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- [00:00]
Nadav Ayel
These are the three balls in the air right now, right? Iran normalization with Saudi Arabia and the future of Gaza. And it's up to the Trump team for Netanyahu, Dermer, the Saudis, the UAE and everyone else to try and pull something off here that gets to the second phase of the deal, gets normalization, hits Iran, you know, just touches on all the bases or everything can also blow up and, and Israel might in that condition resume the war.
- [00:45]
Dan Senor
It's 8:00am on Sunday, February 2nd here in New York City. It is 3:00pm On Sunday, February 2nd in Israel. As Israelis turn to a new week, continue to embrace the returning hostages and learn learn about their experiences in captivity. After 485 days in Hamas and some of them in Palestinian Islamic Jihad captivity, 35 year old Yarden Bibas, 65 year old Keith Siegel, an American Israeli and 54 year old Ofer Calderon were freed on Saturday and reunited with their loved ones, or at least with some of their loved ones. Yarden Bibas, his wife Shiri and children Ariel and Kfir were all abducted from Kibbutz nir Uz on October 7. The children Ariel and Kfir were four years old and 10 months at the time, which means today they would be five years old and two years old. And then they were separated from their husband and father Yarden, who was released. Hamas has claimed that shiri and the two children were killed in captivity. Again, Kfir was 10 months old and Ariel was four at the time. Israel has not confirmed this claim but has expressed, quote, grave concern for their fate. Yarden has returned home, the family said in a statement they issued, but the home remains incomplete. On Thursday, three other Israeli hostages were released. Arbel Yehud, 29 years old, Agam Burger, 19 years old and Gadi Moses, 80 years old, along with five citizens from Thailand who were workers in Israel. I'm going to read their names as well and please understand that my pronunciations will not be as clear as when I do the Israeli names they. Those names are Wachara Sraroon, Pungsak, Tahena Sathyan Suwankam, Surasak Lumnao and Banawat Saitho. Which leads to a total of 18 hostages released out of 38 that are to be included in the first phase, the 33 Israelis and the five ties. Of the 735 Palestinian prisoners who are scheduled to be released from Israeli prisons during the first phase of the deal, 290 have been released. Negotiations over the next phase of the agreement are planned to commence on Monday with us to discuss what we've learned about the experiences of the hostages in captivity and their extraordinary courage, as well as what we think to be happening behind the scenes and leading up to negotiations for the second phase of the deal is Call me back. Regular Nadav Ayel Nadav, good to see you.
- [03:55]
Nadav Ayel
Good to see you too, Dan.
- [03:57]
Dan Senor
And it was good to be with you this weekend over Shabbat, where you shared some of the stories that we will be discussing today. So I just want to get into it. You published a very powerful column in your paper in Yediot Acheronot this past Friday, so leading into Shabbat about the stories and the fortitude of some of these hostages that we've learned of in captivity activity. You opened, and I'm going to quote here, you open, and this is just a translation to English. You opened with the line the word heroism shrinks in shame in the face of the returning hostages. What did you mean by that?
- [04:32]
Nadav Ayel
Dan? There's so many forms of courage, and those who have been kept by Hamas are now giving us a gift with their stories, telling really incredible stories of resilience and fortitude. And what I meant by talking about how Herod shrinks in their face is that I don't think that we expected these kind of stories to come after more than a year of captivity, of being held by a fundamentalist genocidal organization in the way that they were held. These are people who are telling us, and this is one of the things that the abductees have been telling since they're returning, that they suffered near starvation. They were literally telling us the story of sitting in front of one bowl of rice and counting every rice there, so it will be divided and shared between them in a fair way. And although this situation is so dire, some of the men were held in cages at the beginning of their captivity, only brought out of these cages in order to eat. They managed to save their inner self, their dignity, in various ways. And I think that the most heroic way was the way that they really thought about others. So one thing is the courage of maintaining your dignity in a very difficult condition when you are willing to sacrifice yourself for the others in this kind of a condition after being held for so many months, and you're willing to share your food and to encourage other people who are there in captivity and to be willing to confront the Hamas terrorists there, willing to sacrifice yourself for others after a year in which they have been doing everything to make you less than a human. This is truly heroic and I think that this is a gift that the Israeli society and the Jewish community around the world, the Diaspora, is receiving from the hostages returning. And it is so meaningful for the process of healing within the Israeli society.
- [06:52]
Dan Senor
Can you, Nadav, tell us a couple of these stories? You're alluding to them, but I actually want to get specific. So tell us what we know about Arbel Yehud and her captivity.
