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PDB Afternoon Bulletin | August 19th, 2025: Hamas Accepts Last-Minute Ceasefire & North Korea To 'Rapidly' Expand Nuclear Arsenal
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Mike Baker
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Unknown Foreign Language Speaker
Foreign.
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Mike Baker
It's Tuesday the 19th of August. Welcome to the PDB Afternoon Bulletin. I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage. All right, let's get briefed. First up, Hamas claims that it will accept an updated 60 day ceasefire proposal that would see the release of 10 living Israeli hostages. Israel is reportedly closely studying the terror group's response to but the question is, will it be enough to forestall Israel's planned offensive to occupy Gaza City? We'll have the details later in the show. North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un lashes out at the US And South Korea over their annual large scale joint military exercises calling for a rapid expansion of the Hermit Kingdom's nuclear arsenal. You can always count on Kim Jong Un to throw his teddy out of the crib every time there's a joint US South Korea military exercise. But first, today's afternoon spotlight. Israel is now weighing Hamas's response to a ceasefire proposal that could establish a 60 day truce and free half of the surviving hostages still held in Gaza. That's according to two sources familiar with the talks today. The potential break in the war, driven forward by Egyptian and Qatari mediators with support from Washington, calls for hamas to release 10 living hostages and the remains of 18 more in exchange for Israel freeing 200 Palestinian prisoners and terrorists alongside an unspecified number of women and minors. As of now, Israeli Officials estimate roughly 50 hostages remain inside the enclave, though only 20 are believed to be alive. Momentum for a deal accelerated last week after Israel announced a now planned offensive aimed at seizing Gaza City in an effort to uproot Hamas from the strip's largest population hub and the terror group stronghold. The proposed deal also envisions a partial withdrawal of Israeli forces who now control three quarters of the enclave, coupled with a surge of humanitarian aid for Gaza's 2 million civilians. Qatar's foreign ministry spokesman described the potential deal as a pathway to a comprehensive agreement to end the war, end quote. As we've been tracking, despite last week's momentum, negotiations stalled over the weekend in Cairo. Mediators floated new ideas based on a US Framework advanced in late July by special envoy Steve Witkoff. Terms that Israel had already signaled that it would accept. When Hamas balked, Qatar's prime minister personally flew to Cairo on Monday to meet with the Iran backed terror group's negotiators. According to a diplomatic source, Hamas chief negotiator then delivered the terror group's updated response, which was then sent to Jerusalem. But on the battlefield there are no signs of any potential breakthrough. The fighting intensified along Gaza City's eastern edge with Israeli tanks rolling into a neighborhood that IDF commanders described as critical high ground that needs to be secured before any truce takes effect. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said he would convene his war cabinet in the coming days to weigh Hamas offer. He declared in a statement from the media reports, you can gather one thing, Hamas is under immense pressure, but that pressure isn't exclusive to the terror group, as we've previously discussed. Inside Israel, more than 200,000 people rallied Sunday against the government demanding a hostage deal immediately as senior IDF officers warn that a major push into Gaza City risks killing the very captives and Israel seeks to free. However, Netanyahu faces fierce pushback from within his own coalition, with hardline ministers rejecting any pause in fighting and urging Israel to pursue Hamas's elimination and the annexation of Gaza. Across the Atlantic, President Trump echoed those calls, urging Israel to escalate just hours before Hamas delivered its response. Today, Trump posted on Truth Social, quote, we will only see the return of the remaining hostages when Hamas is confronted and destroyed. Play to win or don't play at all, end quote. In a separate but recent interview with Axios, the president made his stance clear, insisting that the sooner Israel delivers a decisive military blow to Hamas, the better its chances are of successfully taking over the Strip. A Hamas official, by contrast, described the terror group's position as a interim accord, paving the way toward broader negotiations to end the war, which they started. But the gulf between the two sides remains wide. Israel demands that Hamas disarm and its leaders leave Gaza altogether, conditions that the Iran backed group has so far repeatedly rejected. All right, up next, North Korea's Kim Jong Un calls for a rapid buildup of his country's nuclear arsenal to counter what he calls provocations by the US And South Korea. I'll be right back. Hey, Mike Baker here. Now, Labor Day is coming up. I'm sure you already knew that. And it's one American holiday where we celebrate hard work by, well, not working. And while no one's quite sure what we're supposed to be doing on Labor Day, grilling or resting or shopping for mattresses, we do Know this Tritails Beef is giving away a free prime ribeye when you order either the Freedom box or the Pitmaster Grill. Out pro now through September 1st. Now Tritails is a terrific company. It's a fifth generation Texas family run ranch. Real people. No corporations, no middlemen, no fluff, just pasture raised grain, finished dry aged beef delivered straight from their ranch to your home. Their amazing steaks will make your Labor Day grill the most American thing since pickup trucks and porch flags. Now one heads up, there is no shipping on September 1st or 2nd. Even ranchers frankly should get a break occasionally. Head to try beef.com that's tribe beef.com and grab your box. You can even order the PDB box. That's correct, you can. It's chock full of my favorite steaks. Give it a go. It's really good. This Labor Day, don't settle for shrink wrap steak from some megastore. Get the real stuff straight from the Tritails Ranch in Texas to your home. Mike Baker here. Let me take just a moment of your time to talk about protecting your hard earned assets. Now you've probably noticed a little turmoil out there in the economy, am I right? Trade wars, tariffs back and forth, a U.S. federal Reserve that's a bit at odds with the White House. Uncertainty over employment numbers, volatile stock market. You get the picture. And it's at times like these when it's important to think about your assets and how to protect them. And one way to do that is through diversification. 