Vice President JD Vance said it was an ‘amazing blessing’ Thursday to visit the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, where Christians believe Jesus Christ was crucified, buried and resurrected.

The visit came as Vance was visiting Israel to build upon the Trump administration’s ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

‘I am immensely grateful to the Greek, Armenian, and Catholic priests who care for this most sacred of places,’ Vance wrote on X on Thursday, sharing photos of his visit to the church. ‘May the Prince of Peace have mercy on us, and bless our efforts for peace.’

‘I am also grateful to the Franciscan monks who celebrated a private mass for my family and many of the Americans working for peace. They are a great credit to the Christian faith, and they were kind enough to take the time to minister to us at a very special moment,’ Vance added.

Vance previewed his church visit in remarks to reporters on Wednesday. 

‘I hope to go to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which Christians believe is the site that Jesus Christ was crucified in,’ Vance said. ‘And I know that Christians have many titles for Jesus Christ, and one of them is the Prince of Peace. And I’d ask all people of faith, in particular my fellow Christians, to pray that the Prince of Peace can continue to work a miracle in this region of the world.’

‘I think that we have made incredible strides over the past week,’ he added. ‘We’re going to have to make a lot more. But I think with your prayers, with God’s providence, and with a very good team behind me, I think we’re going to get it done.’

The church was founded in 326 A.D., though the original fourth-century structure was destroyed by Islamic ruler al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah in 1009 A.D.

The site was taken over by Christian crusaders nearly a century later, and Francesca Stasolla, an archaeology professor at the Sapienza University of Rome, told Fox News Digital earlier this year that the still-standing church is largely the work of the crusaders.

‘The site of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem is identified as the place of both the crucifixion and the tomb of Jesus of Nazareth,’ the church’s website says. ‘The church has long been a major pilgrimage center for Christians worldwide.’ 

Before departing the country on Thursday, Vance categorized his trip to Israel as ‘productive,’ adding that so far, the ceasefire has seemed to hold for the most part.

‘The whole purpose of this trip was really to try to understand how to make the peace stick, how to move on to phase two successfully, and a big part of that is just understanding what would be necessary to police and secure Gaza so that on the one hand,’ Vance said. ‘We can provide stability and hopefully some humanitarian assistance to the Gazans, but on the other hand, ensure that Hamas is unable to threaten Israel. So it was a productive trip.’

Speaking alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday, Vance said that the ‘very, very tough task’ ahead is to ‘disarm Hamas but rebuild Gaza to make life better for the people in Gaza, but also to ensure that Hamas is no longer a threat to our friends in Israel.’ 

Fox News Digital’s Andrea Margolis contributed to this report.

U.S. travelers could soon start to feel the pain of the ongoing government shutdown, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy warned on Thursday.

Duffy joined House GOP leaders at their daily press conference on Day 23 of the shutdown to talk about the difficulties Congress’ fiscal standoff is putting on the nation’s air traffic controllers.

The Trump Cabinet official said air traffic controllers he’s spoken with were ‘angry’ and ‘frustrated’ about being forced to work without pay — noting that Tuesday, Oct. 28, will mark their first full missed paycheck if a sudden breakthrough does not happen on Capitol Hill by then.

‘Safety is paramount for us. And so, if we don’t have the staffing levels in a tower TRACON or center, you will see us delay traffic. You will see us cancel flights,’ Duffy said. ‘It’s not moving as many flights as possible. It’s moving as many flights as possible safely. That is our mission.’

Duffy said that many air traffic controllers are already working under difficult conditions, noting they would get even worse if the shutdown persists.

‘If you have a controller that’s working six days a week but has to think about, ‘How am I going to pay the mortgage, how am I to make the car payment, how am I going to put food on my kid’s table?’ They have to make choices, and the choice they’re making is to take a second job,’ he said.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., noted that roughly 13,000 air traffic controllers and 50,000 Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers will work without pay the longer the shutdown goes on.

‘There were 19,000 delayed flights from Saturday to Monday and an additional 1,600 canceled flights during that same period. That number is only going to increase as the Democrat shutdown continues,’ Johnson said.

‘We are rounding into a holiday season, as we all know, and we’re in the middle of the height of the football season. This is peak travel time for the U.S. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are going to travel to football games this weekend, for example.’

The U.S. air traffic control system has already been dealing with years-long staffing issues, forcing existing workers to take on grueling shifts with little time off. But the shutdown’s compound effect on the current workforce could exacerbate longstanding issues.

It comes just over a month before millions of Americans are expected to travel for the Thanksgiving holiday and the end-of-year holidays a month after that.

‘I want to reiterate, we are all about safety. And we will make sure we work every day on that part of our job,’ Duffy said. ‘But again, I can’t guarantee you that your flight is going to be on time. I can’t guarantee you that you’re not gonna be canceled. It’s going to depend on our air traffic controllers coming in to work every single day.’

