In a “60 Minutes” interview on Sunday, Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, who served as son-in-law and Middle East special envoy respectively to former President Donald Trump, revealed behind-the-scenes details of the recent Israel-Hamas ceasefire agreement. Their appearance comes as they prepare to travel back to Israel this week.
Speaking with Lesley Stahl, the pair explained that a key part of securing the deal was convincing Hamas that holding hostages was a liability and assuring them that Israel would not restart the war after their return. To achieve this, Trump authorized Kushner and Witkoff to break with long-standing diplomatic protocol and speak directly with Hamas.
During a meeting in Egypt with Hamas’s lead negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya, Witkoff said he found common ground by discussing the deaths of their sons. Witkoff lost his son to an overdose in 2011, while al-Hayya’s son was killed in an Israeli strike in Qatar last month.
“It turned from a negotiation with a terrorist group to seeing two human beings, kind of showing a vulnerability with each other,” Witkoff said. He also confirmed an emotional moment after the deal was reached, stating that Israeli and Qatari officials hugged. “Absolutely,” he recalled, “and I thought to myself, I wish the world could’ve seen it.”
After the ceasefire was settled, Kushner and Witkoff visited Gaza. Kushner described the devastation as looking “almost like a nuclear bomb had been set off,” adding, “it’s very sad because you think to yourself, they [Palestinians] really have nowhere else to go.” Despite the destruction, both men declined to call the war a genocide. “Absolutely not, no,” Witkoff said. “There was a war being fought.”
Kushner said their primary message now to Israeli leadership is that long-term regional stability depends on improving conditions for Palestinians. “If you want to integrate Israel with the broader Middle East,” he stated, “you have to find a way to help the Palestinian people thrive and do better.”
Source link
