MIRACULOUS: ‘It’s really the hand of God we’re seeing’ — Israel’s ambassador talks to ALL ISRAEL NEWS about Trump, Bibi, Qatar & the imminent release of all hostages

DENVER, COLORADO — I reached Yechiel Leiter, Israel’s intrepid and highly trusted ambassador to the United States, by phone just before 4 o’clock Mountain Time yesterday afternoon.

He was in Washington, D.C., and in his car en route to Dulles International Airport to catch a series of flights that would get him back to Israel just ahead of the beginning of Shabbat at sundown tonight.

I first met Leiter two decades ago when he was chief of staff to then–Israeli Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and late last year conducted his first interview as Netanyahu’s newly appointed emissary to the U.S. government (an interview for ALL ISRAEL NEWS and THE ROSENBERG REPORT on TBN).

Now I was grateful my friend had some time to chat and was eager to get his insider perspective on the extraordinary events that had been unfolding since President Donald J. Trump announced on social media Wednesday afternoon the stunning — indeed, miraculous — news that the deal was done and Hamas was 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 had in the Oval Office with other senior U.S. and Israeli officials regarding finalization and public release of the White House’s 20-point peace plan the week before.

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

Leiter was as cheerful and light-hearted as I’d heard him in several years.

He graciously gave me 17 minutes, and we covered a lot of ground.

The most important takeaways for me were these:

A devoutly religious Orthodox Jewish man — indeed, a trained rabbi — Leiter made it clear he sees the miraculous hand of the Almighty in the dramatic breakthrough of the last few days.
“I think that it really is the hand of God that we're seeing here,” Leiter told me.
After 733 days of horror, he is convinced that all of the 48 remaining Israeli hostages are coming home from the Gaza Strip very soon, including the last 20 living hostages.
Leiter expressed tremendous gratitude to President Trump for his courageous and decisive leadership that made this masterstroke of diplomacy possible — especially Trump’s decision to get tough with the leaders of Qatar and Turkey, two American allies that for various reasons have supported 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 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.”
A fiercely committed Zionist, and a longtime friend and trusted ally of Netanyahu, he also praised the prime minister’s decision to continually ratchet up military pressure on Hamas.
Leiter also praised the highly professional work of U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee and shared what a blessing it’s been for him, as a devout religious Jew, to work with a devout Evangelical Christian.

The following is the transcript of the call, lightly edited for clarity.

ROSENBERG: Ambassador, thank you so much for chatting with me on ALL ISRAEL NEWS. I understand you're on the way to the airport. Are you in Washington en route to Jerusalem?

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER: Yes, Joel. Well, thank you. It's good to be with you. I'm en route from Washington to Newark, where I’ll get a flight to Jerusalem.

ROSENBERG: I know that exact flight — I’ve flown it many times. Wow, this is a huge development. I'm so encouraged. What can you tell me first about how this thing has played out, and then what's happening next? Is the president definitely coming to speak at the Knesset? Maybe we start there, because that's the news going forward.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER: Yes — well, it's constantly changing. The Trump White House is very dynamic. But as it stands now, the President will be coming, please God, Monday morning — early — and then going straight up to Jerusalem to speak at the Knesset.

ROSENBERG: On Monday?

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER: That's the plan. On Monday.

ROSENBERG: Okay. Wow. Do you know if he's going anywhere else in the region?

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER: I do not. It'll be a short visit to Israel. There is talk that he'll visit Egypt as well the same day — that would also be a very short visit. I think one has to point out the tremendous symbolic aspect of the President visiting the day before Simchat Torah — Tuesday will be the holiday — the very same holiday on which Hamas stormed southern Israel and took these people hostage. And they'll be released on the very day that they were taken hostage, or a day before.

ROSENBERG: I appreciate you pointing that out, Ambassador. Because of the differences between the Hebrew calendar and the Western calendar — in the West we've just had October 7th — but I don't think people realize that on the Hebrew calendar, it's going to be two years to the day since the invasion. Two years — it's quite remarkable.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER: About your question as to how this came about, we have to pay attention to several vectors.

The first vector is that President Trump decided it was time to lay down the law with the countries that are hosting Hamas leaders. This was a last resort, but a very, very effective threat: Either turn the screws on Hamas leaders and make sure they follow through on what we want to get accomplished — including a faster release of the hostages — or else you're going to have to throw them out of your countries.

And I think this White House pressure was effective with Turkey in particular once it was brought into the negotiating process. Turkey houses and gives safety to a number of Hamas leaders. As a matter of fact, Hamas’s entire financial structure is in Turkey. So, between Turkey and Qatar — where the Hamas leaders also reside — President Trump laid down the law and made it very clear to Hamas leadership that they've got to move on this. And that was due to the President's pressure. That's the first vector.

