Axios: Netanyahu’s government demanded that Washington not negotiate with Hamas without preconditions

Media outlets revealed that the secret negotiations that Washington is conducting with Hamas have sparked Israel’s fears in a call between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s closest aides and the US official leading the talks.

“When Trump’s aides sounded out Israeli officials in early February about the possibility of negotiating directly with Hamas, the Israelis advised against it, especially without preconditions… But Israel discovered through other channels that the US was moving forward anyway,” Axios quoted an Israeli official and a source familiar with the call as saying.

Axios noted that “Netanyahu has avoided criticizing President Trump publicly since the unprecedented US talks with Hamas were revealed on Wednesday, saying only that Israel has made its view clear to the United States”.

“But Netanyahu’s closest confidant, Ron Dermer, was much less reserved in a call with US hostage envoy Adam Boehler a day earlier,” according to the sources, who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the discussions.

The call came hours after Boehler met in Doha with Khalil al Hayya, a senior Hamas political official and head of its negotiating team.

Boehler’s negotiations in the Qatari capital began last week, with a meeting with lower-level Hamas officials.

The talks focused on the return of US captive Aidan Alexander, 21, and the bodies of four dead Americans, part of Puller’s responsibilities as hostage envoy.

But the American message was that such a deal would go a long way with Trump — who would then push for a broader deal that could include a long-term truce, a safe passage for Hamas leaders out of Gaza, the release of all remaining prisoners, and an effective end to the war.

Trump and his advisers had hoped for a breakthrough before his address to Congress last Tuesday, but found Hamas’s response inadequate.

The talks also touched on details such as the number of Palestinian prisoners to be released from Israeli jails in exchange for Alexander’s safe release, which Israel has not agreed to.

According to a source familiar with Netanyahu’s policies, the Israeli prime minister was initially skeptical of the idea that the United States would actually sit down with Hamas, but he and his advisers became more concerned after the idea became a reality.

In what the two sources described as a difficult call; Dermer objected to Boehler making such proposals without Israel’s approval.

Boehler assured Dermer that he wasn’t close to reaching a deal with Hamas and that he understood Israel’s parameters, according to a source with direct knowledge of the matter.

An Israeli official claimed that the acrimonious call between Dermer and Boehler prompted the White House to reevaluate its approach.

Families of American prisoners have been pressing the Biden administration for months to negotiate directly with Hamas for a separate deal to release their sons, according to three family members.

The Biden administration didn’t believe such talks would bear fruit and was concerned about legitimizing Hamas, which the United States considers a terrorist group, according to a former official.

The official, who was directly involved in Biden’s negotiations on Gaza, said the White House held “Track 1.5 talks,” in which a former US official close to the administration spoke with Hamas officials about the possibility of reaching a deal to release American prisoners.

“These talks went nowhere because what Hamas wanted was a ceasefire and the release of prisoners, and that was in Israel’s hands, not ours,” the former Biden adviser said, stressing that direct talks between the United States and Hamas would have further complicated the main track of negotiations.

When Trump envoy Steve Witkoff joined efforts to reach a deal on Gaza in the final days of the Biden administration, he proposed meeting directly with Hamas to accelerate talks, but that ultimately did not happen at the time, according to an Israeli official and a former US official.

Trump and his advisers held a long meeting Wednesday about the talks with Hamas and decided they needed to send a strong public message.

The idea was to pressure Hamas to make concessions and make clear that the US position on the group had not changed, according to a US official.

On Wednesday evening, shortly after meeting with a group of freed prisoners, Trump issued a new public ultimatum to Hamas to release all remaining prisoners, writing on his Truth Social account, “This is your final warning!”

Trump defended the talks with Hamas on Thursday as beneficial to Israel, “We’re talking about Israeli hostages”.

Witkoff, who is scheduled to travel to the region early next week, said Thursday that Alexander’s release is a top priority for the administration, noting that he is injured.

He said that a good humanitarian move by Hamas regarding Alexander would give them “a lot of political capital, stressing that there was a deadline for Hamas to reach an agreement.

Trump’s envoy added that if Hamas didn’t take a more rational approach, Israel would take some action.