Israeli strike in Qatar helped force Hamas to say ‘yes’ to Trump deal, convinced terror leaders there were no more places to hide, Israeli ambassador tells ALL ISRAEL NEWS

DENVER, COLORADO — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s highly controversial recent decision to order a missile strike against Hamas terror leaders in the wealthy Gulf state of Qatar turned out to be a great success.

That’s the assessment of Yechiel Leiter, Israel’s ambassador to the United States.

In a phone interview with me for ALL ISRAEL NEWS on Thursday, Leiter said the attack may not have eliminated the specific Hamas terrorists that Israel was hoping to take out.

But it did impose tremendous pressure on the Hamas leadership.

It made it crystal clear that there is nowhere Hamas officials and operatives could be safe from the long arm of the Israeli military or the legendary Mossad spy service.

Unless Hamas moved quickly to release all of the hostages and agreed to a deal to end the war immediately, every Hamas terrorist would soon be dead.

Leiter expressed tremendous gratitude to President Donald J. Trump for his courageous and decisive leadership in crafting a first-rate peace plan and then forcing Hamas to accept it.

The ambassador especially praised Trump’s decision to get tough with the leaders of Qatar and Turkey – two American allies that, for various reasons, have been supporting Hamas in significant and practical ways over many years.

“President Trump decided that it was time to lay down the law with the countries that are hosting Hamas leaders,” Leiter told me.

He said that it was “a very, very effective threat.”

Trump told Qatari and Turkish leaders to “either turn the screws on Hamas leaders and make sure that they follow through on what we want to get accomplished – a faster release of the hostages – or else you're going to have to throw them out of your countries.”

“Ironically, the decision [by President Trump] to go ahead with that [application of pressure on Qatar] was probably due in no small measure to our missile attack on the leadership of Hamas itself in Qatar,” Leiter said.

“I know that everybody will raise eyebrows and say, ‘Well, that [air strike] was condemned and everybody was upset and even the Prime Minister apologized.’”

“Well, the Prime Minister did not apologize,” he said.

Rather, Netanyahu expressed “regret” for the inadvertent death of a Qatari citizen in the strike.

“It was actually a very successful missile attack because it made it very clear to Hamas leadership that they're not going to be safe anywhere,” Leiter said. “And they could not maintain this refuge in Turkey or in Qatar.”

“The message was sent to the leadership of those countries as well,” he added.

“So, I think that had much to do with President Trump’s decision to insist that it was time they act in accordance with, you know, a civility with any basic moral conscience, and tell Hamas that they have to move ahead and this is what the President wants.”

As I noted in a column we published on Friday, I was grateful for the opportunity to interview the ambassador by phone on Thursday to get his insider perspective on the extraordinary events that had been unfolding since President Donald J. Trump announced on social media the stunning – indeed, miraculous – news that the deal was done and Hamas is set to release every single Israeli hostage in the coming days.

I was also eager to get his readout on the extraordinary and historic meetings that he and Prime Minister Netanyahu had held in the Oval Office with other senior U.S. and Israeli officials to finalize and publicly release the White House’s 20-point peace plan the week before.

What’s more, I wanted to ask him for details of the American President’s historic and highly consequential trip to Israel next week.