It was late July when three secretive men charged with a near-impossible mission believed they were finally on the cusp of a breakthrough.
The US spy chief, the head of Egyptian intelligence and Qatar’s prime minister arrived on a summer day at a private Qatari-owned villa in Rome, convinced that a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas was tantalisingly close.
In the wake of Hamas’s October 7 attack and Israel’s subsequent offensive in Gaza, the negotiators had relentlessly nudged, cajoled and pressured both parties to accept an agreement that would secure the release of Israeli hostages and a permanent end to war in the besieged Palestinian enclave.
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