- [07:03]
Nadav Ayel
So Arbel Yehud was taken from near Uz, and she was taken together with her spouse that is still held captive. And she was held alone for almost all of her captivity. And that's the most difficult thing. You know, I can talk about forms of torture, about the captors beating up, at least at the beginning, specifically the hostages torturing Amit. So now we're going to speak about that. But for Arbel Yahud to be held alone, no one to speak to in Hebrew, no one to support her and to maintain herself during this time of captivity, it's going to be a long. A long way ahead for her. And she knew the people who came from New Oz sort of understood what happened in your Oz. I should remind the people listening that one in every four kibbutz members was either murdered or taken hostage. The community was devastated. The IDF never came. This is one of the places in which the IDF never fought in Nurs.
- [08:06]
Dan Senor
So I've been to Nero's twice now and three times actually, what you're describing this. I hope our audience takes a moment to process this. One out of every four members of the kibbutz, as Nadav just said, were murdered or taken hostage. In the. Which is the dining hall of the kibbutz, they have set up seats for everyone where they would eat meals because they eat as a community. And you see every seating, the person's name who's either dead or taken hostage. So you just see how it touches one way or the other, virtually every family, either directly or indirectly. And this is the world that Arbel comes from now or will be returning to.
- [08:48]
Nadav Ayel
And this is going to be terribly difficult. But for Nero's, this release is so important of the hostages right now. This phase of the deal is so important because they're starting to see their community members, those who were still held captive, returning. And for them, for instance, one of the founders of the kibbutz, the generation of the founders is gadi Moses, who's 80 years old. And I think many of the people listening, Dan, probably saw this phenomenal photo, really, to an extent, so symbolic of Gadi Moses alone walking through the Hamas terrorists upon his release, looking at them. I don't want to say almost with a grin, but it was almost with a grin, a self certainty of himself, of what he is walking tall there. An 80 year old man held captive more than 400 days. He didn't see. The first time he saw Arbel Yehud from his kibbutz was that when they were joined by the Hamas captors just before the release. And that's the first time that they knew that they're alive. So it's a tribe, right, that lives in the kibbutz and not only in the kibbutz. And he was held in a tiny room of 2 on 2 meter square meters. I don't know how to translate this into feet, dan.
- [10:14]
Dan Senor
It's about 20 square feet and he.
- [10:17]
Nadav Ayel
Knew the sizes of the floor tiles. And he used to walk in that room about four miles a day just to keep shape. And this was one decision he made. Another decision he made was to keep a diary. And they allowed him, just to be.
- [10:33]
Dan Senor
Clear, he would do the equivalent of four miles, meaning going around over and over and he would calculate it to equal to about four miles a day.
- [10:40]
Nadav Ayel
Yeah. And he would write a diary that the captors took from him just before the release. And we can only imagine why. And it was very important for him. And you see this in the first words that he's saying to his family when he's released. I'm free and I'm normal. So one of the things that he was fearing is that this will damage him psychologically. This is a man who has devoted his life to agriculture and he kept on doing math problems and geometry problems and sort of keeping his brain in shape so he'll be able to return back home. And by the way, during this captivity, he told the captors that one day he'll return and he'll teach them agriculture. So this is just an incredible story of fortitude and it's so important for this community because many of its founding fathers and mothers were murdered during the attack on or murdered during their time of captivity. Unfortunately, we still don't know. We're still waiting for other people from Nero's to return. Now there are of course, Dan, the stories of people who offered the Hamas captures to remain in captivity and allow other people to be released first. I was immediately reminded by John McCain's story after his plane was shot in Vietnam and that story, and correct me if I'm wrong, because I'm not American and you probably know the details better than I do, maybe you Tell the details.
- [12:21]
Dan Senor
Then he was shot down and he was taken into a captivity which wound up being about five years. And he was given the opportunity, I think, at least once to be released. And he, according to the protocol, the US Military protocol, if you were captured and you were, your. Those in captivity with you are able to be released or given the opportunity to release, you are released in the order in which you were captured. And he was given the opportunity to bypass that because his father was a very senior officer in the US Military, because they knew who he was. They knew he was the son of Admiral McCain. And he declined it. He said, no, I will leave in the order in which I was captured. And by the way, he was not only in captivity, he was also really, really bad shape and suffered permanent physical damage as a result.
- [13:13]
Nadav Ayel
So this kind of story is, what we know now is very reminiscent of what happened with Emily Damari, for instance. So Emily Damari was taken again from near oz. She lost two fingers during the October 7th attack.
- [13:28]
Dan Senor
Like, shot. Like they were. She was shot. She was.
- [13:30]
Nadav Ayel
They were shot off.
- [13:31]
Dan Senor
Shot off. And she also apparently has a bullet in her leg, too, apparently, or bullet wound.
