CNN’s John Vause interviews Gershon Baskin, the hostage negotiator who helped secure the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, about the behind-the-scenes efforts to free the 239 hostages in Gaza.
To Jerusalem now Gershon Baskin, the hostage negotiator who secured the release of Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier who was held hostage by Hamas for five years. It’s great to have you with us. Thank you for taking time.
GERSHON BASKIN, MIDDLE EAST DIRECTOR, INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITIES ORGANIZATION: Good morning.
VAUSE: Expectations of a hostage deal rebuilding over the past 24 hours, maybe the past few days, not least because of recent comments from U.S. President Joe Biden, like this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What’s your message for the families?
JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT: Hang on there, we’re coming.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Hang in there, we’re coming. Biden also said a deal was going to happen, but gave no details. So, a deal may be near but it comes with this Israeli ground offensive, which is underway. How much does that complicate these talks? And how close do you think a deal actually might be?
BASKIN: It’s very difficult to determine how close we are to a deal. Obviously, the longer they’re talking, the more intensive the talks are, the more secret they are and all leaks about talks are generally noise at impacting the talks themselves putting pressure on the negotiators and the mediators to bring it up a talk.
There’s no doubt that with the Israeli ground operation moving further south and into areas that are very sensitive like the hospital make the deal more difficult to reach even though the Israelis believe that there’s more pressure on Hamas.
There could be a breaking point, we don’t know, where Hamas says no deal. Hamas is demanding a ceasefire. A ceasefire is very complicated for Israel to accept, because it will require a redeployment of troops that are already deep inside Gaza city and around Gaza City and moving south.
There’s no guarantee that once Israel declares ceasefire that Hamas will stop shooting. And a lot of logistics are involved in making this hostage deal happening on the ground in terms of putting in the International Red Cross to receive the hostages to check and make sure that they are all hostages if their names and conditions are provided in advance.
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And should Hamas be demanding the release of prisoners from Israel, that release will also have to be checked and verified by third parties like the Red Cross, like the Egyptian intelligence, it will take a few games to work out all of these details once they have an agreement, and they probably don’t have a full agreement yet on the deal.
VAUSE: Here in terms of what a deal may look like, CNN is reporting this and like you said, it just leaks coming from these negotiations, but the broad parameters that are currently being discussed and how Hamas releasing a large group of hostages at the same time, Israel frees Palestinian prisoners. The hostages for prisoners exchange will take place in the course of a sustained, day’s long pause in fighting that could last as long as five days.
But many details, including the duration of the course remain in flux, which goes to your point. From your early contact with Hamas in the days after October 7, is that the sort of deal you think they’d be looking for? And at this point, is that the duration of the pause in fighting, which is most likely to be the biggest sticking point here?
BASKIN: There are two main sticking points. One is we do believe that the deal is probably going to be women, children and elderly, the obviously is a swap for prisoners are women prisoners and miners in Israeli prison, either 43 women and about 190 people under the age of 18.
Hamas is apparently from what we’ve heard, demanding that other terrorists be released people have killed Israelis. That’s a sticking point for Israel and will be difficult to do. And the other course is the prolonged release of the hostages. Hamas would seek to extend the ceasefire time in order to build up international pressure on Israel not to renew its war efforts. And not to complete the mission of dismantling Hamas is the ability to govern in Gaza.
That’s what Hamas will be seeking. And of course, Israel is seeking the exact opposite, to have the deal done in one batch of swaps, and to end the ceasefire as soon as possible.
VAUSE: Right now, these talks essentially go from Hamas to Qatar, then the Qataris speak with the U.S. and the Israeli officials, why can’t Israel and Hamas just talk one — to one another directly just in this instance?
BASKIN: Well, that’s a great question. That’s what I was able to do in the deal for the release of Gilad Shalit back in 2011, is that there is a direct authorized fact channel between me and a member of Hamas. As a non-official Israeli, Hamas was willing to speak to me, as a non- official Israeli, the government of Israel was willing to speak to me so we set up a direct channel that listen to the people who are holding the Gilad Shalit took the time.
This is a lot more complicated. Now we’re dealing with a lot more hostages, and there’s an active war going on, on the ground. I think you also have to remember that the Egyptians are involved and the Egyptian intelligence do have direct contact with the Hamas leadership underground in Gaza, who are the decision makers here.
The Egyptian intelligence also speaks directly to the Islamic Jihad. So there’s definitely an advantage of using the Egyptian channel. We understand that the head of the Israeli Shit Bet, Israeli security agency was in Cairo over the last days probably a turning up the pressure on the Egyptian channel as well as the ongoing talks in Qatar.
VAUSE: Gershon Baskin, it is indeed a complicated is a difficult negotiation. Clearly it is going to go on for some time and time is something that is running fast running out. Thank you for being with us, sir.
BASKIN: For sure.
VAUSE: We appreciate your time. Thank you.
BASKIN: Thank you
Broadcast Originally on CNN at https://edition.cnn.com/videos/world/2023/11/15/exp-gaza-hostages-gershon-baskin-intv-111512aseg1-cnni-world.cnn