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Piers Morgan
I'm Piers Morgan, the host of the Piers Morgan Uncensored podcast. We do big interviews and we do big debates about whatever's getting people talking. We make news, we make noise and we make a little bit of trouble. Too. Come and see what all the fuss is about. You can listen to Piers Morgan uncensored on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Mike Baker
Welcome back to the afternoon bulletin. North Korea's little rocket man is back to stirring the pot on the Korean Peninsula, calling for a major buildup of his country's rogue nuclear program. The nuclear escalation came on Monday evening after South Korea and the US Began their annual large scale joint military drills, including testing an upgraded response to the Hermit Kingdom's ongoing nuclear threats. North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un slammed the exercises as a, quote, obvious expression of their will to provoke war and said his country will, quote, make a radical and swift change to respond to the perceived threat by engaging in a, quote, rapid expansion of nuclearization, according to a report from Reuters. For some context, the 11 day annual joint exercises, called the Ulti Freedom Shield, are routine and defensive in nature and will involve 21,000 soldiers, 18,000 of which are South Korean. We should note that the drills were actually scaled back this year by South Korean leaders in an effort to ease tensions with their belligerent northern neighbor. Specifically, 20 out of 40 field training events set to take place this month were rescheduled for later in the fall. Just days earlier, newly elected South Korean President Lee Jae Myung and said he would respect the North Korean regime, adding, he, quote, has no intention to engage in any hostile acts. He even wants to revive the 2018 Inter Korean Military agreement aimed at reducing military activity along the border. That was suspended back in 2023 after the Kim regime launched a military spy satellite. But the North Korean despot appears intent on using the drills as an excuse to further inflame regional tensions. During a visit to a Navy destroyer on Monday, one that didn't sink, Kim denounced the drills as evidence that the US and South Korea intend to, quote, remain most hostile and confrontational. He claimed the defensive exercises will involve what he described as a, quote, nuclear element and that the Hermit Kingdom must respond by flooring the gas on their nuclear efforts. An analyst at the Korea Institute for National Unification told Reuters, quote, through this move, North Korea is demonstrating its refusal to accept denuclearization and and the will to irreversibly upgrade nuclear weapons, end quote. Now, back in June, satellite imagery released by the International Atomic Energy Agency, or the iaea, revealed that the Kim regime is building a new uranium enrichment facility at its main nuclear complex. At the time, UN inspectors warned it was the clearest sign yet that Kim is preparing to expand his nuclear arsenal. But insights into the Hermit Kingdom's nuclear program remain very limited, as the IAEA has been locked out of North Korea since 2009. Since then, inspectors have been forced to rely almost entirely on satellite surveillance and the regime's heavily curated state media output. The regime's long defiance of UN Security Council resolutions, well, that's well documented. They've conducted six underground nuclear tests since 2006 and dozens of ballistic missile launches. Their ever growing arsenal has all but normalized North Korea's status as a nuclear power. As a reminder, Western intelligence agencies estimate that North Korea has already stockpiled around 55. 0 nuclear warheads and has enough fissile material to produce some 40 more. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute echoed that warning last year, saying the arsenal could grow significantly under current conditions. South Korea's new president is set to meet with U.S. president Trump at a summit on Aug. 25 in Washington, D.C. and the North's latest nuclear buildup is expected, of course, to be at the top of the agenda. And that, my friends, is the PDB Afternoon bulletin for Tuesday 19th August. Now if you have any questions or comments, please reach out to me@pdbhefirsttv.com and of course to listen to the show ad free. You can do that and you can do it very easily. Just become a Premium member of the President's Daily brief by visiting PDB premium.com It's that simple. I'm Mike Baker and I'll be back tomorrow. Until then, stay informed, stay safe, stay cool. Hey, Mike Baker here. If there's something that all of us can believe in, it's hard work, self reliance and and showing up for the people who count on us. Am I right? And a key factor in doing all that, of course is getting enough rest, getting a good night's sleep. You know how important that is. So introducing Beam's Dream Powder. Now Beam Spelled B E A M is a proudly founded American company and it's run by people who share our values, hard work, integrity and delivering results. 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