- [13:36]
Nadav Ayel
And right before the release, they're telling her, the Hamas people are telling her, you're going to go back home. And she knows that Keith Siegel, who's, you know, her father is best friends or her family is best friend with Keith Siegel. And Keith Siegel is over 60. And Emily Damari, after 450 days, more than 450 days, goes, you should release him first. And I'm willing to stay, and I'm asking you to stay in captivity and Keith should go first. And, you know, what can you say about that? Even sort of discussing this with the Hamas fighters. These are people, I need to explain this. You can't even move to your right hand side or your left hand side while sitting without getting your permission first. They denied them the right to cry. They said they would punish them for crying. So this wasn't only a story about willing to sacrifice yourself, which is a story of Emily de Mari, but not only of Emily de Mari. It's also a story about managing, to an extent, to manipulate your captures to develop a relationship with them. And the most famous story in that regard is, is the story that Amit Susner told Uvda in Channel 12, Ilana Dayan. So Amit Susna was released during the first deal, and she was made famous by her heroic battle on the road to Gaza. One woman fighting three, four, five. I don't remember how many men Trying to physically drag her through the dusty and bloody fields of near Oz back to Gaza. And she's fighting and they're, you know, they're beating her up on the way to Gaza. And Amit, who's a civilian, was taken into Gaza. And the Hamas operatives there were certain that she's intelligent, that she's high ranking in the army, and they were torturing her. They basically, they took a stick, a long stick, and they connected her with her hands and with her legs and held her in a position. And then the terrorist tells her, you're either gonna tell us the truth or I'm gonna come back here and I'm gonna kill you to this room in five minutes. And he pulls out his gun. And the spotters, the IDF spotters, one of them is Leary Albagh were there. And Leary manages to somehow convince the capturers. And Leary tells Amit Susna, before she does that, look, it looks really bad for you. I'm going to do my best. And she takes her final words from her, according to that interview with Ilana Dayan, her final words, because she doesn't know if this is going to succeed. And Amit told her immediately, I don't know if he would have shot me, but you just saved my life. For me. You saved my life. And when explaining how Leary managed to do this, this is a kid. These spotters, they were tasked with a mission.
- [16:48]
Dan Senor
When you say spotter, you mean this was their job in the idf, which was they were in the surveillance role, they were not in combat roles.
- [16:54]
Nadav Ayel
Yeah, but they were in the field in a base near the border. And it's a job with a lot of responsibility because you need to use technology. And if you're missing something, there's going to be a terror attack in one of those kibo teams. So just imagine they went through the basic training of the IDF and then they went through the training of the intelligence spotters. And then almost immediately they fell captive after seeing their friends murdered in front of their eyes in the most terrible and gruesome ways. And they were taken into Gaza and even then to find these levels of resourcefulness and in front of the terrorists. And Leary says Amit in her interview, Leary was a force to reckon with. And she, by the way, one of the things that she did is at a certain point they wanted to take her underground to the tunnels. And Leary stood in front of the group and basically said to the captors, we're not going to go underground. We're not going underground, we're not going to go into the tunnels, and they actually didn't. So, look, these are only parts of the stories. And what we're hearing right now are the encouraging and, you know, the inspirational stories of captivity. But there's so many of those stories, and Leary as a Yev soldier, and I expect her to be formally commended for this, also suggested to stay in captivity so that one of her friends could go first, and she was refused. So when you just sum this up together, the picture that you're seeing is of people who suffered immensely, really. They think about just the trauma of being taken captive and the way that they've been taken captive, about the bodies that they've seen on the way. Ofer Calderon tells his kids that are with him that were released in the first deal, when they're running from the house, they're running from the safe room, he's telling his kids, don't look right and left because he doesn't want them to see the bodies. And they're running and they're hiding in a bush, and the terrorists see them through the bush. Then next thing, we see one of his kids. And it's one of the most powerful and terrible images of October 7th, just an Israeli kid with his head held down, taken by the Hamas terrorists. And this kid is saying, I saw my dad. And the last time I saw him, he was on the road and they were beating him up. That's the last image that he had of his dad before Ofer returned back home to his family. And when Ofer sees. He comes into the hospital and he sees that his friends are standing at the entrance of the hospital, just on the road of the hospital, he makes the ambulance stops and he goes out of the ambulance to talk with his friends. And there's a ceremony with this and the ceremony that started, you know, and ceremonies are really important for this. They are on the chopper, right? So the IDF takes them in a chopper from the Gaza Strip to the hospitals. It's either Teleshama, usually Tele Shomer, but Ichilov, Belinson. And on the chopper, they can talk, but they can write something, right? So some of them wrote at the beginning, thank you to President Trump. And Steve Witkoff showed that to the president. And it was in English. It's very important that they did that. As you know, Dan, it's very important for the commitment of the president for this deal. Some of them were just saying, thank you, a.m. israel. Thank you, the people of Israel, we want to thank you. And a gun Berger, who comes from an observance Family said, when I fell in captivity, I went at the way of faith, and I am returning with the way of faith. So it's both a personal message, it's a national message. And this is exactly the process of healing that the Israeli society needs in order to start turning the page on October 7th. And it will never be complete until all these hostages are back home. Dan I just want to add, I told a lot of stories here about the hostages and the hostage families, and I want to source them. They are sourced through reports in the Israeli press and family members, close family members of these hostages telling these stories. But very rarely have we heard from the hostages themselves. And journalists have not interviewed the hostages themselves. So I need to sort of give this disclaimer and I want to be clear that as to accuracy of the stories, we will know only when the people themselves decide to talk, if they decide to talk directly to the public.
