Axios: Trump Admin in Direct Talks With Hamas

Er … what? Whatever happened to “we don’t negotiate with terrorists”?

Check that — we’ve been negotiating with terrorists since the early 1980s in Lebanon. But this doesn’t make a lot of sense even apart from that, if Axios’ Barak Ravid has it correct, and he’s usually reliable. At the same time that Donald Trump argues to flatten Gaza and eject every resident within it, he has also authorized direct talks with Hamas to end the war and return the hostages — at least nominally cutting Israel out of the process:

The Trump administration has been holding direct talks with Hamas over the release of U.S. hostages held in Gaza and the possibility of a broader deal to end the war, two sources with direct knowledge of the discussions tell Axios.

Why it matters: The talks — held by U.S. presidential envoy for hostage affairs Adam Boehler — are unprecedented. The U.S. had never before engaged directly with Hamas, which it designated a terrorist organization in 1997.

Boehler has a broad range as part of that portfolio, and for obvious reasons. “Hostage affairs” will inevitably require some contact with non-state actors, especially in that part of the world. However, contact with Hamas is particularly toxic in the political sense and has been ever since Rob Malley got exposed for engaging Hamas prior to coming aboard Barack Obama’s first presidential campaign. Given Trump’s hawkish approach to the Gaza war up to now, it doesn’t make a lot of sense in the first-blush sense.

Perhaps Trump is playing for effect? A little 3D chess in the Middle East for the sake of our Abraham Accord partners? If so, maybe the purpose is to get Hamas to reject an offer direct from the Americans about the American hostage they hold:

Zoom in: The talks have focused in part on the release of U.S. hostages, which is within Boehler’s remit as hostage envoy.

• But they have also included discussions of a broader deal to release all remaining hostages and reach a long-term truce, the sources say. No deal has yet been reached.

No deal will ever be reached, because there is no deal to be had for a lasting peace with Hamas. They are not interested in lasting peace. They want to annihilate Israel, and will only offer taqqiya in the short term while plotting annihilation at the next possible opportunity. In the meantime, they use these kinds of diplomatic initiatives to split Israel from its allies in the West and stall for time. They know how to play 3D chess too:

Hamas has been stalling for four days to prevent Israel from pushing it to extend a hostage deal. The initial phase of the ceasefire and hostage deal began in mid-January, a day before the inauguration of US President Donald Trump. That deal was successful and saw hostages released by Hamas. However, the deal ended on March 1, and since then, Hamas has demanded that Israel move to phase 2 of the ceasefire deal.

Israel’s leaders have opposed phase 2 since the ceasefire began. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other officials have rejected the idea of ending the war and leaving the Philadelphi corridor in southern Gaza. However, Israeli officials also are unclear on when and if they will return to fighting in Gaza. Hamas now believes its long-term strategy has been successful.

Hamas believes that it can stall for long enough and call Israel’s bluff about having the “gates of hell” open if Hamas doesn’t buckle. Hamas also believes the Trump administration will not let “hell break loose” in Gaza. Why is Hamas so optimistic? It believes that Israel doesn’t really want to return to fighting. It knows the Trump administration has told Israel that Jerusalem can do whatever it wants.

If they have direct contact with the Trump administration, they will interpret that as weakness rather than resolve. And in fact, it looks as though Hamas has already taken that message:

Hamas believes it will be able to keep long-term control of Gaza. It says it won’t hand over its weapons or give in to a new Egyptian-led proposal for Gaza. It also rejects Trump’s idea of re-settling Gaza. Hamas believes Israel is bluffing about returning to war. It also knows that Israel doesn’t want the Palestinian Authority to run Gaza. Hamas knows that if there is a vacuum in Gaza, it will fill it as it has done for the last decades. …

Why is Hamas not being flexible? It doesn’t feel pressured. 

If they are engaging with the US side directly, no wonder. 

On the other hand, Trump just told Egypt to pound sand on their Gaza-reset plan:

The White House has rejected an Arab plan for rebuilding the Gaza Strip, an early indication of the strength of President Trump’s commitment to positions he has staked out on contentious foreign-policy issues.

Arab governments have scrambled to come up with a plan after Trump laid out a proposal for the U.S. to take over the territory and redevelop it as an international destination after clearing out its Palestinian residents. The Arab proposal nodded to the president’s vision of a “Riviera of the Middle East,” calling for the eventual development of beachfront resorts.

But the White House shot down the proposal, saying the extent of the destruction in Gaza made keeping Palestinians in the enclave unworkable. Critics of the plan also said it failed to spell out how it would disarm Hamas, the U.S.-designated terrorist group that led the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel that left 1,200 dead and triggered the war.

The rejection makes clear that Trump won’t easily give up on an idea that has been criticized by governments around the world and surprised some of his aides and own party. It is also a sign of the challenges facing countries from Canada to Ukraine in trying to steer Trump to more palatable outcomes in disputes of their own.

What sense can be made of this? The most cynical take is that Trump wants to take credit for ending wars, even if the wars actually don’t end. That was the sotto voce message from Volodymyr Zelensky last week, for which he’s now apologizing: Trump was only buying a cessation, after which the West would lose interest. Getting Hamas to release the rest of the hostages in exchange for a return to the status quo would certainly fit that assessment, especially when it comes to Hamas, which has violated every cease-fire it has ever signed.

The more generous theory: Trump is offering a Godfather move, essentially making Hamas an offer it can’t refuse — in the hopes that it will. In the movies and the book, the line “I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse” was a signal that all hell would break loose otherwise. If Hamas remains intransigent, Trump can then say, “We tried, and now all hell will break loose.” That would certainly accelerate matters towards his own Gaza reclamation plan and mark an end to the Doha Billionaire Boys Club that Obama allowed in his second term. 

Which is it? It’s hard to tell, perhaps by design. The fact that it’s leaked out leads me to lean toward the more generous theory, as does Trump’s flat rejection of the Egyptian plan. But even if that’s the intent, getting on the dance floor to do the Hamas Hokey Pokey rarely works out well for anyone, and it encourages other groups to hike pressure for that level of engagement down the road. “We don’t negotiate with terrorists” is still the best policy, even if no one’s following it these days.