ROSENBERG: Okay.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER: Ironically, the decision by President Trump to go ahead with that application of pressure was probably due in no small measure to our missile attack on the leadership of Hamas itself in Qatar. I know that everybody will raise eyebrows and say, well, that was condemned and everybody was upset and even the Prime Minister apologized. Well, the Prime Minister did not apologize — that was completely taken out of context.

ROSENBERG: My understanding from the reporting was that he [Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu] expressed “regret” for the death of a particular Qatari civilian.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER: Yeah, for a Qatari civilian that was killed. And, you know, Qatar wanted that kind of fig leaf — they wanted that for self-respect. So, the Prime Minister paid that respect, but it was not an apology by any means.

In many respects, 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. They could not maintain this refuge in Turkey or in Qatar. And the message was sent to the leadership of those countries as well.

So, I think that had much to do with the President's decision to insist that it was time they act in accordance with civility and basic moral conscience — and tell Hamas that they have to move ahead. That was the first vector.

The second vector is the fact that our soldiers — who have risen like lions to defend the country…

ROSENBERG: Your son, being one of them, who gave his life in the early months in a special forces unit to defeat Hamas and protect us — thank you for your son’s service.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
Thank you for that, Joel — yes, he and his colleagues, and the hundreds of thousands of soldiers who participated throughout this war. We have surrounded Gaza City and made it very clear — Prime Minister Netanyahu could not have been clearer — he said, "If we don't move ahead with negotiations, we're going to move ahead with the military operations." And we were ready. We were poised — we still are — to take Gaza City, the last stronghold of Hamas, and completely eliminate them. We've eliminated some 23 out of 25 battalions, and we could take out the battalions that were reconstituted in Gaza City as well. So, they felt the noose was around their neck.

ROSENBERG:
Ultimately, what we have here is a surrender — an admission of defeat — on the part of Hamas, because the parameters of the Trump plan include a complete disarming of Hamas and a removal of Hamas from power.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
And an international agency that will see to it that Hamas and the Gaza Strip are completely demilitarized and de-radicalized. So, that is 180 degrees from what Hamas wanted. And now we just have to be vigilant and make sure that Phases Two and Three of the Trump parameters are actually implemented on time and to the degree that’s intended.

ROSENBERG:
Yeah, because you and I are recording this interview on Thursday as you're heading to the airport to return to Israel. But literally just yesterday — just hours before the President announced to the world that the deal was done — there were, I think, five Hamas terrorists who sprang out of a terror tunnel and tried to ambush — or did ambush — an Israeli unit and tried to kidnap somebody. And it's just a few days since Israeli forces found long-range missiles in part of Gaza that were all ready to fire on central Israel. This is still a very serious situation.

How confident is the Prime Minister and his senior team that with the IDF stepping back and controlling maybe 53% — rather than, what, 86% — of the Gaza Strip [as specified in the agreement], that we can still get to a demilitarization of Gaza, which is point #1 on President Trump’s remarkable 20-point plan?

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
Well, you know — look, we're hopeful more than confident. If the international agency that the President is establishing is not able to disarm Hamas entirely and demilitarize it, then we’re going to have to go back in — and we're ready to do that.

Look, there are 450 miles of terror tunnels in an area that's only 24 miles long and eight miles wide. No army in the world has had to deal with the extent of this terror network. So, it's going to take time for any agency — for any military or civilian organization that’s come together to demilitarize Gaza — to actually implement this. Those terror tunnels have to be gone through, and there are so many different weapons that have been smuggled into Gaza over the years — mind-boggling numbers. So, it's going to take a bit of time.

But we are very, very hopeful. I mean, the President — look, he took it upon himself to be the chairman of this board.

ROSENBERG:
Yes.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
So, you know, I heard him in the Oval Office — we were sitting there and he was talking about the different building projects that he's done around the world, and now he's talking about being responsible for rebuilding Gaza. So, he sees this as a very personal endeavor — and when President Trump gets behind something, it gets done.

So, we’re very, very hopeful that, at the end of the day, this will be implemented. If it's not, there won't be peace. The only way for there to be peace is for Gaza to be demilitarized. Israel cannot live once again with jihadi militants — with Islamic fascists — on our border. We just can't do it. Not in Gaza. Not in Syria. Not in Lebanon. This is a very, very radical, extremist ideology.

By the way, Joel, they [the leaders of Hamas] don't even believe in a Palestinian state.

ROSENBERG:
Right.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
All these happy idiots running around the campuses, screaming, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free!” — they don’t get it. Hamas is a caliphate organization. They’re not talking about a Palestinian state. This is the Muslim Brotherhood. This means Hamas believes you have to have a caliphate and destroy Judeo-Christian civilization.

The beauty of the Abraham Accords is that it is the moderate Muslims — the ones who want a reformation within Islam — who are coming and saying, “Let's live side-by-side with Judeo-Christian civilization.” And the first step to that is to accept Israel. So, that’s really what the battle is here — against Iran and its proxies, whether they’re Shia or Sunni. They believe in a very radical, extremist version of Islam, which means to eradicate us [Jews], and then you [Christians], and then the United States.

