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Originally posted by wcb6092:
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Inside Story

On a deadline: How Biden and Trump brokered hostage deal before ‘all hell’ broke loose

Mediators used framework outlined by outgoing US president and were empowered by Israel’s weakening of Iranian axis, but needed assistance from US president-elect to close the deal

By Jacob Magid
Today, 9:58 am

To chalk up the hostage release and ceasefire agreement inked Wednesday to the actions of one leader would be to oversimplify a months-long negotiation between Israel and Hamas that had a dizzying number of moving parts.

Unmoved by that reality, US President-elect Donald Trump was quick to declare that he was the one and only causative factor.

“This EPIC ceasefire agreement could have only happened as a result of our Historic Victory in November, as it signaled to the entire World that my Administration would seek Peace and negotiate deals to ensure the safety of all Americans, and our Allies,” Trump wrote in a celebratory post on Truth Social.

Outgoing US President Joe Biden was a bit more diplomatic, while pointing out that the deal reached Wednesday was the “exact” same framework as the one he unveiled in a May 31 speech.

However, he was also willing to note that it was Israel’s successes on the battlefield against Hamas, Iran’s more powerful proxy Hezbollah, and Tehran itself that created the conditions necessary for a breakthrough.

But during the talks, the parties had still appeared stuck in a state of perpetual bloodshed even though Israel had decimated Hamas and just about all of Gaza, and despite the Biden administration’s framework allowing both sides to save face — with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu certain to assert now that the deal allows him to resume fighting after the first phase, and Hamas already characterizing the deal as a permanent end to the war.

[...]

Arab diplomats from both mediating countries Egypt and Qatar acknowledged to The Times of Israel that Hamas had periodically been the main obstacle in the hostage talks, but just as often, the barrier was Netanyahu — something Washington never said publicly until after the deal was announced on Wednesday.

Overcoming that obstacle required an American leader whom Netanyahu feared, not one he boasted of having snubbed.

Enter: Donald Trump.

His December 8 threat of “ALL HELL TO PAY” in the Middle East if the hostages weren’t released by his January 20 inauguration was directed at Hamas, but the incoming leader’s ability to influence the Palestinian terror organization, which had almost nothing left to lose, was limited.

Netanyahu, on the other hand, will be needing Trump’s assistance for the next four years, not least with his arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court, which he’s hoping the US will agree to sanction once the president-elect enters office.

Trump dispatched his incoming Mideast envoy, Steve Witkoff, to join the negotiations in Doha last week, and on Saturday, Witkoff flew to Israel to meet with Netanyahu.

Two officials familiar with the meeting told The Times of Israel on Monday the meeting was tense, with Witkoff leaning on Netanyahu to make the compromises necessary for a hostage deal.

The sit-down led to a breakthrough, with two senior Arab diplomats telling The Times of Israel on Tuesday that Trump’s envoy managed to pressure Netanyahu more in one meeting than the Biden administration had all year.

Asked about this during a Wednesday press briefing, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller insisted: “It is not because of pressure… by any party on the government of Israel [in] the last few days that has gotten us to a deal.”

Miller said the breakthrough was because of Hamas’s weakened and isolated position and the fact that its fighters “needed a break” from the fighting.

From temporary to permanent ceasefire

Another senior Biden administration official sought to hash out this argument during a separate briefing with reporters on Wednesday.

The senior Biden aide credited the breakthrough in negotiations to Israel’s September escalation against Hezbollah in Lebanon, which he said Washington fully backed.

[...]

The senior Biden official briefing reporters on Wednesday harkened back to the first hostage deal in November 2023, which fell apart after a week when Hamas walked back on commitments to release a number of female hostages, whereupon the fighting resumed.

The US sought unsuccessfully to secure short-term hostage release and ceasefire deals in the months that followed, before settling on the staged framework in May.

Negotiations were subsequently held on and off, with Hamas agreeing to the proposal at the beginning of July, while making a series of amendments.

Netanyahu’s added conditions

The senior US official claimed that the Hamas response was one that no Israeli government could have accepted as it was effectively an “all for all” deal that required Israel to fully withdraw from Gaza, while leaving Hamas in power. This contradicted what Israeli and Arab officials familiar with the talks have said about the Hamas offer, arguing that it was not a drastic departure from Israel’s earlier proposal.

Moreover, Israel’s negotiating team of security chiefs urged the government to accept the Hamas response at the time. However, Netanyahu proceeded to add conditions regarding Israel’s withdrawal from the Strip, which led to a breakdown in talks, according to Arab, Israeli and US officials at the time.