At another point, he blamed Democrats for resisting the GOP’s government funding plan for over a month and prolonging the shutdown.

‘I do think, in the Democrat senators’ hearts, they want to vote to open the government up. They don’t want to hurt the American people. But we’ve seen they have a radical base,’ Duffy said. ‘This is because Democrats are concerned about their own hide, and they’ve sold the country to the most radical element of their country. And I think that’s really shameful. It’s too bad.’

The government shutdown shows no signs of ending for now as Democrats and Republicans remain in disagreement over federal funding.

Senate Democrats, who are demanding any funding bill be paired with healthcare concessions from the GOP, have rejected Republicans’ plan — an extension of current federal funding levels through Nov. 21 — 12 times.

With just a dozen days to go until Election Day, a new poll in one of the only two states in the nation holding showdowns for governor this year indicates Democrats with a single-digit lead at the top of the ticket, but tight margins in the races for lieutenant governor and attorney general.

Democratic gubernatorial nominee and former Rep. Abigail Spanberger leads Republican rival Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears 52%-43% among likely voters in Virginia, according to a Suffolk University poll released Thursday in the race to succeed term-limited GOP Gov. Glenn Youngkin.

But the survey indicates Republican Lt. Gov. nominee John Reid and Democratic rival Ghazala Hasmi deadlocked at 45%, and GOP Attorney General Jason Miyares topping Democratic challenger Jay Jones 46%-42%.

Virginia and New Jersey are the only states that hold gubernatorial contests in the year after a presidential election. And the elections, which traditionally grab outsized national attention, are viewed this year as early verdicts on President Donald Trump’s unprecedented and relentless second-term agenda, as well as key barometers ahead of next year’s midterm showdowns for the U.S. House and Senate.

While Spanberger has held the lead over Earle-Sears in a slew of surveys since the start of the year, polls tightened recently after explosive revelations in Virginia’s attorney general race rocked the campaign trail.

Jones has been in crisis mode since controversial three-year-old texts — where he compared then-Virginia House Speaker Todd Gilbert to mass murderers Adolf Hitler and Pol Pot. He said that if he was given two bullets, he would use both against the GOP lawmaker to shoot him in the head. The news was first reported a couple of weeks ago by the National Review.

Jones acknowledged and apologized for the texts, but has been facing calls from Republicans to drop out of the race. And the GOP is aiming to leverage the controversy up and down the ballot, forcing Spanberger on defense.

While the poll indicated that more respondents see the nation on the wrong track, more also view Virginia on the right track under Youngkin, which would typically buoy the party in power in Richmond.

However, President Donald Trump’s approval has fallen below 40%, suggesting a tug-of-war that could break for Democrats in the end. However, Trump also received the most credit from Virginians asked about the Israel-Hamas peace process – with former President Joe Biden only receiving credit from 4% of respondents.

More respondents also blamed Democrats than Republicans for the ongoing government shutdown – by 38-28%, while Trump, by name, was blamed by 21% of additional respondents.

‘Spanberger is trying to carry the whole Democratic ticket over the finish line,’ said David Paleologos, Director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center. ‘However, the Democratic nominees for lieutenant governor and attorney general are struggling in their respective contests, and they can’t seem to replicate Spanberger’s popularity, early voting ground game, or dominance over their opponents.’

According to the new poll, which was conducted Oct. 19–21, Spanberger led Earle-Sears among women 57%-38%, while only trailing among men by a single point, 49%-48%. Among Black voters, Spanberger led Earle-Sears 87%-9%, while trailing among white voters 52%-46%.

And the survey indicated Spanberger topping Earle-Sears by 15 points among those voters who identify as independents, and by 19 points among those who have already cast a ballot.

Early voting in Virginia kicked off on September 19 and the poll suggests that nearly a quarter of all votes for governor in the November election have already been cast.

Five-hundred likely voters in Virginia were questioned in the poll. The survey’s margin of error is plus or minus 4.4 percentage points.

President Donald Trump issued Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a stern warning Oct. 4, according to a new report. 

At that point, representatives from the Trump administration had hashed out an agreement with other mediators from countries including Qatar, Egypt and Turkey — just days before the two-year anniversary of the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.

Trump didn’t mince his words during a call with Netanyahu: the deal would be announced and Netanyahu had no other choice but to get on board, Time magazine reported Thursday. 

‘Bibi, you can’t fight the world,’ Trump said he told Netanyahu, as he detailed their conversation in an interview with Time. ‘You can fight individual battles, but the world’s against you.’

