11/9/2024–|Last update: 11/9/202403:57 PM (Makkah Time)
A report published by the Israeli investigative journalist Ronen Bergman in Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper confirmed that the documents revealed by the German newspaper Bild and the British newspaper Jewish Chronicle were distorted and included lies aimed at serving the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s views that the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) is behind the disruption of the prisoner exchange deal.
Manipulation to serve Netanyahu
Bergman, a military and security affairs expert who also writes for the New York Times, quoted Israeli military sources as saying that an examination of the document published in Bild showed that it was “not a document issued by Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar at all, or taken from his computer, but rather a proposal from a mid-level Hamas figure. More importantly, the main part that Bild supposedly quoted from the same document, which says that Hamas is not interested in reaching an agreement, has no origin in the document.”
He added, “This document was written by the military intelligence of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades (not Sinwar), but it is a document of minor importance, and certainly not Sinwar’s orders, although it represents a moderate point of view.”
A high-level source with ties to what the newspaper described as the prisoner-of-war network, and who is familiar with the details of the negotiations with Hamas regarding the deal to return the detainees from Gaza, was quoted as saying, “This document is fabricated and its source and contents have been manipulated. It represents part of a particularly malicious, evil and satanic campaign for narrow and selfish political considerations,” hinting at Netanyahu’s marketing of the newspapers’ claims that Hamas is not interested in reaching an agreement, and that Sinwar is about to smuggle the “hostages” to Iran!
He confirmed that the families of the prisoners had gone to the “Prisoners of War” department in the Ministry of Interior to verify this matter, and they were informed that “this fear is based on zero facts and pure lies.”
The investigations conducted by the Intelligence Community were also quoted as describing the manipulation of classified documents as an “operation of the Blue Influence, i.e. a misleading operation carried out illegally by Israeli officials against the Israeli public, using false classified information.”
The Jewish Chronicle also revealed that it had produced a series of other false publications written by one of its correspondents (Elon Perry) in order to serve Netanyahu, such as the claim that only “20 kidnapped” remained alive, their hands tied next to Sinwar, and that there was no chance of their release, and the claim that Mossad agents, dressed in green, were hiding behind trees around the house where former Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, who was assassinated in Tehran, was staying.
The Israeli writer and journalist Amir Shawan was quoted as saying that the real name of the writer in this newspaper is not Alon Perry, but Eli Yifrach, and he was not, as his biography claims, a fighter in the Entebbe operation (the rescue of Israeli hostages who were kidnapped by fedayeen in 1976), nor a university professor, secret officer, and journalist for 25 years; rather, he was just an ordinary soldier!
In the case of Bild, Bergmann said, “There should be no suspicion that the deputy editor of Germany’s most widely circulated newspaper, and the most important member of the influential media group, Axel Springer, knew he was part of a sinister ruse, but the result is harsh… not the Sinwar document, not instructions on how to conduct negotiations, and not Hamas’s decision not to reach an agreement.”
Document expressing flexibility
Bergman discussed the truth of the document, which he said was written by the military intelligence of Hamas’s military wing, one of Hamas’s three intelligence organizations, as part of recommendations on how to deal with the proposal presented by the three mediators to Hamas to reach an agreement on April 8, but which Hamas’s leadership did not accept, he claimed.
“The views and recommendations presented there certainly do not reflect hesitation in reaching an agreement, quite the opposite. They describe how Hamas can maximize the benefit it can gain from such a deal, how it can move toward it, what Israel might get and what it might not get, and also how it would be possible to exert pressure on Israel to accept the deal,” he added.
The introduction to the document was quoted as saying: “We accepted the mediators’ latest proposal, which consists of three parts and deals with (the basic principles of an agreement between the Israeli and Palestinian sides in Gaza to exchange prisoners and return to continuous calm), and we see that there are many factors that must be taken into account when making the decision, and their negative and positive effects must be studied. It is necessary to show flexibility so that Hamas does not bear responsibility for the failure to reach an agreement.”
“We believe that some of the basic provisions of the agreement can be improved, even if the negotiations continue for a longer period,” it said, adding, “On the other hand, it includes the possibility of abandoning what has been for several months the main stumbling block between the two sides.”
He concluded by saying that these manipulated documents “raise serious thoughts about what was published in the Israeli media throughout this war.”