- [21:50]
Dan Senor
Nadav I want to move to phase two of the ceasefire deal, which is the according to the deal, on day 16, which is Monday, they're supposed to commence negotiations for phase two. So when this episode will be dropping, negotiations over that phase are least scheduled to begin. And obviously with Prime Minister NETanyahu's arrival in D.C. this week, presumably that'll be a big focus of his, of his visit. There was a lot of doubt being speculated about around the question of whether or not the second phase would actually be implemented. As you know, there was resistance within the Netanyahu's coalition against ever go into phase two. So, so what can you tell us about what's going on here in terms of the beginning of phase two negotiations?
- [22:39]
Nadav Ayel
So Netanyahu is in D.C. this week, and there are basically three balls in the air. All of them are major issues for the Middle east and the Middle east future. One is Israel desiring and understanding with the United States as to tackling the Iranian nuclear issue. There is a window of opportunity here in which Hezbollah is weakened, the Iranians don't have their air defenses. It's possible Israel wants to get this done together with the U.S. alone, needing the assistance of the U.S. coordinating with the U.S. this is the number one strategic aim of Israel right now to try and tackle the Iranian nuclear program. And the Israelis believe that they can do it. If needs be, they can do it alone, but they need the assistance of the American administration in both certain types of ammunition and other assistance and coordinating mainly the response afterwards if the Iranians are going to respond towards Israel, and also making sure that Iran doesn't use possible Israeli strike in order to break for a bomb later. So this needs to be really very tightly coordinated with the U.S. second issue is the normalization with Saudi Arabia. And that's very much on the table. Ron Dermer, who's the close associate of the Prime Minister, actually, you know, the acting strategic mind of the Prime Minister has been working extremely hard to try and reach some sort of a draft that will reconcile between the Saudi demands for Palestinian statehood and so the Israeli statements that they don't see any Palestinian state being formed in the near future. Considering October 7th and Israel's security worries, I don't know if there's a real breakthrough there. But what I can tell you is that Steve Wytkoff is all over this. This is his brief now. He was in Riyadh, he's focused on negotiating with Saudi Arabia. He postponed his travel to Jerusalem the week before the last week, calling Jerusalem, saying, we have some good news coming from Riyadh or from Jeddah, and what we're seeing here is possibly a breakthrough. Prime Minister Netanyahu before boarding the plane on his way to D.C. his words to the Israeli media are, I hope we can expand the circle of peace in the region. This is the take home message that he's sending the Israeli public just before boarding the plane on his way to D.C. that's terribly important, that he's basically raising expectations towards a breakthrough with Saudi Arabia. And of course, the third issue is the rebuilding of Gaza and making sure that Hamas doesn't control Gaza anymore. And I'm saying making sure that Hamas doesn't control Gaza because it is the position of the President, it is the position of the entire administration, the Secretary of State, the US National Security Advisor that you had on your show here, Mike Waltz, saying the same things that Hamas cannot rule the Gaza ship and the Israelis are saying. And they can bluff too. They can't be like Hezbollah has been in Lebanon. They're not going to control a bureaucrat government behind the scenes. In other words, we want them out physically out of the Strip. The entire Hamas leadership needs to be expelled. And we have here ideas that have been floated by the President of a mass immigration of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to Jordan, Egypt. And you have the president doubling down on that idea after it was rejected formally by Egypt and Jordan, doubling down, saying, they're gonna do it, we're doing a lot of things for them, they're gonna do it. So I don't know if that's gonna happen, but then even to take it off the table like they've done with annexation and the Abraham Accord, just to take this off the table and to present this as an achievement of the Saudi Kingdom on the way to normalization, that's also a possibility. So one of the major elements when you have this kind of negotiations in the Middle east is, you know, your wins are not only what the other side is doing, but also what the other side decides not to do as a result of a possible agreement. For instance, on the road to the Abraham Accords, the Israeli government was talking about annexing parts of the West Bank. Then came the agreements with Bahrain and the uae. And one of the credits that the UAE took was that the Israelis decided that they're not going to go through annexation because it was either annexation or having a historic peace agreement in the Middle East. And Netanyahu decided against it, by the way. He decided against it because he was ordered by Trump that basically said it's off the table. So you don't really have two options there, but you have one option. But for the uae, it was an opportunity to say, look, we managed to shut down the Israeli extremists that want an annexing.
