March 7, 2025 (EIRNS)—While President Donald Trump made some wild demands on Hamas to release the Israeli hostages, he nonetheless defended the fact that his Administration is also holding direct talks with Hamas. The report of these talks was said to have been leaked by the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in order to sabotage them.
“We are helping Israel in those discussions, because we’re talking about Israeli hostages,” Trump told reporters, while signing executive orders in the Oval Office. “We’re not doing anything in terms of Hamas. We’re not giving cash,” he continued. “You have to negotiate. There’s a difference between negotiating and paying. We want to get these people out,” he was quoted in Times of Israel as saying.
Israel’s Channel 13 news reported that Trump repeatedly asked the former hostages whether the Israeli public supports continuing with the hostage deal beyond its first phase—which stance, according to polls, does have wide support among Israelis. Of course Netanyahu is seen as trying to sabotage it,
Speaking on March 6, Trump said the former hostages urged him to continue with the deal.
“We have 59 left—of which 24 are living [and] they said they’re in very bad shape … [but the released hostages] want to know if we could just continue” with the release of the remaining Israelis still in Gaza, said Trump. “I put out a statement that’s self-explanatory,” he continued, referring to the ultimatum he issued after his March 5 meeting with the released captives, demanding that Hamas immediately release the remaining hostages or face destruction.
The Times of Israel said that they were told by Israeli officials, on condition of anonymity, that Israel was behind the March 5 media leak about the negotiations’ existence, confirming an earlier report on the Ynet news site. An official also said that Netanyahu was not informed of the talks until after the fact. The U.S. has good reason to have not done so, since Netanyahu’s people had sabotaged a previous effort to hold talks with Hamas, according to ToI. While these talks are said to be over the issue of two American hostages, other issues are obviously being discussed in terms of post conflict matters.
Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, also defended the talks. “It was the responsibility of the special envoy to actually have a conversation and see if anything can be achieved,” he said. “I commend him for doing that. Adam (Boehler) cares about lives. The hostage families are grateful for it, and so is President Trump.”
Witkoff said he plans to visit four unnamed countries in the region next week.
