Trump administration secures mother of US Navy soldier's evacuation from Gaza - report
She was evacuated in past weeks in a discreet cooperation after an intervention by the Trump administration and the Israeli and Jordanian governments, the Washington Post reported
Ahlam Firwana, a 59-year-old Palestinian woman whose son serves in the US Navy, was evacuated from Gaza in the past few weeks in a discreet cooperation after an intervention by the Trump administration and the Israeli and Jordanian governments, sources told The Washington Post.
According to the report, her evacuation required a coordinated pause in IDF strikes to protect Firwana's transportation through the Strip, and involved a $10,000 donation to cover transportation costs, sophisticated software to monitor her movements, and the direct involvement of senior US officials who helped secure agreements from the governments of Jordan and Israel.
Firwana’s son, Navy Petty Officer Younis Firwana, 32, joined the US military in 2023 seeking a path to citizenship. His family’s seven-story home was destroyed in Israel's offensive, which began after the October 7 massacre in 2024. In August, the State Department announced that it would stop issuing visitor visas for people from Gaza. The children and spouses of US citizens were since denied for evacuation based on national security grounds, the report said.
Younis Firwana worked since early 2024 to coordinate his mother’s departure through Jordan from California, where he is stationed as a Navy medic. He applied for expedited processing for his siblings’ cases, too, but said he was denied in every case but his mother’s. He secured approval from US immigration officials for her to enter the US but couldn’t find anyone who could escort her out of Gaza or help her renew her expired passport.
In early September, Firwana was connected with the Special Operations Association of America, a veterans organization that has supported the legal evacuation of roughly 1,100 people from Gaza since the war began, including the mother of a US soldier.
Morgan Ortagus, Trump’s deputy special envoy to the Middle East and herself a Navy reservist, connected the team with top officials at the US Embassy in Amman, Jordan.
Together with the Shin Bet and the Mossad, they ensured “they didn’t target her location” and sought “a security buffer around her” so that the extraction team would not unintentionally be hit by a military strike.
When the original plan for an Israeli escort was abandoned because of paperwork delays, the veterans’ group donated $10,000 to hire ground transportation to securely move Firwana from her building in Gaza City to the Kerem Shalom border crossing, according to The Post.