CNN –
Israel has suggested that senior Hamas leaders could leave the Gaza Strip as part of a broader ceasefire deal, two officials familiar with the ongoing international discussions told CNN.
The extraordinary proposal, which has not been previously reported, comes as Israel struggles to achieve its stated goal of completely destroying Hamas. By its own estimates, despite its nearly four-month war in Gaza, Israel has failed to capture or kill any of Hamas' most senior leaders in Gaza and has left around 70% of Hamas' fighting force intact.
While it would allow the senior Hamas leaders who orchestrated the Oct. 7 attack a safe exit from Gaza, stripping Gaza of its leaders could weaken Hamas's hold on the war-torn territory while also enabling Israel to continue to track down high-value targets abroad.
High-ranking Hamas officials are known to live in Doha, Qatar and the Lebanese capital Beirut, among other places. An Israeli air strike earlier this month killed a senior Hamas commander in Beirut.
Israel's suggestion that Hamas leaders could leave the Gaza Strip, while unlikely to be accepted by Hamas, has been discussed at least twice in recent weeks as part of broader ceasefire negotiations – once last month in Warsaw by Israel's intelligence chief, Mossad Director David Barnea , and then again this month in Doha with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, according to an official familiar with the talks.
It also comes amid a flurry of diplomatic activity aimed at securing a prolonged pause in fighting and the release of hostages believed to be still alive in Gaza. The White House's top Middle East official, Brett McGurk, is traveling to Egypt and Qatar this week for further talks.
American and international officials familiar with the negotiations said that recent participation by Israel and Hamas in the talks was encouraging but that an agreement was not imminent.
Pressure is growing on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to present a resolution. According to his own statements, the “complete victory” over Hamas that he calls for is still a long way off. Meanwhile, anger has grown among Israelis over the government's inability to bring home the more than 100 hostages held in Gaza.
Israel is “not achieving its military goals,” says Aaron David Miller, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. This, along with the “enormous pressure” on Netanyahu and his government to bring hostages home, Miller said, created a situation in which Israel would be willing to propose the withdrawal of Hamas leaders from Gaza.
Jack Guez/AFP/Getty Images
An Israeli tank along a fence on January 19, 2024, as damaged buildings are seen in the Gaza Strip amid ongoing fighting between Israel and Hamas.
“I think they’re just bumping up against reality,” Miller said. “And hostage families are starting to exert enormous influence.”
In addition, international sentiment toward Israel has worsened due to the ongoing bombardment of Gaza, which has killed more than 25,000 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry.
Over the past two months, the Biden administration has openly called on Israel to move to a lower-intensity phase of the conflict, which U.S. officials say has already begun, although intensive operations continue in the southern Gaza Strip.
The proposal for Hamas leaders to leave Gaza was made in Warsaw in December by Barnea, Israel's top intelligence official, when he met with US CIA Director Bill Burns and Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al Thani, who served as acted as a mediator for Hamas. The official familiar with discussions at the meetings said the issue was then brought up again when Blinken was in the Qatari capital earlier this month.
Gil Cohen-Magen/AFP/Getty Images/File
Mossad director David Barnea
At that meeting, Blinken was told by Al Thani that the Israeli idea “would never work,” the official said. Partly due to Hamas' distrust that Israel would actually end its operations against Hamas in Gaza even after its leadership left.
A second Middle Eastern official was briefed by the US on Israel's proposal.
The US State Department, the CIA and the Israeli prime minister's office declined to comment.
While it is unclear whether Israel has named in private discussions which Hamas leaders they hope to leave Gaza, there is no bigger target than Yahya Sinwar, Hamas' top official in Gaza. Sinwar was a “dead man walking,” Netanyahu and others said.
Sinwar spent two decades in Israeli prisons and is originally from Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip, where most of Israel's operations in Gaza are currently concentrated. Israeli and U.S. officials said they believe Sinwar could be hiding in the vast, deep network of tunnels beneath the city, Gaza's second largest.
His closest confidants and associates are Mohammed Deif, the leader of Hamas' armed wing, and Deif's deputy Marwan Issa. Sinwar's brother Mohammed is also a senior Hamas commander. None of them are believed to have been found or killed by Israel.
Mahmoud Hams/AFP/Getty Images/FILE
Senior Hamas official Yahya Sinwar
Last month, Israel dropped leaflets over Gaza and offered rewards of hundreds of thousands of dollars for information on Hamas leaders, including a $400,000 reward for information on Sinwar.
“The goal is to overthrow Hamas as ruler of the Gaza Strip,” said Ofer Shelah, a senior researcher at the Israel Institute for National Security Studies.
“There is no difference if [Sinwar] dies or when he leaves,” Shelah said. “If he dies, someone could take over a lot of the same things. If we bring back all the hostages and Sinwar leaves, most people in Israel would definitely feel that we have won the war.”
American officials believe it is highly unlikely that Sinwar and those around him would agree to leave Gaza and would rather die fighting their arch-enemy.
Israel has made no secret of its intention to continue hunting Hamas leaders long after the war ends.
Netanyahu said in November that he had “ordered the Mossad to take action against Hamas leaders wherever they are.” Ronen Bar, the director of Israel's Shin Bet domestic intelligence agency, has vowed to “eliminate” Hamas worldwide, even if it takes years.
“Everywhere: in Gaza, Israel, Lebanon, Turkey, Qatar, everywhere,” Bar said in a recording broadcast by Israeli public broadcaster Kan in early December.
Sinwar could potentially be persuaded to leave the country, Miller argued, if Israel agreed to an “asymmetric” trade involving many times more Israeli-held Palestinian prisoners than Israeli hostages.
“I think he would only consider it if the Israelis also agreed to release all Palestinian prisoners,” Miller said.
“Whatever the Israelis agree to, Sinwar must know that they will try to kill him,” he added. “Weeks, months, years.”