Speaking shortly before the anonymous US official on Wednesday, Miller became the first US official to acknowledge publicly for the first time that Netanyahu added conditions to prior proposals that hampered negotiations.

For months, Biden officials publicly insisted that Hamas was the main obstacle to a deal, and while they sometimes said “both sides” were not cooperative, they avoided ever singling out Netanyahu.

Israeli, Arab and US officials all told The Times of Israel on condition of anonymity that Netanyahu was also chiefly to blame at times for breakdowns in negotiations, particularly in July when he added conditions to his earlier proposal regarding the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, which torpedoed the negotiations.

Former members of Israel’s war cabinet Benny Gantz, Gadi Eisenkot and Yoav Gallant have all spoken publicly of this to varying degrees, revealing that Netanyahu’s desire to ensure his coalition would remain intact had harmed efforts to reach a deal. Netanyahu has denied this.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken appeared to suggest earlier this month that the US refrained from publicly criticizing Israel’s role in the talks amid fears that this would lead Hamas to harden its positions.

Miller said Wednesday: “There have been times that Israel has introduced new conditions and new proposals that have made it more difficult to get an agreement.”

“There certainly have been times when we went to the government of Israel and said: ‘We think that you are pushing too hard, and we want you to back down,’” Miller recalled.

However, he asserted that Hamas sometimes did the same thing and that since August, the terror group had been the main obstacle to an agreement. During that month, Hamas decided that it wasn’t going to negotiate at all.

Hezbollah leaves the scene

The US sought to revive negotiations in August, but that effort fell apart after Hamas executed six hostages — including American-Israel national Hersh Goldberg-Polin — as their captors feared that IDF troops were approaching the tunnel where they were held in southern Gaza’s Rafah, the senior US official said during the separate briefing Wednesday.

“After that, we really shifted our focus, and the strategy became… the campaign in Lebanon to defang Hezbollah,” the senior US official says. “We supported the Israelis… because as long as Hezbollah was saying it would continue to [maintain] another front against Israel… Hamas was not really under enough pressure and isolation to do the deal and release the hostages.”

It was around this time that Israeli forces managed to kill Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in Gaza.

The senior official told reporters that already in August when the hostages were executed, the US “basically concluded that as long as Yahya Sinwar was alive, we were not going to get a deal.”

This conclusion was also what led to the shift in focus to wrapping up the northern front.

Once Israel completed many of its operational goals against Hezbollah in October, Biden’s top aides returned to the region and met with Netanyahu, who agreed to work toward a US-brokered ceasefire in Lebanon, which could then be dovetailed with a ceasefire in Gaza, the senior official recalled. The Lebanon deal was reached on November 27.

Less than two weeks later, Biden’s top aides traveled to the region to revive the negotiations.

He recalled quickly hitting a wall after Hamas refused to provide a list of the 33 hostages it was prepared to release in the first phase of the deal.

Hamas asked for a one-week ceasefire in order to come up with the list, but Israel and the mediators held firm in their rejection of the idea.

The terror group managed to submit a list at the end of December, which allowed talks to proceed, the senior US official says.

The list is widely reported to not specify which hostages are alive and which are dead, but the official didn’t go as far as to acknowledge this.

Hamas officials said the group had lost contact with many of those holding hostages and insisted it could not confirm the status of all hostages without a halt of Israeli fire.

Shortly after the list was produced by Hamas, though, Biden’s top advisers traveled to the region to jumpstart and finalize negotiations. On January 5, Brett McGurk arrived back in Doha where he has remained ever since, participating in 18 hours or more of negotiations each day, the US official said.

Over the last several days, negotiations were taking place at a building in Doha, with the Israeli and American teams on the second floor, the Hamas team on the first floor and the Egyptian and Qatari teams shuttling between them.

Hamas tried to add new demands at the last minute, but “we held very firm, and we now have an agreement,” said the US official.

Hamas tried to add new demands at the last minute, but “we held very firm, and we now have an agreement,” said the US official.

The senior US official appeared to acknowledge that the “natural deadline” created by the January 20 transition between administrations had added a sense of urgency that led the talks to progress, but he insisted that the “catalyst for intensive diplomacy” was Israel’s defanging of Hezbollah in the fall.

The Biden aide appeared to agree with US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan’s downplaying of Trump’s “all hell to pay” threats if the hostages weren’t released by January 20. “Jake has spoken to this — hell has been paid to Hamas tremendously.

