Your World Tonight - Trump peace plan, Ottawa loan for Algoma, cannabis painkiller, and more

Episode Date: September 29, 2025

U.S. President Donald Trump lays out his multi-point plan for peace in Gaza. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agrees with it. Trump says if Hamas doesn’t sign on, Israel has his full backing to destroy “the threat of Hamas”. Family members of the hostages have called the plan a historic turning point.  And: The federal government is promising almost a half a billion dollars in loans to Algoma steel, as it tries to adjust to tariffs imposed by the U.S. Also: A cannabis-derived drug is showing signs of promise in treating back pain. Plus: Canada adds the Bishnoi gang to the list of terrorist organizations, updates on Michigan shooting, federal funding for hotel rooms for asylum seekers ends tomorrow,and more.

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This is a CBC podcast. Is this true? Are you really doing peace in the Middle East? This is the most incredible thing we've heard. Some think it's the biggest thing they've ever heard. They call just to find out, was it just a rumor or is it actually done? It's not a rumor, but it's also not actually done. A comprehensive plan for a mid-east ceasefire and post-war Gaza backed by U.S. President Donald Trump and unveiled alongside Israel's leader,

a 20-point proposal that's still missing one critical piece. Welcome to Your World Tonight. I'm Susan Bonner. It is Monday, September 29th, just before 6 p.m. Eastern, also on the podcast. Algoma must pivot its business model, but it does take us some time to get there, and this loan that was announced today is a critical piece of that. With Canada's only independent steelmaker getting sunk by the weight of the U.S. trade war, a new federal loan isn't just aimed at keeping Algoma afloat.

It's nearly half a billion dollars to help the company turn away from the American market towards Canadian consumers and fight for its future. Donald Trump says he's confident there will be peace in Gaza. There are questions whether it can happen anytime soon. Today he delivered his ceasefire proposal for the region. It lists a series of conditions and has Israel's support. What it doesn't have? Buy-in from Hamas.

Sasha Petrissik has our top story tonight. And let's call it eternal peace in the Middle East. With a flourish that promised to end what he calls centuries of death and destruction, U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled his peace plan, endorsed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after a three-hour meeting at the White House. I support your plan to end the war in Gaza,

which achieves our war aims. Trump's proposal, calls for an immediate end of the Gaza War, the release of hostages within 72 hours after that, followed by a gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces. That would be followed by an international administration and peacekeeping force, and maybe one day a government led by Palestinians themselves. A pathway to a Palestinian state is offered if many other conditions are met. Trump says the plan is endorsed by Arab leaders, Muslim-led nations, and the Palestinian Authority. So now it's time for Hamas to accept the terms of the plan that we've put forward today.

That was followed by a threat. Trump's approval for Netanyahu to continue Israel's two-year assault on Gaza. I have a feeling that we're going to have a positive answer. But if not, as you know, Bibi, you'd have our full backing to do what you. would have to do. Netanyahu agreed. Then Israel will finish the job by itself. Hamas received the proposal shortly after the meeting. But with many familiar elements previously rejected by Hamas, there is no guarantee of a positive answer. Israel interprets Trump's deal as giving it security control of Gaza for the foreseeable future. Netanyahu also underlined

his skepticism that the Palestinian authority would ever meet conditions to run Gaza. Both men ridiculed those backing a Palestinian state, Canada included. Several countries have foolishly recognized the Palestinian state. One ally of Hamas, which has also taken hostages, was quick to reject Trump's plan. It's a recipe to blow up the region, says the Palestinian Islamic jihad. In Tel Aviv, hostage families and their supporters still aren't sure the deal will give them what they want. We know it is possible they are a decision away and this decision can be made right now in this room. In Gaza, too, where they are still digging bodies from under rubble, hope while the fighting continues.

Sasha Petrosic, CBC News, Jerusalem. Hit hard by the U.S. trade war, one of Canada's biggest metals producers is getting some much-needed help. The Canadian and Ontario governments are loaning half a billion dollars to Algoma Steel, and it's hoped the money will help build the framework for more home-grown production. Senior business correspondent Peter Armstrong explains how. Inside the Algoma Steel facility in Sioux-St. St. Marie, Ontario, the impacts of the U.S. trade war are everywhere. This industry was once a model for free trade and integration.

