The US moves are risking ending prematurely what is a very delicate negotiation: the release of prisoners held by Hamas. And the United States should know that in any case without Israel’s approval they would not be able to bring home alive their only citizen still held by Hamas. On Friday a Hamas delegation was in Cairo to discuss the ceasefire agreement in Gaza and to continue negotiations aimed at entering the second phase of the agreement.
Abu Obeida, Hamas spokesman was clear, “if we do not move to the negotiation phase the prisoners will die”. The negotiations seem to have stalled and Trump, as usual, has raised his voice to threaten Hamas, has rejected the Egyptian proposal for the reconstruction of Gaza, with the high probability that the negotiation talks will be interrupted definitively by an attack by Israel on Gaza.
Israel’s new Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir will fire IDF spokesman Daniel Hagari, with Haaretz reporting that “The chief of staff will present a plan to launch a large-scale attack on the Gaza Strip that requires the mobilization of tens of thousands of reserve troops.” “The plan that Zamir will present to the General Staff includes the deployment of several teams across the Gaza Strip, a step that will require a wide-ranging mobilization of reserve forces over a long period of time. After about a year and a half of fighting, security officials said it was doubtful whether the plan was appropriate for the current moment and confirmed that reserve teams are already having difficulty filling their ranks.”
Defense Minister Yisrael Katz said: “I have given instructions to the armed forces to allow the protest ships to reach the coast of Gaza, disembark the protesters in Gaza, seize the ships and transport them to the port of Ashdod so that Israel can use them to evacuate the residents of Gaza.”
According to Ronin Bergman for Yediot Ahronoth: The decision by Adam Bouhler’s team to create a direct path of negotiations with Hamas, according to the Americans’ discussions with people close to the hostages’ families, based on the understanding that negotiations for the general release of the rest of the hostages, whether under the second phase of the current agreement or under a new and different agreement, have reached an impasse – and that the possibility of the first phase of the agreement continues to include the release of other hostages. American actors have also received updates that Israel is preparing for a large-scale and very violent military operation in Gaza, and it could begin at any time.
Based on this analysis of the situation, and with escalating fears that the resumption of fighting could immediately and dangerously endanger the lives of the remaining hostages, and significantly reduce the chances of recovering the bodies of other hostages, the United States has decided to try to secure the release of the American hostages, including Adan Alexander, the last surviving American-Israeli hostage, as well as restore the bodies of four other Israeli-Americans killed and kidnapped in the October 7 attack.
The Israeli government, according to the reporter, has consistently refused to provide assistance to efforts based on the non-Israeli nationality of some hostages, due to the great social and political sensitivity, as such an issue could cause anger among other families. For this reason, the United States has decided that the most appropriate way for this effort to succeed, especially with the closing of the available time window, is to have direct, urgent and confidential conversations with Hamas.
The US delegation that was in Doha last week tried to arrange a meeting with the leaders of the Hamas negotiating team, but then Israel intervened and approached the US National Security Council, and due to Israeli pressure, the council leaders instructed the team in Doha not to hold the meeting at this time.
For this reason, senior US officials decided not to inform Israel about the meeting this time, and wanted to keep it secret for fear that the Israeli government would intervene again to obstruct the talks.
Despite this, a White House spokeswoman announced that Israel had been informed of the talks, while the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office responded with a brief statement that Israel had informed the US of its opposition to direct talks with Hamas.
But behind the scenes, more dramatic developments took place: an article published by the New York Times revealed that Israel did not receive information about the talks directly from the United States, but found out about them through “other channels.”
According to the report, Major General Nitzan Alon, head of the Israeli military intelligence division and a member of the negotiating team, contacted American representatives in Doha, who were surprised that he was aware of what was happening. The United States understood that this call was intended to inform the Americans that they had failed to hide their movements from Israel, which follows these matters through multiple channels, and the Americans believed that the communication was an indirect rebuke to the Trump administration for making a decision that was not coordinated with Israel.
Antonio Albanese e Graziella Giangiulio
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