“But I do have to say, if they refused to release the hostages, I think there was a very good chance of the war escalating,” he added, while noting that this would also likely have meant that the hostages would have been killed.

quote:

PM’s office claims Hamas creating last-minute ‘crisis’ and backing out of some agreements, delaying cabinet vote

By Amy Spiro
Today, 10:37 am

The Prime Minister’s Office claims Hamas has backed out of some agreements and is creating a last-minute “crisis” in finalizing the hostage release deal.

“Hamas is reneging on the understandings and creating a last-minute crisis that is preventing an agreement,” the PMO says in a statement, issuing it in both English and Hebrew.

“The Israeli cabinet will not convene until the mediators notify Israel that Hamas has accepted all elements of the agreement.”

Overnight the PMO said the purported dispute was related to the identity of Palestinian security prisoners slated for release. It said Hamas was “demanding to dictate the identity of these murderers,” contradicting agreed-upon terms.

A leaked version of the deal said prisoners would be released “based on lists agreed upon by both sides.”

[...]

quote:

Right-wing protesters opposed to hostage deal march to PM’s office in Jerusalem

By Charlie Summers
Today, 12:08 pm

Hundreds of demonstrators decrying the hostage and ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas are marching to the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem.

At the head of the march are family members of slain soldiers, affiliated with the right-wing Gevurah (“Heroism”) Forum.

Protesters deride the deal as a surrender to Hamas that stands to harm the “honor of the Jewish people.”

“We all know that this deal will only weaken the Jewish people,” says Elkana, the brother of fallen soldier Amichai Weitzen.

quote:

Originally posted by BansheeOne:
Claims from Netanyahu's office that Hamas is trying to add conditions after basic agreement are probably meant to cover efforts to keep his own coalition together as the cabinet vote on the deal is coming up.

quote:

Analysis

With hostage deal, Netanyahu is going all in on Trump

The prime minister is risking a schism with his closest political allies to advance a deal with Hamas. He has good reason to think it’s worth the gamble

By Haviv Rettig Gur
Today, 4:38 pm

At the time of writing, the deal between Israel and Hamas for a hostage release and temporary ceasefire in Gaza has not, despite much fanfare around the world, actually been signed and sealed. Claims of last-minute demands from Hamas have prevented a formal announcement.

On Hamas’s side, the last hiccup seems to be the identities of some of the terrorist prisoners Israel will be required to release under the terms of the deal.

But there may be an Israeli hiccup too — a complication that emerges from Netanyahu’s political fears of losing the far-right factions of his coalition.

Otzma Yehudit party leader Itamar Ben Gvir has already declared he will leave the government if the deal is signed. While he appears resolved to that outcome, Netanyahu has worked hard to keep the Religious Zionism chief, Finance Minister Betzalel Smotrich, from doing the same. On paper, Netanyahu’s coalition could survive without them for some time, but it would be a far less stable coalition, and a far less loyal one.

Netanyahu has spent much of the week trying to convince Smotrich that the deal will not mean an end to the war, even if outgoing US President Joe Biden has insisted otherwise.

The argument he’s been making behind closed doors emerged into public view on Thursday in a media statement credited to an unnamed “senior official” — more often than not, journalistic code for a Netanyahu spokesman or even Netanyahu himself.

“Contrary to distorted reports,” the statement read, “Israel won’t be leaving the Philadelphi Corridor” that runs along the Egypt-Gaza border. “Israel will remain on the Corridor throughout phase 1, for all 42 days.” Though IDF forces would redeploy in some parts, “the scale of forces will remain the same, including outposts, patrols, observation sites and control of the entirety of the Corridor.”

And then the statement made a dramatic promise: “If Hamas doesn’t agree [in talks over phase 2] to Israel’s demands for an end to the war (the fulfillment of the war’s goals), then Israel will remain in the Philadelphi Corridor on the 42nd day as well, and certainly on the 50th. In other words, in practical terms, Israel remains in Philadelphi until further notice.”

It’s a strange statement, with the parenthetical about “the fulfillment of the war’s goals” seeming to suggest that phase 2 would depend on Hamas agreeing to surrender or exile after phase 1 — a clear message to Smotrich and the far right — but made by someone trying to phrase it vaguely enough so as not to trigger new obstacles in the negotiations.

Embarrassment

There’s a reason Netanyahu seems to be struggling to speak clearly — and in fact, has not yet spoken openly to the public about what’s going on in the talks.

A large majority of Israelis, including majorities of both Jews and Arabs, support the hostage deal. Some 58% support the deal in full, including at the cost of leaving Hamas in power in Gaza, according to an Israel Democracy Institute poll released Tuesday. Another 12% support the first phase of the deal — 33 hostages released without a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza — and then want a return to fighting. Some 70%, in other words, want the prime minister to sign on the dotted line.

