Netanyahu allegedly used 2014 Hamas backchannel
neljapäev, 27. august 2026 09:50
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu allegedly held direct ceasefire-related talks with Hamas during Israel’s 2014 Gaza war through businessman Shlomi Fogel, bypassing the defense establishment, The Jerusalem Post reported, citing Maariv and anonymous security officials.
The talks did not use the traditional channels of Egypt, Qatar or another intermediary. Fogel was sent by Netanyahu, under the guidance of then-National Security Council chief Yossi Cohen, to speak by phone with Razi Hamed in the Gaza Strip for several weeks. Netanyahu set the guidelines, Cohen shaped the messages and Fogel conducted the talks.
Netanyahu was seeking a ceasefire during Operation Protective Edge and had sent a security delegation to Egypt for negotiations through Egyptian mediators. The delegation included Fuli Mordechai, Nimrod Sheffer, Amos Gilad and then-Shin Bet chief Yoram Cohen, and held talks involving representatives of Hamas and other Gaza factions. Those negotiations stalled without a breakthrough.
Defense officials later discovered that a separate channel was operating while the Israeli delegation traveled to and from Cairo. Senior officials confronted Netanyahu, who denied the matter and told them to contact Fogel and ask him to stop. “People’s jaws dropped,” one anonymous security official told Maariv.
“He appointed all of us; he sent us to conduct negotiations in Cairo, and at the same time he was conducting direct negotiations with Hamas without us knowing about it,” the official said. The official said Fogel later showed that “everything was done with authorization and approval.”
The article described Hamed as a known Hamas terrorist who was then a deputy minister in the Hamas government in Gaza and is now chairman of the Gaza Energy Authority. It contrasted the alleged 2014 channel with earlier Netanyahu contacts with Yahya Sinwar, which it said were conducted through Egypt as a third party.
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