Algoma's CEO, Michael Garcia, says those days are over. Algoma must pivot its business model to a domestic-focused business model. Historically, 60% of our volume has been in the United States, but that's now unviable. What is viable is a pivot to making products that can be sold and used here in Canada. Algoma produces giant coils of steel shipped to the U.S. to make everything from cars to appliances. But Garcia says there are other products the company can make. There's an oversupply of coil in the market, but there's an undersupply of, for instance, structural beams in the market. So we have to diversify the products that we make.

And so this loan gives us the time to do it. Those beams are used to build just about everything. Right now, all the structural beams used in Canada come from producers in the U.S. Algoma says one key use of the loans announced today will be to start making beams in Canada, a move that Ottawa believes can breathe new life into Canada's steel industry, clobbered by 50% tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump. It's a lot harder to bring something back to life than it is to keep it alive. Patty Heidu, Minister of Jobs and Families, says there's an opportunity here,

not just to provide products needed by Canadians, but to shore up a Canadian company and an essential Canadian industry that generates as much as $14 billion a year. Countries can lose sectors through that kind of economic disruption. So we're pulling out all the stops here today for Alabama Steel and for the future Steel in Canada. Bill Slater, President of the United Steelworkers,

says the union supports this idea of shifting production. The government's been talking for a long time that the steel industry is, critical to the sovereignty of our nation, and they've been promising lots of things, and now they're starting to put some actions to their words. The money is the first loan to be handed out as part of the federal government's large enterprise tariff loan program,

but also part of a larger plan to protect industries hit by tariffs and generate growth within the country. Garcia says Ottawa should focus on projects that drive the most economic growth. The thing about steel is it's so ubiquitous, So if there is economic activity and growth in the country of Canada, it's going to bode well for steel demand. And the clock is ticking. Algoma lost $110 million in the second quarter of this year. And there's no tariff relief on the horizon.

Peter Runchunk, CBC News, Toronto. And in posts on social media today, Trump proposed some new tariffs. He said he will impose substantial tariffs on any country that doesn't make its furniture in the U.S. and he suggested a 100% tariff on movies produced outside the U.S. Trump's post did not include any detail about how those tariffs would work or when they would start. Coming right up, time and money being running, may be running out for asylum seekers, with a federal hotel program set to expire. And after a decades-long fight for justice, the family of a Manitoba man

may get the chance to prove his innocence. Also, a potential game changer for lower back pain as a new study finds promising results from a cannabis-based medication. That's later on your world tonight. They came to Canada looking for help. By tomorrow, they could be looking for a place to live. Federal funding that pays for asylum seekers

to live in hotels is, set to run out. And while some organizations are offering support, it may not be enough. Nicole Williams reports. Staying in the hotels was one of my comfort zone. John Muchama and his wife arrived from Kenya two years ago. They ended up in a hotel in Niagara Falls, Ontario, as part of a federal program to temporarily house asylum seekers. Mocchama says that gave him time to find a home, a job, and a sensitive safety in Canada. He says it's difficult knowing asylum claimants no longer have that as an

option. It will lead to homelessness. The federal government is putting an end to its temporary hotel housing program as of Tuesday. It's an operation that's been running since 2018 in Ontario and Quebec as a way to deal with a surge in migration. Now community groups are scrambling to help as asylum seekers are being forced to move out. People who are remaining in these hotels are among the most vulnerable of asylum seekers in the country right now. Patty Leonard is a professor at the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa. She says some will struggle more than others.

A single mother with five children is not somebody who can make this process work really quickly for all kinds of reasons. But options are limited. In Ottawa and Toronto, shelters are overflown. and they don't have the money to help. Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow. We can either stop sheltering refugees claimants, leave them on the street, which will make homelessness worse. Or Torontoians will have to pay for it through their property taxes.

