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| Israel-Palestine-Jordan |
| Gal Hirsch to ToI: Biden pressure ‘screwed up’ hostage talks, gave Sinwar hope he could drag out negotiations for 10 years |
| 2026-02-01 |
| [IsraelTimes] Gal Hirsch, the government hostage pointman, tells The Times of Israel that public pressure on Israel from the Biden administration “screwed up” negotiations and gave Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar “exactly what he wanted.” He also says that he was shocked that some Israeli demonstrations “amplified” Hamas propaganda during talks. Me, too. “The night I heard about the arms embargo — or ‘don’t you dare enter Rafah’, all those pressures — I had a call with a very senior American official while driving in the middle of the night from Jerusalem down here [to Bnei Brak],” Hirsch says.“It was a very tough call. I told him, bluntly — I don’t usually speak this way —what are you doing? You have American hostages there — Israeli-American citizens. Do you understand you’re screwing up the negotiations? You’re giving Sinwar exactly what he wants. From his perspective, any daylight advances his political strategy from the October 7 attack to generate political achievements — you are doing that now.” He says that Hamas “exploited the daylight between us and the US, the UN’s activity against us, Security Council moves against us, European states’ activity against us, the embargo against us.” Hamas, says Hirsch, “acted to create a rift in Israeli society through very effective propaganda — and by creating the reverse picture — although they were stalling and not wanting to progress in negotiations and torpedoing deals, they pinned responsibility on us, that we were torpedoing negotiations and deals.” The terror group, he argues, “called the Israeli public to demonstrations. Every Saturday afternoon, a video of a hostage — calling for protests: go out into the streets.” “The way Hamas messages were received here in Israel and amplified was shocking,” says Hirsch. He says that Sinwar’s strategy in talks was to drag them out for 10 years. “All the stories that we didn’t want to advance a deal — those are fairy tales and lies. The side that constantly canceled and delayed a deal within a 10-year negotiation strategy was Hamas. The change came when he was eliminated and Nasrallah was eliminated; the Iranian axis suffered; the Syrian army was destroyed; the Houthis were hit; the Iranians got the hint; in Beirut, we carried out effective actions; and we were in a deep maneuver inside Gaza.” “At that stage, we began to understand Hamas was shifting toward a deal because it understood it had nothing to build on,” says Hirsch. “Until then, Hamas’s strategy was to exploit the political fallout of October 7 to derive political gains.” Hirsch argues that the failed September 2025 strike on Hamas leaders in Doha was, in hindsight, a key factor in forcing Hamas to make a deal: “It’s clear to all of us that the fact Hamas understood it wasn’t immune anywhere, and the mediators understood Israel’s long arm reached everywhere, had a clear effect on achieving the deal and the return of everyone.” Hirsch tells The Times of Israel that he knows that releasing terrorists for hostages will cost Israelis their lives in the future, but it still must be done. Related: Gal Hirsch 01/14/2026 Israeli-Argentinian imprisoned in Venezuela for over a year released, returns home Gal Hirsch 12/13/2025 Israel said to give mediators a list of terrorists who know where Ran Gvili is buried Gal Hirsch 12/11/2025 Israel said to believe ‘someone in Islamic Jihad knows’ where Ran Gvili’s body is |
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| Posted by: Super Hose 2026-02-01 09:14 |