Benjamin Netanyahu is sabotaging talks, hoping Donald Trump will blame Hamas if negotiations fail.

He vows to renew the war after a ceasefire and insists on holding Gaza’s Morag Corridor. Unless Trump forces his hand, there will be no deal, and that suits Netanyahu.

On 4 July, Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One that “there could be a deal on a ceasefire in Gaza by next week”. It was Friday when he spoke, three days before the expected arrival of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington.

Netanyahu will head back to Israel without a deal to announce. In between his two meetings with Trump, the prime minister also spoke to the families of some of the hostages held by Hamas, and told them an agreement could still be reached, but not within the next day or two.

The hype ahead of Netanyahu’s visit was inflated by the media. Israeli reporters competed among themselves, promising drama and creating suspense. They spoke of an impending deal on Gaza, a breakthrough toward normalisation with key Arab countries, perhaps even the announcement of a new agreement with Syria.

But in the end, at least as of Thursday afternoon, we were left with the same promise that we heard from Trump last Friday – a ceasefire agreement with Hamas could be reached by next week.

It’s entirely possible that behind the scenes, some dramatic decisions were made, and that we’ll learn about those in the coming days and weeks. But judging by the public statements that Netanyahu and Trump made during and after their meetings, combined with the endless stream of leaks emerging from the negotiations between Israel and Hamas, it’s clear that major obstacles remain, and the much-awaited truce in Gaza is far from guaranteed.

Soon after the media turned its gaze to another “dramatic visit”, this time by Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, it was delayed on the grounds that the talks were not in a strong enough position yet. When and if it happens, his trip will probably raise a positive sense of deja vu for many Israelis, who will be reminded of his arrival in the region in mid-January 2025, which was decisive in securing the previous Israel-Hamas ceasefire. Without his personal involvement back then, an agreement wouldn’t have been reached.

But that agreement, and the way Netanyahu broke it and renewed the war in Gaza instead of entering the deal’s second stage, will also impact Hamas’ decision-making in the days ahead. Hamas signed the January deal based on the assumption that Trump and Witkoff would pressure Netanyahu to seriously negotiate an end-of-war agreement during the deal’s first phase, allowing for a smooth transition into phase two, which was supposed to include the release of all the hostages in return for a complete Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.

Instead of using his leverage over Netanyahu to secure such an outcome, Trump chose to do the exact opposite. He allowed Netanyahu to break the ceasefire agreement and restart the war.

That was almost four months ago, and in the meantime, almost 40 Israeli soldiers have died, but only one hostage, Israel-American Edan Alexander, has been released. Apart from Trump, not a single Western leader has expressed support for Netanyahu’s decision to renew the war, and Israel’s Arab allies have also come out strongly against it.

That episode heightened Hamas’ suspicion of any promises made by the Trump administration to curtail Netanyahu. One of the biggest challenges that the Arab mediators — Qatar and Egypt — have faced in the current round of negotiations is convincing Hamas that this time, if a temporary 60-day ceasefire is signed, the US will actually hold Netanyahu accountable if he tries to break its terms and re-launch the war.

Without such a commitment from the US, it is highly unlikely that Hamas will agree to enter another temporary ceasefire. The Palestinian terror group has long favoured a comprehensive deal to release all the hostages at once, in return for ending the war.

It is Netanyahu who has instead opted for a partial hostage release in exchange for a time-limited truce. The promise that Trump will force Netanyahu’s hand is the only thing that Qatar and Egypt can give Hamas in order to overcome the lingering impact of the previous agreement’s collapse.

Netanyahu, for his part, would prefer to avoid even the temporary ceasefire that Trump and Witkoff have constructed to suit the Israeli premier’s own political needs. From his point of view, such an agreement poses unnecessary risks to the survival of his far-right coalition, and the preferable alternative is to continue the war without any pause, hostages be damned.

But he can’t convince Trump outright to adopt such an approach, it seems; the president is publicly committed to saving the remaining hostages, and senior members of his administration have promised the hostages’ families to do everything in their power to reach an agreement.

What Netanyahu can still do, and is actively trying to achieve, is to sabotage the negotiations in the hope of convincing Trump that any future breakdown will be Hamas’ fault. That’s why he is briefing the media that he will renew the war after the 60-day ceasefire; that’s why he told the hostages’ families on Thursday that he has Trump’s full support for such action.

That’s why he insists on holding on to the “ Morag Corridor” – a route that cuts through southern Gaza and no Israeli had ever heard about before April of this year, when Netanyahu first announced its existence.

Holding onto this road will allow the Netanyahu Government to use the ceasefire period to promote its plan of concentrating the entire population of Gaza in a tiny sliver of the coastal enclave, and then “encourage” the Palestinians to immigrate to other countries. This isn’t a conspiracy theory spread by Israel’s haters, but rather, the official explanation presented by Netanyahu and members of his government as to why they insist on keeping this corridor under Israeli control.

Unless Trump finds the determination to force Netanyahu’s hand on these two crucial issues — the question of renewing the war, and the control over Morag — a deal won’t be reached next week, just like it wasn’t signed this week. There will be more dramatic visits and historic meetings, more negotiations in Qatar and proximity talks in Cairo; but there won’t be an agreement and a release of hostages. From Netanyahu’s perspective, that’s the best possible scenario. Now we wait to see what Trump wants.

Republished from Haaretz, 10 July 2025

The views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.