- [28:15]
Dan Senor
I mean, one could argue, yes, it was shut down by Trump or his team. On the other hand, Netanyahu may have.
- [28:21]
Nadav Ayel
Played with it well.
- [28:23]
Dan Senor
He accelerated the normalization process by potentially creating a stick rather than just a carrot.
- [28:30]
Nadav Ayel
It's possible.
- [28:31]
Dan Senor
Meaning creating a negative outcome that it would be avoided if they produced a positive outcome. But whatever, that's.
- [28:37]
Nadav Ayel
Yeah, that's possible. But his supporters in the Israeli media were literally, literally dancing in the streets of Washington, D.C. on that trip, believing, after being briefed, that annexation. And this came from the prime minister's office, annexation is just a fact of life. At any rate, the result was great as far as I'm concerned, and as far as President Trump is concerned, and also as far as the Prime Minister is concerned, there are peace agreements with the Abraham Accords, and there is no annexation in the West Bank. And the same equation then can also happen here because Israel is talking about resuming the war. Hey, we managed to get the Israelis not to resume the war. The Israelis are talking and the Americans are talking about, you know, a wide population displacement of Palestinians. Well, we managed to take this off the table. We'll say the Saudis. So everything is related to Gaza, just to be clear.
- [29:36]
Dan Senor
So President Trump starts saying, you know, we're gonna have to remove a lot of Palestinians from Gaza. I don't think he was clear whether or not it was temporary or permanent, but maybe they go to Jordan Maybe they go to Egypt. And this topic, it's an interesting question. Why 60% of Jordan is a Palestinian population. Why can't they take more Palestinians? Obviously, Gaza used to be under occupation by Egypt, so it's not like Egypt hasn't had control of Palestinians before. And how did we get into this situation where Egypt, you know, the world treats Egypt like it's doing Israel a favor by maintaining the Egypt Israel peace treaty. And it's really Israel's job to figure out how to make sure the Gaza Egypt border is secure. And suddenly there's a question like, hey, Egypt, you have some responsibility here, too. Jordan, you have some responsibility here, too. We're not gonna get into the merits of this debate. It's obviously a much bigger conversation. But it is this classic, you know, Trump just sort of raises these questions and everyone's heads explode. And suddenly King Abdullah and President Sisi are calling Marco Rubio and saying, what is going on? What does he mean? And then they kind of quiet things down. And then Trump says it again the second day. So suddenly it gets oxygen. And then I think what you're saying is it gets elevated, it gets oxygen, and then it's considered a win when it's pulled back.
- [30:56]
Nadav Ayel
I have to tell that the only way to understand this, because it's the Middle east and it's is through the famous joke, the shtetl joke of the goat. So a guy comes to his rabbi and he says, my house is too small. So the rabbi says, so bring a goat into the house, and the goat is going to live with you in the next two weeks. And after two weeks, the guy comes to his rabbi and says, the goat has been leaving us for two weeks, and it's terrible, you know. And then the rabbi says, yeah, now take out the goat. You'll feed much better. So.
- [31:31]
Dan Senor
Right, right.
- [31:32]
Nadav Ayel
This is an Israeli expression, which usually you don't have Israeli expressions coming from the shtetl, which is bringing the goat in and bringing the goat out.
- [31:41]
Dan Senor
Right?
- [31:41]
Nadav Ayel
So the goat here is both resuming maybe the war in Gaza, although this is not really a goat. This is a real thing. And massive population displacement of Palestinians from Gaza to Jordan and Egypt, something that nobody knows. It's like Greenland. Nobody knows how this is even legally, you know, possible to do. But President Trump wants it so then the Saudis can play this hand as achievements on the way to peace. Now, how will this boil down? Nobody knows exactly, but these are the three balls in the air right now, right? Iran normalization with Saudi Arabia and Gaza and the future of Gaza. And it's up to the Trump team for Netanyahu, Dermer, the Saudis, the UAE and everyone else to try and pull something off here that gets to the second phase of the deal, gets normalization, hits Iran, just touches on all the bases that you need to do, or everything can also blow up. And I should say this, that this can all just collapse and Israel might, in that condition, resume the war.