ROSENBERG:
Yes.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
So, we are very, very hopeful that this will succeed. It is a victory for the West. It is a defeat for Iran. That is very important, and we will persist in our hope that this goes the distance.

ROSENBERG:
Amen. One last question — and I know you have got to go. When I study this 20-point plan, I can’t see where Israel would want more.

I'm sure there are some in the Cabinet, I know, who wanted to occupy and retake Gaza. And even biblically — in Zephaniah chapter 2 — that’s actually going to happen one day, apparently, prophetically.

NOTE: In the biblical book of Zephaniah, the Hebrew prophet says that in the eschatological future Gaza will be abandoned by its current residents and that the tribe of Judah will reclaim possession of Gaza, which was given to the Jewish people by God.
🔗 Learn more here

ROSENBERG:
But in the current world that we live in, it seems like Israel got everything it was asking for to achieve its war aims — obviously assuming that everything gets implemented as written. So, could you just describe, before we go, some of the atmospherics in the Oval Office between the President and the Prime Minister? Because this is an extraordinary relationship that has achieved unprecedented accomplishments in just six or seven months.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
Well, you're on to something. Not having been with us in the Oval, you're really on to something, Joel. Because, you know, there was this narrative that some journalists created — that there was daylight between the President and the Prime Minister.

ROSENBERG:
Oh, yeah — the premise that the President was using foul language to describe Netanyahu.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
Well, it never happened — it's all a bunch of baloney, or malarkey, as the former President used to say.

You know, I sat next to the Prime Minister at lunch with the President — and across the table from the Vice President and the Secretary of State — and it was a jovial conversation. But nothing speaks more to the fact that they have a wonderful relationship than the simple fact that the 20 points, as you mentioned, basically embrace the Israeli government’s position from day one, which was that:

all the hostages have to be released;
Hamas has to be disarmed;
Gaza has to be demilitarized; and
a situation has to be created where Gaza could never again become a jihadi stronghold.

And here the President came with his plan — and that’s exactly what appears in the plan: that Hamas cannot remain standing, they cannot be in any way part of governing Gaza, they have to be completely disarmed, and Gaza has to be demilitarized.

And President Trump created an international agency that is poised to do that and has been charged with the responsibility to accomplish it.

So, that speaks more than a thousand words about the relationship between them. He actually embraced the Prime Minister’s position and put it into the peace plan.

ROSENBERG:
Can you believe — I know I said one more question, but I have to just say before you go — can you believe where God has put you? You're at the epicenter of the U.S.–Israeli strategic alliance for the Prime Minister. And my dear friend Mike Huckabee is in Jerusalem for President Trump. I mean, you two — an Orthodox Jew and a devout Evangelical Christian — are at the epicenter of the epicenter at an extraordinary moment.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
It is an extraordinary moment, and I think it speaks so much to the values that we share. This really is a battle for Judeo-Christian civilization. And together we are working toward that end. We want to see a Muslim civilization live side by side without the intent of one devouring the other.

And I think that it really is the hand of God that we're seeing here — between myself and Mike Huckabee, who’s a dear friend and a great ambassador. He is doing incredible work in Jerusalem. We’re in constant contact, and I don’t think there’s ever been this kind of relationship between Israel’s ambassador in Washington and Washington’s ambassador in Jerusalem. It’s so amazing. What can I tell you?

ROSENBERG:
Well, I'm so grateful. I don’t think I’ve ever said to a fellow Israeli, “Shabbat Shalom,” with such confidence that the “Shalom” was really going to be part of the “Shabbat,” as I’m saying to you right now. So, Shabbat Shalom, my friend.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
I don’t know if you know this, but my son’s last words before the explosion went off and killed him were, “Shabbat Shalom.”

ROSENBERG:
Oh, I didn’t know that.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
Yeah, he announced on the wireless — he and his team were in search of a shaft to a tunnel in northern Gaza, and he had found the shaft. He announced on the radio, “We have found the shaft, Shabbat Shalom.” And as soon as he said “Shalom,” the explosion went off. So, “Shabbat Shalom” is very meaningful to me, and I appreciate that. Indeed, we want a Shabbat Shalom not only for the week but for humanity.

ROSENBERG:
Yes, and we’ve got a new Jewish year ahead of us — so, Shabbat Shalom, Happy Sukkot, Happy Simchat Torah, and a very happy New Year to you, my friend.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
Thank you very much.

ROSENBERG:
I'm only sorry that I'm not jumping on the plane with you and going to Jerusalem for President Trump’s visit, but I’ve got to stay and focus on my family. So, we’ll do that.

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR YECHIEL LEITER:
May God comfort you on the loss of your mom, and may you know only good things in the coming year.

ROSENBERG:
Thank you — likewise, my friend. All right, God bless you. Thanks for being part of ALL ISRAEL NEWS.

[To watch Joel’s first interview with Ambassador Yechiel Leiter on THE ROSENBERG REPORT, please click here.]