NPR News Now - NPR News: 02-22-2025 2PM EST

Episode Date: February 22, 2025

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Nour Ram, NPR News. Live from NPR News in Washington, I'm Nour Ram. Hamas has now released all six Israeli hostages. In exchange, Israel is expected to release more than 600 Palestinian prisoners and detainees in Israeli jails. NPR's Hadil El-Shalchi has more. At a second ceremony at the Nusayrat refugee camp in central Gaza, the three Israeli hostages were brought onto a stage flanked by masked Hamas gunmen.

Shouting pro-Hamas militia chants, the crowd watched as 27-year-old Elia Cohen, 22-year-old Omer Shemtov, and 23-year-old Omer Venkart stood waving and giving thumbs up. Earlier in the day, two other hostages were released in a ceremony in the southern city of Rafah. A sixth hostage, a Bedouin Arab citizen of Israel called Hisham Sayyid, was released later in the day. He had been in captivity for almost 10 years when he crossed into Gaza himself.

Hadeel Al-Shalchi, NPR News, Tel Aviv. President Trump's top national security adviser says Ukraine's president is going to sign a critical minerals agreement with the U.S. NPR's Franko Ordonez reports. National Security Adviser Mike Waltz spoke confidently to a friendly audience at the conservative political conference CPAC and said the U.S. will reach a deal over Ukraine's rare earth mineral deposits. Here's the bottom line.

President Zelensky is going to sign that deal and you will see that in the very short term and that is good for Ukraine. What better could you have for Ukraine than to be in an economic partnership with the United States number one. Walt went on to say that the agreement is a way to provide more security for Ukraine as well as a way to recoup the billions of dollars that the U.S. taxpayer has invested in the war. Franco, Ordoñez.

NPR News, The White House. The Defense Department announced it's firing 5,400 probationary workers next week. Yesterday, President Trump fired Charles Q. Brown, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the second black officer to hold that position. Republican Congressman Glenn Grossman of Wisconsin held a town hall yesterday and found some of his constituents are not happy with the Trump administration. Nick Rommel of Wisconsin Public Radio reports. Grossman spoke to about 100 people at a local government office in Oshkosh.

He praised one of President Donald Trump's recent executive orders. The crowd reacted immediately. He's gotten rid of birthright citizenship. Oh, yeah. Outside, in the snowy parking lot, around 50 people couldn't get into the venue after it reached capacity. One of them was John Kelnhofer, who said he was worried about billionaire Elon Musk's power within the Trump administration.

I've been getting more and more politically involved and I can finally continue as long as this stuff keeps happening. He said it was his first time going to one of his congressmen's town halls. For NPR News, I'm Nick Rommel in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. This is NPR News. Investigators in Germany say the suspect in a stabbing yesterday is a refugee from Syria who wanted to kill Jews. The stabbing took place at Berlin's Holocaust memorial and badly injured a tourist from Spain. There have been several attacks in recent weeks in which the suspects were from migrant backgrounds. This has made migration a major issue in Germany's national election, which is tomorrow. A 27-year-old man from New Jersey has been found guilty

of attacking writer Salman Rushdie in 2022. NPR's Mandelit Delbarco reports. Hadi Matar faces a sentence of up to 32 years in prison for the 2022 attack of Indian-born British novelist Salman Rushdie. Matar declined to testify in his defense before he was found guilty of attempted murder and assault. During the trial and in a memoir about the attack,

the 77-year-old Rushdie recalled being on stage at the Chautauqua Institution, preparing to deliver a lecture about how the U.S. had been a safe haven for artists in exile. Rushdie has been living in the U.S. for many years after Iran's former leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini ordered Muslims to kill him for his 1989 novel, The Satanic Verses. Mandelit Dalbarco, NPR News. Mandelit Dalbarco, NPR News. According to the Associated Press, the Vatican reports Pope Francis is in critical condition. He's been hospitalized for a week with a complex lung infection. A statement quoted by the AP said the 88-year-old

pontiff suffered a long asthmatic respiratory crisis that required high flows of oxygen. He said the pope continues to be alert while the prognosis is reserved. I'm Nora Rahm, NPR News in Washington.