Will Israel, Qatar cooperate to save Gaza?

The latest tweets by US Middle East envoy Jason Greenblatt have surprised many. He tweeted Feb. 9, for instance, about the suffering of the Gaza Strip’s residents and the concern for the burden they are enduring under Hamas rule, and thanked Egypt for agreeing to open the Rafah crossing into Gaza to let people and goods in and out. Greenblatt also argued for the first time — and one cannot ignore the fact that he speaks for the Trump administration — that only cooperation between Israel and Qatar would save Gaza.

Greenblatt linked one of his tweets to an interview with Mohammed al-Emadi, the head of Qatar’s Gaza reconstruction committee, who explained to The Associated Press, “When you want to do work in Gaza, you have to go through the Israelis.” Emadi visited the Gaza Strip several times since the 2014 war between Gaza and Israel. In March 2015, he met with Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, Maj. Gen. Yoav Mordechai, to discuss the execution of major projects in Gaza with Qatari funding.