Man seen with missing Pittsburgh student will receive passport back, prosecutors say

(WASHINGTON) — Despite President Donald Trump’s push for the forcible displacement of Palestinians from Gaza — a move that, if carried out, would be a violation of international law that some experts and U.S. allies have called ethnic cleansing — he is facing significant pushback from allies and states in the region.

There is “zero possibility” that Palestinians will be forcibly displaced from Gaza and into Jordan and Egypt, one expert told ABC News.

“I see no scenario where this happens,” Brian Katulis, a senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy at the Middle East Institute, a nonpartisan think tank, told ABC News. “This is their home. They’ve endured so much to stay in their home, even if their home — literal homes, family homes — have been destroyed.”

“It’s a model that just won’t work in today’s Middle East,” Katulis said, referring to the forced displacement of Palestinians.

“The risk is that [this] comes at a very uncertain time with the ceasefire and hostage release deal on thin ice, and it actually serves to distract from the important work of trying to keep that process moving forward — to get hostages released and much-needed aid into the people … and to actually try to move forward to something that is realistic,” Katulis said.

Trump at one point threatened to withdraw aid to Egypt and Jordan if they didn’t agree to take in Palestinians, though less than 24 hours later, he said, “I don’t have to threaten that, I don’t think. I think we’re above that.”

“The point of this is to ostensibly force Egypt and Jordan to accept all of the Palestinians currently living in the Gaza Strip, so they can engage, so the U.S. can annex the territory. I think it’s safe to say it’s a non-starter for the Saudis,” Daniel Drezner, a professor of international politics at Tufts University’s Fletcher School, told ABC News.

“The Jordanians, in particular, need the money. They’re not oil rich, and same with Egypt, but in some ways the expectation would be that if Trump actually threatened to cut them off, they would likely turn first to Saudi Arabia and the Emiratis,” Drezner said.

Arab nations quickly rejected Trump’s proposal to forcibly displace Palestinians and relocate them in neighboring states, with several calling it a hard line.

“The Foreign Ministry affirms that Saudi Arabia’s position on the establishment of a Palestinian state is firm and unwavering. HRH Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, Crown Prince and Prime Minister clearly and unequivocally reaffirmed this stance,” Saudi Arabia said last week, just hours after Trump called for the displacement of Palestinians from Gaza.

As much as a bind Jordan is in, it is unlikely that it would accept anything along the lines of what Trump proposed, Drezner said, adding the proposal is worse than losing the $1.5 billion in annual aid that it receives from the U.S.

“The question is the extent to which the Saudis are willing to bankroll both the Jordanians and the Egyptians,” Drezner said.

“Pay attention to how the Gulf states are reacting to all this, because they’re the ones that are simultaneously most likely to be able to resist Trump’s pressures, and also it will send a regional signal to Egypt and Jordan as to what their options are,” Drezner said.

After Trump’s comments, Egypt expressed its support for the legitimate and inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, calling for the need for a two-state solution and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.

As Trump continued to double down on forcing out the Palestinians, Egyptian President Abdelfatah El Sisi announced he will indefinitely postpone his plan to visit Trump at the White House. According to Saudi-owned Al Arabiya News, Sisi said he won’t attend any White House talks if the displacement of Palestinians in Gaza is on the agenda.

“They’re probably trying to figure out how do they reposition themselves in light of Trump’s incendiary remarks, because they come directly at odds with Egypt’s own positions on this issue and its national security interests. And I don’t think they want to be put in any sort of position to actually directly challenge Trump right now until they assess,” Katulis said.

“[Egypt]’s security aid from the U.S. is part of a package that came out of the Israel-Egypt peace treaty. And if Trump wants to play games with that, he’s actually going to undercut a lot of America’s long-standing traditional security relationships in the region,” Katulis said.

Egypt also announced it plans to host a meeting with Arab states in Cairo later this month where they will discuss a counterproposal.

After meeting with Trump, King Abdullah of Jordan said in a statement he “reiterated Jordan’s steadfast position against the displacement of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. This is the unified Arab position. Rebuilding Gaza without displacing the Palestinians and addressing the dire humanitarian situation should be the priority for all.”

Trump appeared to walk back his threat of withdrawing aid after his meeting this week with King Abdullah resulted in the news that Jordan would take in 2,000 sick Palestinian children for treatment.

“This is a replay of what we’ve seen with regard to threatening Canada and Mexico [with tariffs] — it’s the shining orb strategy. It turns out if you offer Trump like a pretty gaudy but not terribly significant concession, he’ll back down,” Drezner said.