- [32:53]
Dan Senor
By the way, I was with someone, I won't say his name, but I was with a member of the Biden team on Friday who was involved in everything Israel related on behalf of the Biden national security team since October 7th. And he felt that Saudi normalization, it is much warmer than people appreciate. There's a real opportunity here if Trump and Witkoff and Netanyahu and the coalition, I mean, there's so many moving pieces here. It's interesting, by the way, that Witkoff, the Biden people and this Biden person made this observation to me that the Biden people would never meet with some of the more extreme members of Netanyahu's coalition directly. They would never meet with, say, Bezalo Smoltrich, because he was considered quasi sanctioned, if you will, by the US Government, by the Biden administration. And there Wyckoff was meeting with Smoltrich, and then Dermer arranged a meeting as well with Koff and Aryeh Derry, another senior member of the coalition. And so suddenly. So Witkoff is in it with these members who were considered like Persona non grata entre, like, you just couldn't they.
- [33:58]
Nadav Ayel
Understand something critical that Netanyahu is trying to explain to them? Netanyahu is trying to explain to the Trump administration something critical which I think they get. And here's the thing. Let's say I agree to go to a phase two and to normalization with Saudi Arabia, but I don't have a government. So you're not going to get a phase two and you're not going to get normalization with Saudi Arabia. So I need to bring over the far right with me. So it's not only my problem. What does it mean when Wytkov meets Smotrich? What does Smotrich want? And the answer is that I think that there is another ball in the air that they're going to use. I think it is somewhat plausible that the Trump administration, and I am speculating, but it's based on, you know, my best source is speculating with me that the Trump administration will allow possible annexation of some of the settlement blocks in the west bank in Judea and Samaria that were already recognized as part in the final agreement, final status agreement as part of Israel. And they were recognized by the Bush letter towards the roadmap more than 20 years ago.
- [35:14]
Dan Senor
So George W. Bush's administration had written a site, what they call a side letter to the Sharon government. Right. This was to Ariel Sharon. And what was the context? Why did they write the side letter to what?
- [35:25]
Nadav Ayel
The disengagement.
- [35:26]
Dan Senor
Disengagement, right. Disengagement From Gaza in 2005, in the lead up to disengagement, it was agreed between the Sharon government and the Bush administration, the George W. Bush administration, that there would be this side letter that would be basically a commitment of US Policy that was intended to transcend change's administration. That said what?
- [35:48]
Nadav Ayel
I don't have the letter in front of me, but basically I'm paraphrasing. It said that in every final status agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, it's the understanding that these settlement blocks will remain parts of Israel.
- [36:04]
Dan Senor
And.
- [36:04]
Nadav Ayel
And this was the first tacit acknowledgement that Israel is not going to evacuate Gush Etzion that, by the way, existed before 1948 there and was occupied by the Jordanians as a Jewish settlement before 1948, meaning it was a Jewish settlement.
- [36:20]
Dan Senor
In Jordanian occupied West bank before 1948, which was run by the British. And then when the Jordanians were there from 1948 to 1967, what happened to that settlement?
- [36:33]
Nadav Ayel
They, of course, they kicked everyone out.
- [36:35]
Dan Senor
Right, but the Jews had presence there.
- [36:37]
Nadav Ayel
Before the founding of the state, before 1948. Yeah. And this is the first place that Israelis returned to after 1967. But it's not only Gush Etzion, which is one block, another block is Ariel, whereas there's an Israeli city called Ariel and there are a few settlements around it. And. And Maale Adumim, which is not far from Jerusalem. And if you take all these three places that I just mentioned, the majority, the total majority of settlers in the west bank or Judea and Samaria are really living in these areas. So annexing just these areas is basically stating the obvious. During the Taba negotiations, the negotiations between the Eood Barak government, and during the negotiations between the Olmert government and the Palestinians, the basic principle there was that the Palestinians will get every inch that they lost, quote, unquote, in 1967, we can argue they didn't exactly lose it. It was Jordan. Let's not go into that. But the settlement blocks will remain and Israel will compensate the Palestinians with more territory by the way near Gaza, because Gaza is so heavily populated. But again, the distinct trademark of negotiations in the last 25 years, Dan, is that these settlement blocks are not going to be evacuated. So if this is the case, I could very well argue to the Trump administration, hey, give the Israeli hard right, this annexation of areas that everybody knows that Israel is not going to evacuate anyway. And, and Israel has in the past acknowledged that it will need to compensate the Palestinians if there would be a Palestinian state. And this is going to be a major win for Smotrich and Ben Greer and the rest. And this can, you know, install the road to normalization with Saudi Arabia. This is one option being speculated about. I think it's on the table. But many other elements are on the table. And one thing is for sure, Gaza is the key. You know, Gaza is the most problematic issue between the three, including the strike on Iran. Gaza involves a local population. It involves trying to see a future there. Other countries in the region like Jordan and Egypt, and of course, society that has been radicalized. And I should say that outcomes are really dire and the trajectory is usually pessimistic as to societies that have