With Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump’s meeting in Budapest “on hold” for now, US correspondents Martha Kelner and Mark Stone unpick the US president’s latest position on the war in Ukraine.

Martha also chats to Huffington Post journalist SV Dáte about his run-in with White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.

You can also watch all episodes on our YouTube channel.

Email us on trump100@sky.uk with your comments and questions.

As shows of diplomatic power go, this was a pretty good one. Here, in an industrial complex in the south of Israel that is rapidly being repurposed into a joint operations centre, America is taking centre stage.

A group walks in. At the centre is US Vice President JD Vance, flanked by omni-envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, the president’s unofficial emissary to the Middle East and official son-in-law.

And as if to prove just how much heft there is on show, the fourth person to walk in is Admiral Brad Cooper, commander of the US’s Central Command, in charge of a bewildering number of troops and the most powerful foreign military leader in the Middle East. But in this company, he barely said a word.

Mr Vance was composed, enthusiastic and conciliatory. During our drive down to the complex, near the town of Kirya Gat, we had read the latest statement from Donald Trump, released on the social media platform that he owns, threatening swingeing repercussions against Hamas. “FAST, FURIOUS AND BRUTAL,” he had written.

So often the echo of the president’s words, Mr Vance struck a more nuanced tone. Yes, he said that Hamas could end up being “obliterated”, but he also offered the group some support. Since the ceasefire was signed, Hamas has repeatedly said that it cannot easily recover the bodies of all the dead hostages. Mr Vance agrees.

“This is difficult. This is not going to happen overnight,” he said. “Some of these hostages are buried under thousands of pounds of rubble. Some of the hostages, nobody even knows where they are.”

He said it would have been unwise to set a deadline, insisting “we’ve got to be a little bit flexible” and even accused Israel, along with Gulf Arab states, of “a certain amount of impatience with Hamas”.

I asked him if his visit was as a direct result of Israel’s actions on Sunday, responding to the deaths of two soldiers with attacks that killed dozens of Palestinians.

No, said Mr Vance, it had “nothing to do with events in the past 48 hours”. Many will remain dubious – this is his first visit to Israel as vice president, and, if the timing really was coincidental, it was very fortuitous.

Then I asked him about the future of Gaza, about whether there really could be no safeguards that Palestinians would have a significant role in the future of the enclave.

I didn’t expect a long answer – and I certainly didn’t expect him to start by saying “I don’t know the answer to that question” – but that’s what we got.

“I think that what is so cool, what’s so amazing about what these guys have done, is that we’re creating a governance structure that is very flexible to what happens on the ground in the future. We need to reconstitute Gaza. We need to reconstruct Gaza,” he said.

“We need to make sure that both the Palestinians living in Gaza but also the Israelis are able to live in some measure of security and stability. We’re doing all of those things simultaneously. And then I think once we’ve got to a point where both the Gazans and our Israeli friends can have some measure of security, then we’ll worry about what the long-term governance of Gaza is.”

Read more:
British troops deployed to Israel to ‘monitor Gaza ceasefire’
‘Heavy force’ could enter Gaza, says Trump

While the words are different, and the tone is less didactic, the theme is familiar. The short-term gain is peace, while the long-term plan remains largely unaddressed and unformulated.

Work is being done on that front. Diplomatic sources tell me that the effort behind the scenes is now frenetic and wide-ranging, encompassing countries from across the region, but also way beyond.

But the questions they face are towering – who pays, who sets the rules, who enforces law, whose soldiers are the peacekeepers and what happens to all the displaced Gazans?

None of this will be easy.

Mr Vance, like Mr Trump, exudes confidence, and it has clearly inspired other leaders and their nations.

Few can doubt that Mr Trump’s iron-clad self-confidence has given life and momentum to this deal.

But that isn’t enough.

The diplomats, planners and, yes, the politicians have a lot to do.

Elon Musk has attacked NASA’s administrator – and claimed he isn’t smart enough to hold the top job.

The billionaire’s criticism of Sean Duffy came after the space agency said it was open to using moon landers that weren’t manufactured by his company SpaceX.

On X, Musk accused Mr Duffy of “trying to kill NASA”, and wrote: “The person responsible for America’s space program can’t have a 2 digit IQ.”

While NASA has been planning to use SpaceX’s Starship rocket system to land on the lunar surface, proposals will now be accepted from rivals.

The agency wants to return astronauts to the moon within Donald Trump’s second term and do so before China gets there.

Mr Duffy had told CNBC: “We’re not going to wait for one company. We’re going to push this forward and win the second space race against the Chinese.”

While SpaceX has a $2.9bn (£2.2bn) contract for the Artemis III mission, it has fallen behind schedule – with Starship suffering a series of explosive failures this year.

Nonetheless, Musk has defended the company’s progress, writing: “SpaceX is moving like lightning compared to the rest of the space industry.

“Moreover, Starship will end up doing the whole moon mission. Mark my words.”

In response, Mr Duffy said: “Love the passion. The race to the Moon is ON. Great companies shouldn’t be afraid of a challenge. When our innovators compete with each other, America wins!”

Mr Duffy is currently the acting administrator of NASA, but reports suggest that he wants to keep the role.

Musk has previously thrown his support behind a billionaire called Jared Isaacman for the top job, who has previously flown on two private SpaceX missions into orbit.