At the United Nations last month, Benjamin Netanyahu and Recep Tayyip Erdogan met in person for the first time—an important sign of the gradual thaw between the two countries that began in 2022. Hay Eytan Cohen Yanarocak examines its significance:

The warm hospitality Turkey’s President Erdoğan showed his Israeli counterpart [Isaac Herzog in March of last year], the growing intelligence cooperation, and the following reciprocal ministerial visits—ranging from the foreign, defense, and economic ministries to the Israeli earthquake rescue and humanitarian mission—have contributed to a fragile normalization between the two countries.

The normalization process of 2022 contrasts with the failed 2016 normalization, particularly at the level of bilateral summits, their frequency, and their public style. Notably, in 2022, we saw the Israeli and Turkish flags waving in the most visible way. Normalization was declared by the former Turkish prime minister Binali Yıldırım and Netanyahu in separate locations via video conferences in Ankara and Rome on June 27, 2016. Erdoğan preferred then not to pose next to an Israeli flag and allowed Yıldırım to take credit as the architect of the normalization.

[T]he Netanyahu-Erdoğan summit should be considered a milestone for bilateral relations if the leaderships of both countries display the political will to deepen the ties.

Tamir Hayman analyzes the latest reports about an offer by Hamas to release three female soldiers in exchange for 150 captured terrorists, of whom 90 have received life sentences; then, if that exchange happens successfully, a second stage of the deal will begin.

If this does happen, Israel will release all the serious prisoners who had been sentenced to life and who are associated with Hamas, which will leave Israel without any bargaining chips for the second stage. In practice, Israel will release everyone who is important to Hamas without getting back all the hostages. In this situation, it’s evident that Israel will approach the second stage of the negotiations in the most unfavorable way possible. Hamas will achieve all its demands in the first stage, except for a commitment from Israel to end the war completely.

How does this relate to the fighting in Rafah? Hayman explains:

In the absence of an agreement or compromise by Hamas, it is detrimental for Israel to continue the static situation we were in. It is positive that new energy has entered the campaign. . . . The [capture of the] border of the Gaza Strip and the Rafah crossing are extremely important achievements, while the ongoing dismantling of the battalions is of secondary importance.

That being said, Hayman is critical of the approach to negotiations taken so far:

Gradual hostage trades don’t work. We must adopt a different concept of a single deal in which Israel offers a complete cessation of the war in exchange for all the hostages.