been radicalized. Look at what happened to the US in Afghanistan, for instance. Usually change stems from within and not from international agreements. Right. So we don't know yet how this is going to develop, but we are seeing that the Prime Minister's people is basically trying to signal that the second phase of the deal might not happen. And they're doing this in various ways. One way is to say we don't know about the second phase of the deal, but we are all for extending the first phase of the deal so that hostages will keep on being released and will give more Palestinian prisoners and will just remain in the first phase of the deal. Now, they know that this is a no go. This is a no go for Hamas at this point because Hamas understands that they're losing their cards as the deal goes through. And they know that the entire point of the deal was to go to a kind of end of the war phase and that Hamas is looking for this. So this is one way of signaling to the Israeli public there might not be a second phase of the deal. And another element is by making demands, and the demands itself are understandable. Israel's positions towards the second phase of the deal are quite well known. I'm just going to say them in short, Dan, Israel demands that Gaza will be demilitarized and it demands that the leadership of Hamas, and by leadership, I also mean thousands of people of Hamas fighters will be expelled from the Gaza Strip. This is like for the Israelis, the bare minimum. And there would be a different regime or rule in the Gaza Strip that isn't Hamas and that it won't be fabricated, that it won't be a manipulation of sorts and Hamas will control this behind the scenes. This is the Israeli demand towards phase two. I don't think that it got any headlines across the seas, but this is the Israeli demand. The demand itself is very understandable. But thinking that Hamas, after having this scenes of their for them, their victory in the Gaza Strip, agreeing to these demands, getting on board ships and leaving the Gaza Strip like Yasar did in 1982 from Beirut, nobody in the region thinks that this is very viable. If the Trump administration can deliver this together, of course, with Israel, that's going to be a major shift. And when in the region, it will be a historic moment to see that. But most people I speak with don't think that it's realist to expect that it will happen right now.
- [42:06]
Dan Senor
Do you think Netanyahu's government, and we talked about how Netanyahu and Dermer now have their working hand in glove with Witkoff working the internal politics of Netanyahu's government, which is new, you're painting a picture in which Netanyahu could possibly hold everything together. Do you think there's also a possibility that Netanyahu's government could just simply not survive the next phase of the deal? Or are you saying that the US Support for an attack, a possible Israeli attack on Iran, could be what holds this government together through phase two?
- [42:37]
Nadav Ayel
I think that the Netanyahu government might not survive this. And I think this entire thing can explode. And I can absolutely see how, for instance, if the president says you go through phase two of the deal and that's it, and during this phase two, then we discuss Saudi Arabia and the rest. But we need to go through phase two because the Saudis will say phase two is a deal breaker for us and the White House will buy into that argument. And then it's very possible that we'll see a direct confrontation between Israel and the US I absolutely do not think that Netanyahu is willing to commit to a realist timeline for Palestinian statehood. And as far as I know, Dan, this is what the Saudis have been demanding. I don't know about the great strides that Ron Dermer has been making in negotiating with them. And if the Saudis are moving towards, away from the position of we need a date for the Palestinian state, I think you and I were in the same room when we heard a Saudi official say how serious the Saudis are was less than a year ago that they actually mean business. They want to see this state not like in a decade. This is not a George W. Bush.
- [44:03]
Dan Senor
Roadmap or in the Camp David, Egypt, Israel treaty negotiations where Begin ultimately got Carter and Sadat to agree to basically a path towards Palestinian self government. And they had like a five year time horizon where they would work on this.
- [44:20]
Nadav Ayel
And let's also remember airy. It was very airy. And it didn't happen.
- [44:25]
Dan Senor
Vague. It was vague.
- [44:26]
Nadav Ayel
And Sadat, the president of Egypt got murdered. He was assassinated by the Muslim Brotherhood. And the reason I'm raising this is because there were quotes of Mohammed bin Salman MBS talking about the risk to his life as a result of this possible agreement with Israel. And usually when leaders start talking about risks to their lives, it's a sign that they're going to be very vigilant at the agreement. So this is very complex. And somewhere here in this triangle of Saudi Arabia, Israel and the United States, there needs to be a real breakthrough. And also remember that the Saudis are much better place today in Washington with the Republican administration than they were with Democrats. And remember what you know better than me, Dan, that there is a problem in procuring the votes to have the 2/3 majority you need in order to pass the sort of defense pact that the Saudi Kingdom wants in return to normalization with Israel. And above everything I just said, there is only one person, one man who can somehow make this happen. And this is with no doubt, Donald J. Trump. Because Trump wants to see a historic peace agreement in the region because this is part of his legacy, because he was dead set on this in 2016, because he will receive, I think, and should receive the Nobel Peace Prize if he gets this through with Gaza. And I would say I don't want to be too stingy about this, but definitely more entitled to it than Barack Obama, who got it when? 2017 or 2018.