Neither is fair. In a statement, Ottawa's interim director of housing and homelessness says it's working with immigration, refugees and citizenship Canada to help with, quote, safe and smooth transitions for the households in question. But Cale Brown also encourages asylum claimants to take up IRCC's offer to relocate, potentially out of the province, in some cases, as far as the Maritimes. When people cross borders, they cross with their rights.

Gowry Srinobasin is with the Canadian Council for Refugees. She says housing asylum seekers isn't just the right thing to do. Canada is obligated to under international law. They have a right to a fair process. they have a right to shelter, they have a right to a legal aid. CBC News asked IRCC how many people across the country were being affected by the program ending. It did not provide a nationwide figure, but says it has spent more than a billion dollars since 2020 on the temporary hotel housing program and that it will not be extending its deadline. Nicole Williams, CBC News, Ottawa.

More than half a century ago, Russell Woodhouse was convicted of manslaughter. The Manitoba man always claimed his innocence and for years fought to clear his name. Now, a decade after his death, his family may finally get that chance after a historic decision by the Canadian government. Karen Paul's reports. It was tough to see what he had went through. Cindy Woodhouse-Nipanak says her family took Russell Woodhouse in after his real from prison. She called him uncle. Because it is my family and he

is somebody who raised me. Woodhouse Nipanak is now the National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations. I knew I wanted to help him because I knew that he was innocent. Russell Woodhouse was convicted more than five decades ago in the killing of a 40-year-old Winnipeg man Ting Fong Chan. Woodhouse, then

19 years old and his three co-accused were convicted in Chan's murder. The other three have been exonerated, including his brother, Clarence, who was thrilled last year to hear a judge declare a miscarriage of justice. Yeah, it's been nice to be free, after all these years. Their sister, Linda Woodhouse Anderson, grateful. At the same time, I was thinking about my brother, Russell.

Now, after the Federal Minister of Justice ordered a new appeal in the case, Russell Woodhouse is one step closer to having his own name cleared more than a decade after his death. It's the first time that the minister has, referred the case of someone who is deceased. James Lockyer is a director with Innocence Canada. We thought it was essential that we have his conviction set aside. The four men were rounded up by police,

largely because of eyewitness accounts that described indigenous people. They were convicted mostly on confessions written in fluent English, even though some barely spoke the language. The whole system engaged in systemic racism. Lockyer expects to be in touch with Manitoba's Appeals Court in the coming days to schedule a hearing where he says lawyers will ask for an acquittal. He hopes this decision will help restore faith in the justice system, which he says has long failed indigenous people. We have a lot to learn from Russell's case and the case of the other three men who were convicted with him, how racism can infect the criminal justice system and how it can be remedied.

Woodhouse Nipanak agrees. And then it makes me think like how many indigenous people are out there that are going through the same faith that my uncle Russell went through. The three other men have filed lawsuits against three levels of government. They're also pursuing compensation for their wrongful convictions. That process is still underway and may now soon include Russell Woodhouse's case. Karen Paul's, CBC News, Winnipeg. Today we acknowledge the role

of the province of Saskatchewan and previous Saskatchewan governments in the operation of the Ila Cross School until 1970s. And today on behalf of the province of Saskatchewan, I apologize to you. That's Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe

at the site of a former residential school today to apologize to students and announce a settlement. For more than 100 years, an estimated 1,500 Métis and indigenous children were forced to attend the school in the northern village of Isle LaCross. Because the school was established before the federal residential school system, it wasn't included in a settlement in 2006.

