'A stern message' How return of Trump loomed over ceasefire

The phone call from Donald Trump's special envoy to the Middle East, Steven Witkoff, surprised the aides of Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

- Peter Beaumont

The phone call from Donald Trump's special envoy to the Middle East, Steven Witkoff, surprised the aides of Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

Calling from Doha in Qatar last Friday evening, after Shabbat had already begun, Witkoff announced he was coming to Israel and would meet Netanyahu. Overruling the suggestion of Netanyahu's aides that they could meet once the Jewish day of rest was over, Witkoff, 67 - a billionaire lawyer and real estate developer - insisted that they meet in the morning.

In what some Israeli media called a "tense meeting", Witkoff delivered his message. Trump was emphatic that he wanted a ceasefire-for-hostages deal. He wanted the war in Gaza finished. He had other fish to fry.

"What happened," a senior Israeli government official told Channel 14, regarded as a mouthpiece for Netanyahu, "is that Witkoff delivered a stern message from the incoming president of the United States, who unequivocally demanded the deal's conclusion."

Writing in the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper this week, Nadav Eyal summed up the situation confronting Israel's prime minister and his closest aides. "Netanyahu suddenly came to recognise precisely where it is that they stand with the new American president.

"They came to realise that Trump speaks at dictation pace, and they will never be able to outflank him from the right. Trump, once again, wants a deal."