“Jordan can never agree to this — to Trump’s proposal — that would be the end of the regime. And that’s the fundamental thing that I assume someone must have told Donald Trump,” Drezner said.

In addition to opposing the forced displacement of Palestinians, Jordan and Egypt also have strains on their economies and taking in millions of refugees could potentially produce more economic and security challenges.

For the last 20 years, Jordan has faced an influx of refugees from Iraq and Syria, which has strained their economy and their social fabric, according to Katulis.

Egypt’s economy has also faced strains, with the Egyptian pound being depreciated several times in recent years. According to the World Food Programme, from January 2016 to January 2025, the Egyptian pound was devalued by 84.5% relative to the U.S. dollar — a move that governments use to increase its competitiveness or trade balance. And the U.S. dollar appreciated by 543.8% relative to the Egyptian pound during that same time period, based on the official exchange rate, according to the World Food Programme.

Taking in all Palestinians living in Gaza could also pull other countries into a confrontation with Israel, Drezner noted.

“There is no scenario whereby the Palestinians that are displaced are not going to want to return. Essentially, you’re introducing the possibility of violent non-state actors to operate within your territory,” Drezner said.

Other international powers

While Egypt and Jordan are most likely to look to Gulf states for alternate sources of aid, other international actors could also fill a gap created by the U.S. if Trump follows through on his threats.

“I’m not sure Russia is really in all that strong a position, particularly in the Middle East, since they lost their last port [when the regime fell in Syria] and we just saw what happened to Bashar Al Assad. I’m not sure that [Vladimir Putin]’s necessarily a reliable benefactor,” Drezner said.

“It would make much more sense to make a pivot towards China, in no small part because, among other things, China actually has reasons to want to be involved in the region, given their various energy demands,” Drezner said.

But, Jordan and Egypt rely on military supplies from the U.S. and the West.

“The longer-term issue is that you can argue that the militaries in both Jordan and Egypt are a little bit stuck in that they rely primarily on U.S. weaponry. So to engage in a radical pivot means that in some ways you’re also weakening your own coercive apparatus at the same time,” Drezner said.

It would take time before the militaries would be prepared to use weaponry from a different source, and weapons from another source would likely also be incompatible with their existing military stock, according to Drezner.

“It would be hard to pivot to either Russia or China as your primary arms manufacturer,” Drezner said.

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(PUNTA CANA, DR) — Lawyers for the Minnesota college student who was with University of Pittsburgh student Sudiksha Konanki the night she went missing in Punta Cana have requested a habeas corpus hearing, a source from the Dominican Republic Ministry of Justice told ABC News.

Joshua Riibe — who has not been charged with a crime — has been questioned by prosecutors over three days, an official close to the investigation told ABC News.

Riibe’s lawyers believe he’s being detained illegally and want to prevent the 22-year-old from being placed in custody, the source said. Authorities have confiscated Riibe’s passport and his attorneys said he’s being surveilled at his hotel.

In the Dominican Republic, people can challenge an unlawful detention through a habeas corpus hearing. Detained individuals are required to be brought before a judge within 48 hours, or they must be either charged or released.

A ruling on the habeas corpus hearing request cannot prevent an order of arrest by Dominican authorities, according to Riibe’s lawyer and a source from the Dominican Republic Ministry of Justice.

Authorities said they believe 20-year-old Konanki died by drowning, officials told ABC News.

Her missing persons case is being treated as an accident, sources said. Authorities said Riibe is not a suspect and is cooperating and being questioned as a witness.

Konanki was on spring break with her friends in Punta Cana when she went missing in the early hours of March 6.

She was part of a group that went to a nightclub and then for a walk on the beach, officials involved in the investigation told ABC News.

Most of the group went back to the hotel around 5:55 a.m. after their night of drinking.

Riibe — who Konanki met that night — stayed with her on the beach, according to a Dominican Republic investigative police report.

Riibe told the prosecutor the two went swimming and kissed. He said then they were hit by a wave and pulled into the ocean by the tide, according to a transcript provided to ABC News from two Dominican Republic sources.

Riibe said he held Konanki and tried to get them out of the water.

“I was trying to make sure that she could breathe the entire time — that prevented me from breathing the entire time and I took in a lot of water,” he said.

“When I finally touched the sand, I put her in front of me. Then she got up to go get her stuff since the ocean had moved us,” Riibe told the prosecutor. “She was not out of the water since it was up to her knee. She was walking at an angle in the water.”

“The last time I saw her, I asked her if she was OK. I didn’t hear her response because I began to vomit with all the water I had swallowed,” he said. “After vomiting, I looked around and I didn’t see anyone. I thought she had taken her things and left.”