Former students sued both the provincial and federal governments for recognition. Today, Moe announced the province has reached an agreement in principle with survivors. We acknowledge that there were individual and cultural harms and abuses that were suffered by former students. of the Ila Cross School. And as part of this agreement, the province has agreed to pay $40.2 million to address the four major pillars of compensation

under the class action that was filed. Earlier this year, the federal government agreed to pay $27 million for its part in operating the school. A notorious criminal organization based in India is now considered a terrorist group in Canada. The federal government says

the Bishnoi gang uses violence and intimidation to generate fear and insecurity within the South Asian diaspora. Tom Perry has more on what that terror designation will mean. The announcement came with no fanfare, just a statement from Public Safety Minister Gary Anandisangery, that the government of Canada has listed India's Bishnoi gang as a terrorist entity under the criminal code. The government accuses the gang of a long list of crimes. The RCMP says the group has targeted sick activists at the behest of the Indian government. Balpreet Singh is spokesperson for the World Sick Organization of

Canada. So the designation of the Bishno Gang as a terrorist group is something that the community has called for for a very long time. Singh calls the move a symbolic victory but also a practical one because it gives police more power to pursue not just gang members but the people Singh believes are directing them. People on the ground doing the dirty work are one thing but the people that are directing it, that are choosing targets that are funding it, we believe exposing them and sanctioning them is going to be even more important, and we believe those figures are members of the government of India. Ottawa says a terrorist designation allows police to seize property, vehicles, and cash

controlled by the group, and provides more authority to prosecute in areas like financing and recruiting. Conservative leader Pierre Polyev calls it a good move, but wonders what took so long. overdue decision. Conservatives have long been calling for the Bishnoi gang to be banned. This gang has been responsible for much of the extortion that has terrorized Surrey, Brampton, Northeast Calgary. But while the accusations against the Bishnoi gang are serious, some security experts question whether it constitutes terrorism. Leo West is an associate professor at the Norman Patterson School of International Affairs at Carlton University. The definition of terrorist activity is not just that there's violence

and it's not just that there's threats against a group of the population. It's that that intimidation and that violence is motivated by ideology, politics, or religion. And there seems to be no evidence at least being afforded in the government's justification that confirms that third criteria. West worries the process of deciding which group is branded terrorist is becoming politicized. This move does come as political relations between Canada and India are showing some signs of thawing after former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accused the Indian government of being behind the death of sick activist Hardeeb Singh-Nidger

who was shot outside a temple in Surrey, B.C. in 2023. Tom Perry, CBC News, Ottawa. The day after four people were killed in an attack on a Michigan church, investigators are trying to figure out why a former U.S. Marines, crashed a pickup truck through the front doors, opened fire inside, and burned the building down. As a community grieves and the search for answers begins, officials are warning the public not to jump to conclusions.

Katie Simpson has the latest. It's hard. We didn't get any sleep last night. Paul Kirby was inside the Grand Blank Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when he heard a loud boom. The gunman had just... crashed a truck into the front doors of the building and started shooting at worshippers, including Kirby. With how close he was getting to me, with his shooting, I was just standing there, running,

expecting to get a bullet in the back of my, just legs or in my back or something. As he ran to find his family, Kirby says he was hit by broken glass, shattered by bullets, but otherwise he's fine. All of this happening as the gunman then used gasoline to start a fire that engulfed the church. Evil. This was an evil act of violence. Grand Blank Police Chief William Rennie says everyone who was at the Sunday service is now accounted for. However, they will continue to search the rubble for additional bodies.

Victims, including both the dead and injured, range in age from 6 to 78. FBI investigators are still trying to determine a motive, according to White House Press Secretary Caroline Leavitt. All they know right now is this was an individual who hated people of the Mormon faith. The suspect, 40-year-old Thomas Jacob Sanford, was shot dead by police in the parking lot of the church. A former U.S. Marine who deployed to Iraq in 2007, he was from the community and had a prior criminal record with charges for burglary and drinking and driving. Sanford spoke with a local candidate for city council just last week,

according to Chris Johns, who gnapped on his door as part of a routine vote canvassing stop. He did make the statement that Mormons are the Antichrist, which is a shocking statement. And again, this is somebody you're just meeting for the first time. As the investigation continues, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer is asking the public to remain patient. Speculation is unhelpful and it can be downright dangerous. So just ask that people lower the temperature of rhetoric. Some of that speculation is fueled on social media, in part by photos of Sanford wearing a Donald Trump t-shirt

and images taken of his house showing a Trump re-election sign on his front lawn. The FBI has called this a targeted act of violence, but they have not suggested politics is a factor in this case. Trump denounced the deadly shooting and fire, saying this appears to be yet another targeted attack on Christians, and that this epidemic of violence in our country must end immediately. Katie Simpson, CBC News, Washington.