- [46:10]
Dan Senor
No, no, no. Barack Obama got it in 2009.
- [46:14]
Nadav Ayel
Sorry. So without doing anything, I just remember a year after. Yeah, he hadn't done a thing. If the President is dead set on getting the Nobel Peace Prize and we know that this is something that's discussed in the White House. This is important, right? Symbols are important. Your name is important. And I say this to the credit. As long as it works for us Israelis and the people in the region, in the Middle east, this is great. So I think that if Trump is going to employ the full force of the United States in the region, then we can see wonders happening in that sense. But it does also entail a lot of policy making and politics and diplomacy of the highest level. Of the highest level. It's not going to just happen. Specifically Gaza, specifically solving the issue of Gaza. And if the result would be that Bibi will allow a bluff in Gaza, a bluff in the sense that Hamas will continue to control Gaza and will bring an agreement with Saudi Arabia that will make him a center left politician in Israel and that might endanger his position in the short term as prime minister.
- [47:23]
Dan Senor
I'll just say, and we can wrap here just when you say any normalization will need votes, Democratic votes in the Senate, just to put a fine point explaining on underlining what you mean here, the Saudis, yes, it's normalization with Israel. What this would also be and which is even more paramount is a closer defense cooperation relationship with the United States, which it only wants, from what I understand, in the form of a formal treaty, because only a formal treaty can survive changes in US Administration and doesn't want to have a deal with the Trump administration and then some other administration comes in and then policy changes. They want a formal treaty. And the only way you get a formal treaty is it be ratified by the Senate. And in order to be ratified by the Senate, you need 67 votes, which. And there are only 53. There are 53 Republicans. So you need at least a dozen. You probably need close to 15 for cushion's sake, Democratic votes in the Senate. And to your point, Nadav, if this ultimately ends with Donald Trump getting the Nobel Peace Prize, as important as this would be to all Americans of both parties, including Democrats, effectively expanding the Abraham Accords, bringing the most important Arab country in the Middle east into normalization and getting some kind of resolution in Gaza, as important as that would be for the United States, for U.S. interests and U.S. policy objectives, if it ends with Donald Trump in Norway, in Oslo, getting the Nobel Peace Prize, that may be too much for them to stomach, giving him that kind of win and a legacy. And by the way, there may be some Republicans, to be fair, who are uneasy with major defense commitments, the deepening defense commitments in the Middle East. So there's a lot of complexity here. But if it ends with Donald Trump having a major diplomatic win as part of his legacy, how that reality translates into 67 votes in the United States Senate is not easy to see from here to there. But there's something going on right now, and it's definitely real and I think obviously bears close monitoring. And I think we'll learn a little more about all of this in these days ahead during, during the Netanyahu visit to Washington.
- [49:34]
Nadav Ayel
Yeah. And I want to say just one last thing about, because you mentioned the word real, and I want to say something because we spoke about high diplomacy now, but we began with the hostages. What's really very real is that even if this phase goes through to the end, and I hope it does, this phase of the hostage deal, we will still have dozens of Israelis alive and probably some dead, held by Hamas, many of whom are the young Israeli and the young Israeli men and the soldiers taken. Their families are waiting, and their families know that they're not going to be released in this phase. And one of the things I think that we, we learned in these weeks after they returned is how could anyone not see how essential it is for the Israeli society that these hostages return? And this is for me, beyond any sort of breakthrough. This is essential for the Israeli society. And by the way, as far as I know and what I'm hearing from the White House, the president and the White House understand that. And they are very committed, as far as I'm hearing from the hostage families, they are in direct contact with them. They are committed to getting them all back home. And I think this is very meaningful. And again, I'm crediting this administration for reigniting this effort. And these moments of hope in Israel are very much to the credit of this administration. And the ultimatum made by President Trump giving a sense of urgency to all of the sides, it's really a great testament to how policy can make a difference in people's lives and save lives for these people. Released, it was like a miracle. It was unbelievable.
- [51:25]
Dan Senor
Nadav, we will leave it there. Thank you as always, and I'm sure we'll will be in touch, certainly offline, but as the events of the next few days play out. But we'll see you back on this podcast too soon.
- [51:37]
Nadav Ayel
Thanks very much.
- [51:44]
Dan Senor
That's our show for today. You can head to our website, ark media.org that's ark ark media.org to sign up for updates. Get in touch with us. Access our transcripts, all of which have been hyperlinked to resources that we hope will enrich your understanding of the topics covered in the episodes on this podcast. Call Me Back is produced and edited by Lon Benatar, additional editing by Martin Juergo. Rebecca Strom is our operations director, research by Stav Slama and Gabe Silverstein. And our music was composed by Yuval Semo. Until next time. I'm your host, Dan. Senor.