Riibe said he passed out on a beach chair and woke up hours later and returned to his hotel room.

ABC News’ Ellie Kaufman contributed to this report.

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(LONDON) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s team is working on an updated agreement between Ukraine and the United States for Ukraine to agree to give the U.S. revenue from some of Ukraine’s most valuable resources, a Ukrainian official told ABC News.

A U.S. official with knowledge of the negotiations said a new version of the deal between the two countries has been put on the table.

The document currently on the table is a work in progress after the Trump administration initially proposed Ukraine provide the U.S. government with 50% of the revenue from some of its key resources, including minerals, oil, gas and ports a week ago, according to a draft document reviewed by ABC News and a Ukrainian official familiar with the matter.

The proposal hanging between the two countries comes at a critical time in the U.S. and Ukraine’s relationship under the Trump administration and an even more critical time in the almost three-year war since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Zelenskyy’s team was presented with the initial document with almost no warning when U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent visited Kyiv on Feb. 12, prompting widespread criticism that the Trump administration was seeking to strong-arm the country into an exploitative deal, a Ukrainian official said. The purported original draft document, reviewed by ABC News, contained no mention of future security guarantees for Ukraine, suggesting the country should give up access to its resources as payback for the American aid already rendered.

That document was obtained by ABC News from a Ukrainian source.

After Zelenskyy refused to sign the initial deal, Trump escalated criticisms, calling him a “dictator” and questioning his legitimacy as Ukraine’s leader, echoing talking points of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Zelenskyy has held his ground, both thanking the U.S. for continued support and saying that he believes Trump is living in a “disinformation space.”

“I told them to show the security guarantees, and then we talk about the percentage. They said 50% and I replied NO. I can’t sell the country off. I’m just a manager. Tomorrow, the country will have another manager, so I can’t sell it. Besides, around 20% of resources are in Russia-occupied territory,” Zelenskyy said during a press conference Wednesday.

During the meeting between Trump’s Special Envoy to Ukraine, Russian Gen. Keith Kellogg and Zelenskyy in Kyiv on Thursday, the two discussed the proposal again, a Ukrainian official said. After the meeting with Kellogg, Zelenskyy’s team is now working on an updated agreement, a Ukrainian official told ABC News.

A proposed agreemen

A couple of hours before Zelenskyy met with U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent in Kyiv on Feb. 12, a proposed agreement from the U.S. asking Ukraine to agree to give the U.S. 50% of the revenue from some of its most valuable natural resources was sent over. Zelenskyy and his team had almost no time to review the document, but they were asked to sign it during the meeting that day, a Ukrainian official told ABC News.

The official said Zelenskyy refused.

Zelenskyy was due to meet two days later with Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Munich, Germany. But after Zelenskyy sent a revised proposal ahead of the meeting, Vance and Rubio threatened to cancel it, a Ukrainian official said. Zelenskyy’s team asked them to read it first, the official said, and the meeting eventually went ahead. A U.S. official familiar with the discussions denied these details.

An alleged draft document, reviewed by ABC News, of the initial proposal from the U.S. government dated Feb. 7 requests the U.S. government receive “50% of the financial value received” by the government of Ukraine from “resources of Ukraine, including: mineral resources, oil and gas resources, ports” and “other infrastructure (as agreed),” the draft document states. A U.S. official familiar with the matter said these details align with the US’s initial proposal to Ukraine.

The alleged draft document, at the top, states the U.S. “has provided significant financial and material support to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in Feb. 2022.”

“We won’t confirm or deny terms of ongoing discussions. These discussions work best between the interested parties, not through the media,” a White House official said when asked about the authenticity of the document.

Trump has since slammed Zelensky for not signing the deal, on Wednesday accusing the Ukrainian President of treating Treasury Secretary Bessent rudely during his visit, claiming without evidence that Zelensky had kept Bessent waiting because he was “sleeping.”

Trump officials on Thursday also defended the deal and said the President was “frustrated” that Zelenskyy was refusing to agree to what they called a “historic opportunity.”

“Look, President Trump is obviously very frustrated right now with President Zelenskyy. The fact that he hasn’t come to the table, that he hasn’t been willing to take this opportunity that we have offered. I think he eventually will get to that point, and I hope so very quickly.” Trump’s National Security Advisor Michael Waltz said Thursday at a White House briefing.

“There can be, in my view, nothing better, for Ukraine’s future and for their security than to have the United States invested in their prosperity long term,” Waltz said.

It was unclear what changes the Ukrainian side had proposed during their discussions with Kellogg on Thursday.

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