Although Netanyahu resisted, Trump’s patience had expired. Trump ‘launched into a profanity-laced monologue cataloging all he’d done for Israel as President: moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, recognizing its sovereignty over the Golan Heights, brokering the Abraham Accords that normalized relations between Israel and several Arab states, even joining Israel’s strikes on Iran in June,’ according to Time. 

As a result, Trump indicated that he would no longer back Netanyahu if the prime minister didn’t agree to the peace deal, Time reported. 

‘It was a very blunt and straightforward statement to Bibi…that he has no tolerance for anything other than this,’ Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, told the outlet. 

Netanyahu ultimately agreed to the deal, which includes a provision requiring Israeli forces to pull its troops, and a complete disarmament of Hamas. 

The deal also required Hamas to return the hostages that were still in captivity within 72 hours of signing the agreement. Hamas has yet to turn over some of the remains of deceased Israeli hostages.

Netanyahu’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Fox News Digital. 

Israel began to face increased pressure and frustration from the Trump administration after it conducted strikes against Hamas leaders in Doha, Qatar, in September. Qatar is a U.S. ally, and the attack violated the country’s sovereignty — prompting Trump to say at the time that he was ‘very unhappy about every aspect’ of the situation. 

But Trump used the attack as leverage to convince regional leaders to band together and negotiate an end to the conflict. 

‘This was one of the things that brought us all together,’ Trump told Time. ‘It was so out of joint that it sort of got everybody to do what they have to do. If you took that away, we might not be talking about this subject right now.’

Trump has hailed the peace agreement as a victory, and visited with Israeli lawmakers in the Knesset and other officials in Egypt to recognize the finalization of the first phase of the deal. 

‘At long last, we have peace in the Middle East, and it’s a very simple expression, peace in the Middle East,’ Trump told reporters in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. 

‘We’ve heard it for many years, but nobody thought it could ever get there,’ Trump said. ‘And now we’re there.’

Now, Trump has indicated that he is setting his sights on ending the war between Russia and Ukraine, and signaled his administration will build off the momentum from the Middle East peace agreement to end the conflict in Europe. 

Trump met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy Friday, and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte Wednesday, to discuss the conflict.

Vice President JD Vance said Thursday that a vote by Israeli lawmakers to annex the West Bank was a ‘very stupid political stunt.’

A bill applying Israeli law to the occupied West Bank, which effectively would annex the territory for Israel, passed a vote Wednesday in Israel’s parliament as Vance was visiting the country, according to Reuters. It was the first of four votes needed for the proposal to become law. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party did not back the legislation, which was pushed by lawmakers outside his ruling coalition, the news agency added.

‘That was weird. I was sort of confused by that,’ Vance told reporters on Thursday when asked about the vote. ‘Now I actually asked somebody about it, and they told me that it was a symbolic vote, some symbolic vote to recognize or a symbolic vote to annex the West Bank. I mean, what I would say to that is when I asked about it, somebody told me it was a political stunt, that it had no practical significance, it was purely symbolic.’

‘I mean look, if it was a political stunt, it was a very stupid political stunt, and I personally take some insult to it. The West Bank is not going to be annexed by Israel,’ Vance added. ‘The policy of the Trump administration is that the West Bank will not be annexed by Israel. That will continue to be our policy. And if people want to take symbolic votes, they can do that, but we certainly weren’t happy about it.’

Following Vance’s comments, a top member of Netanyahu’s Likud Party announced Thursday that the Israeli prime minister told him not to advance proposals regarding the annexation of the West Bank, according to Israeli media.

‘The Knesset vote on annexation was a deliberate political provocation by the opposition to sow discord during Vice President JD Vance’s visit to Israel. The two bills were sponsored by opposition members of the Knesset,’ Netanyahu’s office wrote on X.

‘The Likud party and the religious parties (the principal coalition members) did not vote for these bills, except for one disgruntled Likud member who was recently fired from the chairmanship of a Knesset committee. Without Likud support, these bills are unlikely to go anywhere,’ it added.

Possible annexation of the West Bank has been floated in Israel in response to a string of countries moving to recognize a Palestinian state, according to The Associated Press.

Israel captured the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip in the 1967 Mideast war. The Palestinians want all three territories to form their future state. They, and much of the international community, say annexation would all but end any remaining possibility of a two-state solution, the AP reported.

More than half a million Jewish settlers now live in the West Bank in some 130 settlements.

‘I will not allow Israel to annex the West Bank,’ President Donald Trump said in late September in the Oval Office. ‘I will not allow it. It’s not going to happen.’

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

A top House Republican is criticizing one of Democrats’ senior leaders for saying the government shutdown and its effects are a ‘leverage point’ to accomplish their goals on healthcare.

‘It’s appalling to see the number two House Democrat openly admit that the left is weaponizing hardworking Americans as ‘leverage’ for political gain, even acknowledging families will suffer in the process,’ Republican Study Committee Chair August Pfluger, R-Texas, told Fox News Digital.

