Over the next few months, I held three long meetings with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to advance a direct secret channel for negotiations between Netanyahu and Abbas. In my vision, Meidan would be appointed by Netanyahu to run the channel and I would continue in the role of mediator between the two sides in order to reach the best possible agreement. Meidan thought that Netanyahu was prepared to make leadership decisions regarding the Palestinian issue, as he did in the Schalit deal. In my meetings with Abbas, I found full agreement to enter the proposed channel. I arranged a meeting for Meidan with Dr. Mahmoud al-Habash, president of the Palestinian Sharia High Court, Abbas’s envoy, so that he could determine Abbas’s willingness to move forward in direct negotiations with Netanyahu. Meidan was convinced of Abbas’s real intentions to reach a permanent agreement between the two sides. I wrote detailed reports on my meetings with Abbas and sent them Netanyahu. I met with two Likud government ministers and with the national security adviser in attempts to persuade Netanyahu to accept the proposal, and three times Netanyahu rejected it outright. Netanyahu’s strategy toward the Palestinians was clear. His plan was to weaken Abbas and to reduce the PA’s legitimacy, while at the same time preserving a weakened Hamas in Gaza. This is his plan until today. Its clear goal is to prevent the possibility of a negotiated agreement with the Palestinians that would lead to Israeli withdrawals from the occupied territories and the establishment of a Palestinian state.
On June 12, 2014, Naftali Fraenkel, Gil-Ad Shaer and Eyal Yifrah were abducted and murdered. The terrorists were Hamas members from Halhul. Before their bodies were found, Israel embarked on Operation Return our Brothers (Shuvu Achim) and arrested 68 Palestinians who were released in the Schalit deal and hundreds of others affiliated with Hamas. During that period, Hamad and I tried to prevent the war between Israel and Gaza. Contrary to the claims of the Shin Bet, Hamas denied that orders had been given to abduct and murder the boys. Hamas leaders strongly asserted that they were not behind the abduction. They said that they had no intention of launching a new round of fighting. But after the arrests of hundreds of Palestinians and the violent clashes all around the West Bank, Hamas began firing rockets at Israel and Israel responded with heavy shelling of Gaza. I warned that if the rocket fire did not stop there would be a military ground operation. After a week of shelling from both sides, the messages that we received were that both sides wanted war. Hamas believed it would surprise the enemy with their tunnels and Israel wanted to give a decisive blow to recreate the deterrence it had lost.
NETANYAHU’S POLICY toward the Palestinians has succeeded even more than expected. Abbas’ legitimacy plummeted and Hamas has been at the mercy of Israel while Israel arranged for protection money from Qatar. The Egyptians blocked most of the tunnels from Sinai to Gaza and sealed Gaza together with Israel. Israel and the PA maintained security coordination, while in Gaza, Hamas did not stop building its force with new and more powerful rockets. The Abraham Accords disappointed the Palestinians as four Arab states abandoned the Arab Peace Initiative. Palestinians began trying once again to reach reconciliation between Gaza and the West Bank. Jabril Rajoub on the side of Abbas, Yahya Sinwar and Salah Aruri on the part of Hamas reached agreement to hold three rounds of elections: for the PA Legislative Council, the PA Presidency and the Palestinian National Council. Hamas, of course, hoped to win all three of these elections. Abbas’s condition for holding the election was that Israel allow east Jerusalemites to participate. Whether the issue of Jerusalem’s vote was a built-in excuse to cancel the elections if necessary, I do not know for sure. It is clear that Abbas lost much of his already limited legitimacy when he canceled the elections.
During the month of Ramadan, Israel once again unilaterally pressed the nerve center of the conflict – al-Aqsa/Temple Mount – that led to a rise in the temperature of hostility between Israel and the Palestinians. Already weighing heavily on the Palestinians was the threat of expulsion from many homes in Silwan and Sheikh Jarrah. Israel plans to expel Palestinian families and bring settler families to replace them. For Palestinians, this is the Judaization of Jerusalem and the continuation of the Nakba, which according to their narrative has continued since 1948. The checkpoints at Damascus Gate, the violence of La Familia and Lahava anti-Arab organizations and violence between Muslims and Israeli police on al-Aqsa/Temple Mount set off waves of anger among Palestinians. The injuring of Jews by a small number of Palestinians who then made viral postings on TikTok set off anger in Israel and the entire area was ripe for a new round of violence, which both Hamas and Israel were more than willing to provide. The additional inter-communal violence within Israel between Jews and Arabs added another layer of complexity that has created deep and lasting wounds that will take years to heal.
At the root of the current war is the occupation. The two states for two peoples solution seems to be dead and buried deep in the earth of the Holy Land. There is a one-state binational reality between the Jordan River and Gaza and a Palestinian Islamic entity in Gaza that exists in poverty and without hope for two and a half million people who are at the mercy of Hamas and of Israel. There is no reason to think that anyone living in Gaza would be willing to accept this situation as their destiny forever. The outrage in Gaza over the horrific damage of the current war will not be directed at Hamas, it will be directed at Israel. Hamas is portrayed as the only force in the world that is willing to stand up to Israeli aggression.
This round will end probably like the previous rounds, yet Netanyahu’s achievements are impressive. He thwarted the formation of a government led by Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid. He distanced the threat of Arab participation in the government, which disrupts the Zionist system. He succeeded in canceling the Palestinian elections that threatened to bring about reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah. He weakened Hamas. He weakened Abbas to the ground and ignited the revolt among young people in the West Bank enough to preserve the opinion in Israel that there is no Palestinian partner. He gave the most violent settlers a free hand to remind Arab-Israelis who is in charge here. He legitimized Itamar Ben-Gvir to such an extent that he is the most interviewed politician in Israel after Netanyahu.
There is no way to improve the situation in Gaza without entering into direct talks with Hamas. Hamas and Israel are not ready for that. The end of this round is simply another timeout before the next round. Between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River live two peoples. They both believe they own the place and that the land belongs to them only. For years, we have talked two states for two peoples. During the meeting of the UN Security Council on the war, many countries that spoke mentioned two states for two peoples. Most of those states do not yet recognize the Palestinian state, a step that could strengthen that solution.
Let’s face it, Israel and the Palestinians are here alone. No one is coming to our rescue. No one will save us from ourselves. Nothing will change until we have new leaders. We need statesmen and not the small politicians we have been overly blessed with. How many more rounds will there be until we see new leadership? Israel and the Palestinians, including Hamas, will remain here. Neither side will raise their hands, neither side will raise a white flag. There is no victory in this war and no military solutions. One day we will understand that we must talk to each other about how to live together. In the meantime, I suggest to countries that want to help: recognize the state of Palestine and start talking to Hamas. The chances of bringing about moderation to Hamas’s positions are a thousand times better through speaking than as a result of air force shelling by Israel.