But Netanyahu’s problem lies with the 23% who do not — who support continuing the military campaign, believe it will lead to a better deal down the road, and are nearly all voters for his coalition.

A great many Israelis, especially on the right, are horrified at the costs Israel will pay in the first phase: a thousand Palestinian prisoners released, some of them arch-terrorists and murderers. The hunt for Hamas in Gaza — that long, painful degradation war that has exacted a high cost from Israeli soldiers and families and a much higher one for Gazans and, they believe, must not end with Hamas still in power — will grind to a halt and may not be easy to restart.

If the deal is signed, these Israelis believe, Hamas will survive the war, its forces will be bolstered, its reputation restored, its future control of Gaza all but assured.

What of Netanyahu’s oft-repeated (and oft-mocked) promise of “total victory?”

This is not a small question for him. One of the main drivers of support for the deal is the widespread distrust among many Israelis, measured in many polls, that Netanyahu is either unwilling or incapable of achieving a successful outcome for the war. If you don’t think your leaders can deliver a victory, you become far more likely to support a negotiated end, even if it leaves a hated enemy in power. Distrust of Netanyahu in the political center and left is a major driver of opposition to continued fighting.

Netanyahu cannot afford to create the same impression of incapacity and dishonesty on the far right.

The second deal

All of which begs the question: Why would he be committing to a deal that has so many political risks for him?

The deal now on the table is not, despite Biden’s claims, the same deal offered in May. Key Israeli demands that Hamas refused in the spring have now been met, including the rate of hostage release and the significant Israeli presence in Philadelphi in phase 1.

But why would Hamas suddenly be willing to make those concessions? And why would Netanyahu, who has clung tightly to his coalition’s rightist flank for 16 months, suddenly be willing to risk a political showdown?

Enter Trump.

There are two deals on the table this week: Netanyahu’s deal with Hamas and Netanyahu’s deal with the incoming Trump administration. We know a great deal about the first and very little about the second.

Netanyahu’s change of heart seemed to come in conversations with Trump officials, from the president-elect himself down to Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff — so much so that some Arab officials have suggested that one meeting on Saturday between Netanyahu and Witkoff did more to bring Netanyahu around than a year of Biden administration cajoling.

(It must be said for those who take this to mean that Netanyahu was the chief obstacle to a deal: Hamas had never actually agreed to any previous version of this deal.)

But what could the Trump team have offered Netanyahu to make a showdown with Smotrich and Ben Gvir suddenly palatable?

Publicly, the answer seems to be a promise to resume the war. In his Senate confirmation hearing for his appointment as secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth told the senators bluntly, “I support Israel destroying and killing every last member of Hamas.”

And in an interview with the Call Me Back podcast, incoming national security adviser Mike Waltz said Trump sought to fundamentally change the dynamic that encouraged terrorist groups to take hostages.

“Terrorist groups and rogue states have been taking Americans hostage, and they’ve only seen upside [for doing so for] the last four years,” Waltz charged. “So why not take more? Why not take as many as you can and see what you get? With President Trump, he made it very clear very early — not just with Hamas, with groups around the world — there’ll be nothing but downside.”

Hamas, Waltz told interviewer Dan Senor, “has to be destroyed to the point that it cannot reconstitute.”

Could Netanyahu be channeling a solemn commitment from Trump when he promises Smotrich a resumption of the war after phase 1?

[...]

Netanyahu will almost certainly sign the deal. Hamas will too. Netanyahu will eat a lot of political crow, especially from his rightist base. Hamas will declare victory and parade through the streets of Gaza.

Trump has already taken credit, and Netanyahu will continue to credit him.

And Hamas will play by the rules as well as it possibly can.

And in the meantime, Israel will work ferociously to build out the kind of intelligence infiltration in Gaza that it possessed in Lebanon. It will spend the ceasefire preparing the offensive Netanyahu seems to believe will be permitted him at the end of phase 1.

If this is indeed Netanyahu’s calculation, then the deal he will soon sign is a reasonable gambit and a serious strategy.

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Originally posted by downtownv:
Once again, Israel gives up 100's for 33. Hamas is still in tact. Shitty deal, IMO.

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Originally posted by sigmonkey:
"!בוא נלך ברנדון"

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Originally posted by PR64:

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Originally posted by sigmonkey:
"!בוא נלך ברנדון"

What does this say?

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Originally posted by gearhounds:
Israel should have sent these cretin back chipped so that they could be tracked and then surgically removed along with their buddies.

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Originally posted by sigmonkey:
Israel is going to be doing some deep cleaning in many places.