I don’t have any secret information. I have heard a little from the Egyptian side, nothing from Qatar, although I asked. All of my contacts in Hamas are all on radio silence and I don’t have hard information from the Israeli side either. I can assess, like all of you, from Israeli, Arab, American, and Turkish media regarding the negotiations. I have the advantage of 18 years of negotiations with Hamas and with the Israeli official side to understand somewhat the nature of the negotiations, but there has never been a situation like the one we are in and these negotiations are different from all previous negotiations.
From what I can assess: there are still wide gaps to close.
These are the issues that I believe are not resolved:
- Hamas demand for an Israeli commitment – obligation – in writing to end the war. It seems there is agreement on Israeli redeployment within Gaza but out of populated areas with a number of specified points along the Philidephi corridor agreed to in the first phase. Nothing is agreed to regarding phase 2 on redeployment, Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and ending the war.
- Hamas demand for free movement from the south to the north of Gaza without Israeli checkpoints. Israel has not yet agreed to this. It is important to also remember that nothing remains of Gaza north of Gaza city. It has been totally wiped out by Israel.
- The list of Palestinian prisoners to be released with the highest demand from Hamas being Marwan Barghouthi, Abdallah Barghouthi, Hassan Salameh, and Ahmed Saadat, plus many others serving life sentences. A few months ago, Hamas told me that there was agreement on the key for prisoner release – how many prisoners for each category of hostages. But Israel then demanded about 65 vetoes on the list which Hamas would not agree to. I understand that the Israel demand is now around 50 vetoes and Hamas still rejects it totally. There seems to be agreement that the hard-core prisoners would be sent to exile in Qatar or Turkey and perhaps Iran.
- The list of hostages that Israel and the mediators demand from Hamas. Hamas says they need a full week of total ceasefire without Israeli flyovers to collect all of the information about the whereabout of the hostages and their condition. They don’t know where all of the hostages are, who is holding them and what is their condition. Hamas does not have control over all of Gaza and there might be hostages buried underneath the rubble of buildings bombed by Israel along with several thousands of Palestinians whose whereabouts are unknown.
Providing the list of hostages is very important because no one really knows if the Hamas leadership outside of Gaza can enforce an agreement on Hamas inside of Gaza. There is no full command and control of Hamas inside of Gaza so this kind of information is a sort of test of the ability of Hamas to deliver. It seems that Hamas is also aware that they cannot continue to govern Gaza after the war, but there is no progress on the decision of who will rule Gaza and that is because of the refusal of Israel to consider various options, the inability of Abbas and the Palestinian Authority to be acceptable to the people of Gaza, and the refusal of the Arab states to force Abbas to step aside. This is a crucial issue that will prevent the exit of Israel from Gaza with the possibility of the Israeli settler movement to move into Gaza and to start to build new Israeli settlements there. This must be prevented by anyone concerned with the future of Israel and Palestine.
