Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu grabbed Brett McGurk’s arm as he walked out of a tense meeting of the Israeli Cabinet over securing the release of hostages Hamas was holding in Gaza.
“We need this deal,” Netanyahu told the White House Middle East coordinator a week ago in Tel Aviv, according to sources familiar with the exchange.
Earlier that day, Netanyahu and President Joe Biden had agreed over the phone that they were ready to accept the broad contours of a deal for Hamas to release 50 women and children who were being held hostage.
A major breakthrough had come two days earlier on November 12. Hamas – after refusing for days – had relented in offering identifying information about several dozen hostages, such as their age, gender and nationalities. The information confirmed that numerous children and toddlers had been taken captive on October 7.
Even though Israel and the US believed there were more than 50 women and children hostages, both sides agreed that they needed to move ahead with securing the release of those 50 – and hope that the deal might incentivize Hamas to release more after the initial group.
But hours after McGurk’s meeting with Netanyahu, everything went dark.
The Qataris – who had been playing the main mediating role – couldn’t get a hold of Hamas. When the group finally resurfaced, Hamas threatened to derail the talks: It demanded that the Israel Defense Forces, which had gone in to raid Al-Shifa hospital, leave the hospital grounds. IDF declined but indicated that it would keep the hospital running.
Once the talks resumed, Biden – who was in San Francisco having just finished a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping – placed one more call to the emir of Qatar. His message: Time was up. The emir gave Biden his assurances that he would do everything possible to close the…
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