This is Your World Tonight from CBC News. If you want to make sure you stay up to date and never miss one of our episodes, follow us on Spotify, Apple, wherever you get your podcasts. Just find the follow button and lock us in. It's a common ailment, affecting everything from quality of sleep to quality of life. Lower back pain can be debilitating. Finding relief can be difficult. Now a new study suggests cannabis may be able to help.

Christine Birak explains what the study found. So back pain is a modern day plague. Toronto, Sarah Kim, says her pain started with a snowboarding accident almost 30 years ago. Now a large German trial published in the journal Nature Medicine shows a medical cannabis medication could offer some relief. What he found is that compared to placebo, the patients reported an decrease in pain intensity not only over a period of 12 weeks. This was the primary outcome, but also in the extension phase, almost 12 months. Dr. Winfried Meisner, head of the German Pain Society, helped lead the study testing

cannabis oil for chronic back pain. About half of the 800 participants got the oil, which included THC, the part of cannabis, that can make people feel high. The other half got a placebo. After 12 weeks and using a 10-point scale, those on cannabis reported their pain dropped by 1.9 points, while the placebo group saw a 1.4 dip. The difference might not sound huge,

but Dr. Meisner says it's on par with current pain meds. So this is the largest study to date on a common problem that affects over half a billion people worldwide. Dr. Hans-Clark is Director of Pain Services at Toronto General Hospital. He says the cannabis-based treatment showed side effects like dizziness and fatigue, but no signs of dependence or withdrawal. He notes current drugs like ibuprofen and opioids can cause ulcers, indigestion or addiction, making them unsuitable for long-term. And really, the study shows that THC is quite helpful when it comes to neuropathic symptoms and back pain outcomes long-term.

Pretty modest, pretty modest effect. Jason Bussa is a professor in the Department of Anesthesia at McMaster University. He welcomes the study, but he would like to see much longer-term data. The question is, is this important to patients? Bassa notes the study findings suggest those getting the drug also reported improvements in sleep and physical function, but not by how much. I think there are some patients that are going to benefit to a degree that is important, but this paper doesn't allow you to understand what that proportion is for physical function or for sleep quality. So for myself, you know, I don't actually rely. I'm paying medication very much.

Sarah Kim says she's managing her pain with movement and physiotherapy, but she sees the need for new options for an old problem. Christine Birak, CBC News, Toronto. Finally tonight, Canadian baseball fans can finally take a few days off, bask in the glory of a thrilling season, and get ready for one last push to win it all. Let's go Blue Chase. Let's go Blue Chase. Let's go Blue Chase. That's Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow raising the flag of the Toronto Blue Jays at City Hall today.

The day after the team won the American League East title. It gave the Jays a buy into the second round of playoffs where they will have home field advantage. In the meantime, players can recover from yesterday's game and that after party. And now they're coming back out on the field for another picture. They look at a much different state obviously than they did. just after the game ended up. Hey, first and foremost, to all of y'all doubting, not anyone here, obviously, but what now?

Like, this is best division in baseball, we win it. First thing first, let's go get it. That winning feeling must have been pretty intoxicating as the champagne-soaked celebrations spilled onto the field and the players toasted the Blue Jays' first division title in a decade. You told me if you won the division that you would be on a policeman's horse with the tarp off and the shirt flinging, is that still the plan? Tarp off, police horse is ready. Here we go.

All right. Blue Jays designated hitter, George Springer, speaking with Sportsnet after the game. As rowdy as the celebration got, Springer did not follow through with his party plan. yet, maybe if they win the World Series, the Blue Jays' first playoff game will be on Saturday. Thank you for joining us. This has been Your World Tonight for Monday, September 29th. I'm Susan Bonner.

Talk to you again. For more CBC podcasts, go to cBC.ca.ca slash podcasts.