Ghazi Hamad, deputy foreign minister of Hamas, responded to an appeal by Israeli peace activist Gershon Baskin to negotiate the release of Gilad Shalit. For three months, Hamad conveyed messages from the Hamas government to then-prime minister Ehud Olmert, through Baskin and Olmert’s daughter Dana.
Gershon Baskin, who maintains close contact with Hamas’s political leadership, thinks that Muhammad Deif is a figurehead, a symbol, the spirit, the myth, and finds it hard to imagine that he’s actually a fully functioning human being.
Gershon Baskin says that by killing Hamas military chief and launching wide operation, Israel has squandered its chance for calm in Gaza and destroyed its security coordination with Egypt.