hostages are released.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Israel launched a ‘wave of strikes’ on Thursday that killed a senior Hamas leader and destroyed operational command centers in Gaza, officials said.

According to the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), one airstrike executed Thursday killed Muhammad Abu Shamla, a senior Hamas naval operative in the Rafah Brigade. Other airstrikes struck operational command centers used by Hamas operatives, where the infiltration into Israeli communities surrounding Gaza on Saturday was organized.

‘IDF aircraft struck Muhammad Abu Shamla, a senior Hamas naval operative in the Rafah Brigade. Abu Shamla’s residence was used to store naval weapons designated for terror against the State of Israel,’ IDF said in a statement.

‘Right now we are focused on taking out their senior leadership,’ said Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli military spokesman. ‘Not only the military leadership, but also the governmental leadership, all the way up to [top Hamas leader Yehiyeh] Sinwar. They were directly connected.’

Other airstrikes carried out by the IDF targeted Hamas’ Nukhba elite force.

‘The Nukhba elite forces consist of terrorists selected by senior Hamas operatives, designated to carry out terrorist attacks such as ambushes, raids, assaults, infiltration through terror tunnels, as well as anti-tank missile, rocket, and sniper fire,’ the IDF said. ‘The Nukhba elite forces were one of the leading forces that infiltrated the State of Israel in order to carry out murderous acts of terror against its civilians.’

On Wednesday, Israeli airstrikes killed Palestinian Islamic Jihad commander Moussa Naseer in his family home in the northern city of Beit Lahia, according to media linked to Al-Quds Brigades, the group’s armed wing.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to ‘crush and destroy’ Hamas, saying no member of the terrorist group was safe. 

‘Every Hamas member is a dead man,’ he said.

Netanyahu said in a televised address that Israel formed a new war cabinet Wednesday that includes a longtime opposition critic.

The U.S. has pledged unwavering support for Israel’s response, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Tel Aviv on Thursday to meet with Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders.

The war, which has claimed more than 2,400 lives on both sides, is expected to escalate, as Israel prepares for a possible ground operation in the Gaza Strip.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.