GNITN - Special Edition

Israel At War – Day 384

Peace In The Middle East

Delayed Attack

According to a report from The Times Of Israel, Israel was forced to delay their attack on Iran:

Israel has been forced to delay a potential retaliatory attack on Iran after details of the planning were leaked from the US, Britain’s The Times newspaper reported Thursday.

While no details about the sites were revealed, there was still important information in the leak:

According to the report, citing an unnamed intelligence source with knowledge of Israeli deliberations, Israel is worried that even though no potential targets were named in the leak, the details provided could help Iran predict certain patterns of attack.

The delay is from needing to practice a plan not seen by Iran:

The Times said Israel has developed an alternative plan but needs to war-game it before proceeding.

The source then told us this:

“The leak of the American documents delayed the attack due to the need to change certain strategies and components,” the source said. “There will be a retaliation, but it has taken longer than it was supposed to take.”

The leaked plans are the topic of an investigation that started a week ago:

Marked top secret, the documents first appeared online Friday on the Telegram messaging app and quickly spread among Telegram channels popular with Iranians.

The US wants to know how it happened:

On Tuesday, the FBI said that it was investigating the unauthorized release of the classified documents on Israel’s latest preparations for a potential retaliatory attack. Speaking to reporters in Rome, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said there were no indications any employees from the Office of the Secretary of Defense were being probed for the leak.

It’s no secret that there are people in the US government that are antisemitic or at least sympathetic to the Palestinian cause and would love to see Israel defeated. However, if the leak did come from the US it is having the opposite effect of hurting Israel since Israel won’t likely inform the US of its new plans or the timing and targets for fear the security breach could happen again. I’ve said over and over again that Israel can’t trust the US and this only makes my point.

Resurrecting Hostage Talks

We read in an article from The Jerusalem Post that Israel is sending negotiators to Doha to restart hostage talks:

Mossad Chief David Barnea will promote a new framework for a hostage deal when he heads to Doha on Sunday to join the first high-level negotiations held by CIA Director William Burns in almost two months.

Publicly the talks are happening, but apparently Israel hasn’t stopped working on a deal:

Barnea has “been working under the radar” on a new deal “together with the Qataris, the Americans and the Egyptians,” a source told The Jerusalem Post.

“They feel that there is a real opportunity for a new start,” the source added but did not provide any details as to what the latest framework for an agreement would entail.

The Prime Minister’s Office said on Thursday, “At the meeting, the parties will discuss the various options for starting the negotiations for the release of the hostages from Hamas captivity of Hamas, against the background of the latest developments.”

One of those developments is the death of Yahya Sinwar who many felt was a roadblock to any deal proposed. Hamas does have some leaders left, though none actually in Gaza:

Shin Bet head Ronen Bar met Sunday in Egypt with the new intelligence chief Hassan Rashad, who will also participate in Sunday's Doha talks along with Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed Al-Thani.

Qatar and Egypt have been the main mediators for the talks to secure the freedom of the 101 hostages, together with the United States.

The PM seems to think an offer could be accepted:

The Prime Minister’s Office said that Netanyahu had instructed Barnea to head to Doha after the Egypt meeting.

Netanyahu “welcomed Egypt's readiness to advance a deal for the release of hostages,” the Prime Minister’s Office said.

A lot has happened since the last talks were held:

The renewal of talks - which were frozen after the Hamas killing of six hostages, including US-Israeli citizen Hersch Goldberg-Polin — takes place after the IDF assassinated Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar just over a week ago.

The US is pushing for a deal:

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was in the region this week in a push to jump-start the talks, visiting Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar.

But Who Is Representing Hamas?

With Sinwar gone, many wonder just who is negotiating for Hamas now and, more importantly, who is making decisions for them:

In a joint press conference with Blinken in Doha on Thursday, al-Thani confirmed that Doha had been in contact with Hamas in the aftermath of Sinwar’s killing.

“We're engaged with them,” al-Thani said.

Another key question is just what does Hamas want now:

“We had some meetings with them the last couple of days,” but he said Qatar was unable to determine their position on the talks. It sensed, however, that “it was the same position" the group held when the last round of negotiations was held.

“I think this will be their starting point until they come up with a further position,” he said.

If we are to go by comments being made by Iran, no hostages will be released unto the fighting ends. And we know that Prime Minister Netanyahu will not stop fighting until Hamas is completely demilitarized and is no longer a governing organization in Israel. The talks are going back to the three stage proposal which incrementally released hostages as we read more:

Until the end of August, Qatar and Egypt, together with the US, had hoped to finalize the first phase of a three-part deal, first unveiled at the end of May. That first phase would have seen the return of up to 32 hostages, characterized as humanitarian cases, including women, the elderly, and ill captives.

The US has largely spoken of resuming hostage talks based on this paradigm. In the aftermath of Sinwar’s death, Israel has spoken of looking at other options, including one that would see all the captives returned at once or making individual deals directly with the Palestinians holding the captives.

The US delegation isn’t confirming that they are starting where they left off:

Blinken was vague when it came to details about what negotiators would discuss in Doha.

“I’m not going to go into any details of what’s on the table or potentially on the table with regard to the hostage and ceasefire deal.

“We’re looking at different options. But as you heard the Prime minister say, we haven’t yet really determined whether Hamas is prepared to engage.

“The next step is getting the negotiators together, and I anticipate we’ll know … more in the coming days,” he said.

Blinken asked what is on the minds of most people, especially Israelis:

"The fundamental question is: Is Hamas serious?” Blinken said, stressing that Sinwar had been “the biggest obstacle to actually concluding an agreement.”

Getting Creative

As we continue to learn from the Post report, Israel may want a bigger deal that would involve Hezbollah and Iran:

Barnea has spoken in the past of the possibility of a larger deal that would leverage pressure from Iran and Hezbollah on Hamas to make a deal, thereby effectively creating a ceasefire with Hezbollah and Hamas that would also see the return of the hostages.

The rumors are that the next deal would see all hostages released and Hezbollah leaving southern Lebanon. Blinken sees it differently:

Blinken clarified that, at present, the talks on Gaza hostages were separate from efforts to reach a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, which would be based on the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701 that set the ceasefire terms that ended the Second Lebanon War.

“Separate from that is work that we’re doing also very intensely on Lebanon to reach a diplomatic resolution, to see the full implementation of 1701, to enable people to return to their homes. That’s separate, but it’s equally intense,” he said.

But Blinken did seem open to a larger deal:

Right before leaving Israel, Blinken appeared to indicate that a Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal could also be placed within a larger regional framework that included a normalization deal with Saudi Arabia.

He told reporters on the tarmac in Tel Aviv before he took off that the US was exploring a “new framework” for a deal.

“We talked about the plan that we’ve had on the table and the work that we’re doing on that plan, looking at new frameworks of foreign relations as a possibility,” Blinken said.

They could see all of these talks bringing peace to the Middle East. But peace needs to start with these Arab nations officially acknowledging Israel and their right to exist, something they haven’t done since Israel became a nation in 1948. That would involve a massive change of hearts, something only God can orchestrate.