Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held direct contact and negotiations with Hamas behind the security establishment's back in 2014, reports in Tel Aviv said on Thursday, inciting upheaval in the Israeli political arena. The Prime Minister’s Office denied Thursday’s reports, describing it as a “powerful blow” to the PM and his Likud party in the run-up to Israel's elections scheduled for late October. The reports from the Walla news site and Maariv newspaper said Netanyahu maintained a secret, direct channel of communication with Hamas during Operation Protective Edge in 2014 without informing senior Israeli security officials. Operation Protective Edge began in July 2014 following a limited exchange of rocket fire between Hamas and Israeli forces in Gaza. The war was preceded by a critical flashpoint when a settler kidnapped and murdered Mohammed Abu Khdeir, a 16-year-old Palestinian boy. In the 50-day war, more than 2,251 Palestinians were killed, mostly civilians. Israel put the number of its dead at 69 soldiers and five civilians. Israeli air strikes and shelling hammered the densely populated Gaza Strip, dominated by Hamas, causing widespread destruction of thousands of homes and schools. At the time, official negotiations were underway in Cairo to end the monthlong war, the reports said, adding that the Cairo delegation was unaware of Netanyahu’s backchannel talks. During official talks in the Egyptian capital, the PM was put in contact with Hamas official Ghazi Hamad by Shlomi Fogel, an Israeli businessman who leads major companies in the maritime, real estate, cement, and construction sectors. At the time, opposition Knesset Member Yulia Malinovsky officially filed a police complaint following a major investigative report revealing that Netanyahu authorized a secret, direct communication channel with Hamas during the 2014 Gaza war. Israeli journalist Ben Caspit wrote on Thursday that officials had learned that Fogel, who was close to Netanyahu, was the person conducting the talks with Hamad. At the time, Hamad served as deputy minister in the Hamas government in Gaza. Fogel was operating under the guidance of then-National Security Council chief Yossi Cohen. Senior defense officials confronted Netanyahu and asked him for an explanation. Netanyahu denied the matter and instructed them to contact Fogel and ask him to stop. However, it later became clear that Fogel had been acting with authorization and approval, behind the defense establishment’s back. The journalist then uncovered that Fogel was initially warned, but after he continued the contacts despite the warning, officials discovered that he was acting with Netanyahu’s approval. On Thursday, the PM’s Office issued a statement denying the publication, stating the report was based on “false briefings by political elements trying to harm the Prime Minister.” "There was no such thing, and there will never be. Prime Minister Netanyahu has never approved such contacts," Netanyahu's office stated. Additionally, Fogel's representative said the report was “Fake news.” But both denials could not stop the storm of attacks issued mainly by military and intelligence chiefs, who denounced the direct talks with Hamas as “stabbing in the back” and “bypassing the security services.” Yisrael Beytenu chair Avigdor Liberman declared in response to the report that the prime minister is a “danger to Israel’s security.” “While I sought to eliminate Hamas, the PM was running secret talks with Hamas behind the Israeli army and intelligence officials,” he said. Yashar chair and election frontrunner Gadi Eisenkot said in response to the report that “every day, the explanation for why Benjamin Netanyahu is fighting for his life to thwart the establishment of a state committee of inquiry... becomes clearer.” Former prime minister and current head of the B’Yachad party, Naftali Bennett, who was a cabinet minister under Netanyahu in 2014, posted to X that the prime minister is “no longer capable of taking care of our security and certainly not of overcoming the enemy.”
