My Negotiation with Hamas

I started negotiating with Hamas a week after the abduction of Gilad Schalit in June 2006. Two and a half months later, after two visits to Hamas in Gaza, I was able to produce a letter in Schalit's handwriting - a sign of life and proof that there is a channel that leads to those holding him. Then our "system" told me to cease. I stayed in touch with Hamas over years. In July 2010, I received a request from Ahmed Jabari that Hamas was ready to resume the talks according to the German proposal. I sent it over to the people in charge in Israel, and it didn't interest them at all - they kept saying: We are waiting for an answer from Hamas. When David Meidan was appointed the hostage coordinator, I approached him and he decided to activate me, and thus the secret direct back channel was created. At that time, Netanyahu approved the channel without knowing that I was running it. 

In the middle of July 2011, I achieved the breakthrough that led to the release of Gilad Schalit. In May of this year, I managed to convince our system to activate me again, I started sending messages and receiving answers officially and directly, but after two weeks the system informed me to "stop". In my estimation, Netanyahu found out that I was operating a direct and secret channel that was very active and did not want such a channel. 

About two weeks ago, the hostage families' forum asked me to try to conduct a direct negotiation with Hamas on their behalf. That's what I did, and within two weeks I obtained agreement to a three-week deal - the release of all 107 Israeli hostages, the end of the war, an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and an agreed release of the names and number of Palestinian prisoners. 

The entire Hamas leadership agrees to this outline, but our Netanyahu does not want to end the war. This is the situation today - Saturday, August 31, 2024