Hamas is said to be “furious” with Egypt for “dragging out the talks” in order to lessen the demands the organization will make on Israel for a prisoner swap. The talks are taking so much time not because Egypt is “dragging” them out, but because Hamas’ demands are so preposterous that they have been rejected out of hand by Israel, and Egypt has merely been trying to persuade Hamas to be more realistic in what it asks of Israel. So far that hasn’t happened. Writes Hugh Fitzgerald
Hamas is furious with Egyptian mediators and believes Cairo is cooperating with Israel’s foot-dragging on efforts to reach a deal for the rehabilitation of the Gaza Strip and a more permanent ceasefire with the terrorist group. This is according to a report in the Lebanese newspaper Al Akhbar. More on Hamas’ anger with Egypt is here: “Report: Hamas ‘furious’ over alleged Egyptian efforts to aid Israel in indirect talks,” by Daniel Siryoti, Israel Hayom, November 28, 2021:
The newspaper [Al-Akhbar], which has close ties to Hamas, quoted a senior terrorist official as accusing Egypt of “not meeting even 5% of the commitments made to us at the end of the Saif al-Quds operation [the Hamas term for the Israel-Gaza conflict in May].”
What commitments were those? In bringing about the ceasefire that ended the Gaza war on May 21, Egypt rescued Hamas as it was being clobbered by Israel. A deluded Hamas believes its own propaganda about how it was still standing and capable of continuing to fight, when its weapons hideouts, its launching sites, its command-and-controls in Gaza had been largely destroyed, and 4,300 of its rockets were intercepted by Iron Dome missiles, and much of its underground tunnel network lay in ruins. In addition, more than 225 of its operatives, including 25 senior commanders, had been killed.
According to the report, the Egyptians are dragging out talks with Hamas to lessen the demands the organization would make in a future deal with Israel for a prisoner exchange deal that would see the return of Israeli captives Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed and the remains of Israeli soldiers Hadar Goldin and Oron Shaul, who were killed in 2014’s Operation Protective Edge.
The Egyptians are not “dragging out” talks with Hamas. They are merely trying to talk sense to Hamas, explaining that in making unreasonable demands on Israel for a massive prisoner swap akin to that which was made by Israel to get back Gilad Shalit in 2011 – 1,027 imprisoned terrorists were traded for a single Israeli – it is Hamas that is causing the talks to “drag out.” Egypt is acting as the go-between, relaying messages back and forth between Hamas and Israel, conveying to Israel Hamas’ continued refusal to budge from its maximalist demands, and conveying to Hamas Israel’s insistence that this time the number of Palestinian prisoners it is prepared to free in a swap will be much smaller than the number it freed in order to get back Gilad Shalit. Too many of those terrorists Israel freed in 2011 went back to committing acts of terror and were responsible for the deaths of two dozen Israelis. Israel does not intend to repeat its mistake.
What really angers Hamas is that Egypt is not taking its side against Israel, but acting as an honest broker between Hamas and Israel. Hamas was infuriated by President Al-Sisi’s friendly meeting with Prime Minister Bennett in September. Hamas’ anger with Egypt is also fed by the realization that there is now such close security collaboration between Egypt and Israel in fighting the Jihadists of Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State that have regrouped in the northern Sinai. Egypt and Israel, too, have joined forces to suppress the Muslim Brotherhood, whose Gazan branch is Hamas. So close have Egypt and Israel become that each has allowed the other’s military to operate in the Sinai, in what was set out in the Camp David Accords to be a “demilitarized” zone.
Hamas’ failure to be grateful for the role Egypt played in bringing about the ceasefire with Israel just as the terror group was being pummeled has angered the Egyptians. Hamas clearly does not understand that Egypt prevented its total disintegration as a fighting force in May 2021. Now the Egyptians are even more furious with Hamas which, instead of gratitude for its peacemaking efforts, blames Egypt for deliberately “dragging out” the negotiations — in cahoots with Israel — over a prisoner swap, when it is Hamas’ own intransigence that has “dragged out” the negotiations and prevented a deal from being reached.
Hamas’ lack of gratitude for Egypt’s bringing about that ceasefire in May reflects the terror group’s miscomprehension of its real situation: Hamas leaders apparently believe that the terror group, and not Israel, was the victor in that war. The IDF, which unlike Hamas is reality-based, believes that the damage it inflicted on Hamas in the 11-day war managed to set the terror group back, as Benjamin Netanyahu said, “by many years.” The IDF was in the middle of destroying the elaborate tunnel network that Hamas had built under Gaza — what would have been a final devastating blow — when the Egyptian-brokered ceasefire was declared.
Hamas is said to be “furious” with Egypt for “dragging out the talks” in order to lessen the demands the organization will make on Israel for a prisoner swap. The talks are taking so much time not because Egypt is “dragging” them out, but because Hamas’ demands are so preposterous that they have been rejected out of hand by Israel, and Egypt has merely been trying to persuade Hamas to be more realistic in what it asks of Israel. So far that hasn’t happened. Hamas continues to believe that it “won the war” and is sure that Israel will in the end be willing to trade a great many terrorist prisoners for the bodies of two dead Israeli soldiers and two mentally impaired Israeli civilians who wandered into Gaza.
Egypt’s anger at Hamas’ behavior-in these talks — its failure to appreciate Egypt’s efforts — has deep roots. For years, the Egyptians have been smarting from what they perceive as Palestinian ingratitude. After all, the Egyptians argue, their country fought three major wars against Israel – in 1948, 1967, and 1973 – expending great amounts of men, money, and materiel, to help the Palestinian Arabs. Yet those Palestinian Arabs have over the years expressed no gratitude to Egypt for its many sacrifices on their behalf. Now Egypt has again expended efforts on behalf of the Palestinians, helping to bring about a ceasefire in May that prevented Hamas from being completely destroyed as a fighting force. And Egypt has been diligently working ever since May to bring about a prisoner swap between Hamas and Israel that still eludes the parties because of the outrageous demands that Hamas refuses to modify.
There may come a time not very far from now when Egypt will throw up its hands, put the blame for the current diplomatic impasse where it is due – squarely on the shoulders of Hamas – and end its role as mediator. It might even, more dramatically, decide to abandon the Palestinian Arabs altogether, fed up with their ingratitude and their hallucinatory conviction that they are “winning.” Egypt could choose to move beyond its ever-closer military cooperation with Israel in the Sinai to a full normalization of ties with the Jewish state, by becoming the latest, and the most important, Arab state to join the Abraham Accords. After all, the Egyptians have seen the benefits being reaped by the U.A.E. in its agreements on trade, tourism, and technology with the Jewish state; already $675 million in deals between the U.A.E. and Israel have been signed. Israel has also made deals with Bahrain on trade, and with Morocco for the sale of Israeli weapons. Why shouldn’t Egypt allow itself to benefit economically, just like the U.A.E., from the Abraham Accords, and the normalization of ties with the Start-Up Nation?