‘This isn’t governance — it’s calculated hostage-taking, with struggling families caught in the balance as Democrats attempt to force through their radical agenda. Families are seen only as leverage by Democrats. We always knew it, now they’re saying it out loud. Absolutely shameful.’

House Minority Whip Katherine Clark, D-Mass., sat down for an interview with Fox News’ Chad Pergram last week. At one point, Clark was asked about who Americans would find responsible for the ongoing shutdown.

‘I mean, shutdowns are terrible and, of course, there will be, you know, families that are going to suffer. We take that responsibility very seriously. But it is one of the few leverage times we have,’ Clark responded.

‘It is an inflection point in this budget process where we have tried to get the Republicans to meet with us and prioritize the American people, and it’s been an absolute refusal, and they were willing to let government shut down when they control the House, the Senate and the White House rather than come and talk about an issue as important to the American people is if they can afford healthcare.’

Fox News Digital reached out to Clark’s office for a response to Pfluger’s comments.

The government shutdown is now in its 23rd day after Senate Democrats rejected the GOP’s federal funding bill for a 12th time on Wednesday evening.

Republicans proposed a measure that would keep federal funding roughly flat until Nov. 21, a spending patch called a continuing resolution (CR), so that negotiators would have more time to strike a longer-term deal on fiscal year (FY) 2026.

The bill passed the House largely along partisan lines on Sept. 19.

But Democrats have been pushing for any funding deal to include an extension of Obamacare subsidies that were enhanced during the COVID-19 pandemic. Those enhancements are set to expire at the end of 2025.

Republican leaders have signaled a willingness to negotiate on those subsidies, but have ruled out doing so in the current package.

‘Mike Johnson said, we have an eternity to talk about this, an eternity. This impact of the ACA is in the next few weeks,’ Clark said. ‘Yes, there are repercussions to a shutdown that are terrible for people.’

She continued, ‘I feel for military families that even if they get paid, you know, there are lots of spouses that also work that are feeling these cuts because we’ve encouraged military spouses to become federal workers to accommodate all the travel and moving that military families so frequently experience. And now we’re saying to them, you’re not going to be paid for your work. I mean, let’s get it together here. The Republicans need to come to town. They need to sit down with us.’

Republicans have seized on Clark’s comments in recent days, however.

House GOP Chairwoman Lisa McClain, R-Mich., said in a statement on Wednesday, ‘Democrats are holding American families hostage to advance their political agenda, and they’re admitting it.’

Vice President JD Vance slammed former White House press secretary Jen Psaki’s ‘disgraceful’ remarks implying that second lady Usha Vance is afraid of her husband.

‘I think it’s disgraceful, but of course the second lady can speak for herself,’ Vance told reporters in Israel on Thursday. 

He remarked that he is ‘very lucky to have a wonderful wife’ and that he was honored to have her by his side during his recent trip to Israel.

Psaki made remarks about the second lady during an appearance on the ‘I’ve Had It’ podcast and suggested that the vice president is ‘scarier’ than President Donald Trump.

‘I think the little Manchurian candidate, JD Vance, wants to be president more than anything else,’ Psaki said. ‘I always wonder what’s going on in the mind of his wife. Like, are you OK? Please blink four times. We’ll come over here. We’ll save you.’

‘And that he’s willing to do anything to get there. And your whole iteration you just outlined, I mean, he’s scarier in certain ways in some ways. And he’s young and ambitious and agile in the sense that he’s a chameleon who makes himself whatever he thinks the audience wants to hear from him,’ she added.

Social media exploded with criticism of Psaki’s remarks as the clip of her podcast appearance went viral.

Steven Cheung, Trump’s communications director, accused Psaki of ‘transferring her own personal issues onto others’ and said she ‘has to overcompensate for her lack of talent by saying untrue things.’

Fox News contributor Joe Concha also chimed in, saying that Psaki is, ‘Not a good person. At all.’

Usha Vance met her husband while attending Yale Law School. The White House notes in its biography of the second lady that she ‘is an experienced litigator whose work involved complex civil litigation and appeals in a wide variety of industries.’ Additionally, she clerked for Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and for then-Judge Brett Kavanaugh, who was serving on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

In his memoir, ‘Hillbilly Elegy,’ which was originally published in June 2016, the now-vice president called Usha his ‘Yale spirit guide’ and said that, ‘In a place that always seemed a little foreign, Usha’s presence made me feel at home,’ according to PBS.

The Vances welcomed their first son, Ewan, in June 2017, according to People magazine. Their second son, Vivek, was born in February 2020, and their daughter, Mirabel, was born in December 2021.

Fox News Digital’s Lindsay Kornick contributed to this report.