President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, leaned hard on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to get him to agree to compromises to advance a Gaza hostage and ceasefire deal, Israeli media reported on Monday.
Witkoff, a real estate investor, flew to Israel from Qatar to meet with Netanyahu on Saturday. The pressure Witkoff put on Netanyahu is being credited for the progress in negotiations in recent days, and officials from all sides are now saying an agreement is close.
According to Haaretz, Witkoff has “forced Israel to accept a plan that Netanyahu had repeatedly rejected over the past half year.” Netanyahu had been pushing for a deal that only involved a temporary ceasefire, but according to the reports, the new plan would involve a full Israeli withdrawal.
However, on Sunday, another report from Haaretz said one of the main disputes in the negotiations was that Israel didn’t want to commit to ending its genocidal war for good, signaling Israel hasn’t agreed to everything.
Reuters reported on Monday that mediators had given Israel and Hamas a final draft deal after a “breakthrough” in the talks and that officials would be discussing it on Tuesday.
Throughout the genocidal war in Gaza, the Biden administration had refused to put any real pressure on Israel to agree to a deal, allowing Netanyahu to sabotage talks with Hamas. The US has significant leverage over Israel since it provides so much military aid, which Israel needs to sustain military operations.
It’s unclear how Witkoff pressured Netanyahu or if he threatened to cut off military aid. It’s also still unclear if the pressure was enough to get Netanyahu actually to agree to a deal, which won’t be known until an agreement is signed.
While Netanyahu is under a lot of domestic pressure to reach an agreement, some members of his coalition government are strongly against it, including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir.
Pro-Netanyahu Israeli media pundits have been expressing anger at the pressure from the incoming Trump administration. Yinon Magal, an Israeli talk show host, referenced Trump’s recent threats to Hamas that there would be “hell to pay” if hostages weren’t released by the inauguration.
“He talks about hell and, in the meantime, sends his envoy to sign a deal. It’s a deal whose impact will be very difficult. That’s the truth,” Magal said.
Magal said the only hope was that Hamas would reject the deal. “A cabinet minister told me we need to pray again that God will harden Pharaoh’s heart,” he said.
