‘I’m here to save lives’: Inside the unlikely Biden-Trump partnership to secure a Gaza ceasefire

CNN’s global affairs analyst Brett McGurk is out with a book tomorrow, Brink: Inside the Race to Free the October 7th Hostages , a firsthand account of the Gaza hostage negotiations and the wider Middle East crisis that followed October 7. The following excerpt details the beginnings of the unlikely cooperation between the outgoing Biden administration and Trump’s incoming team to secure a Gaza hostage-and-ceasefire deal. It offers an inside-the-room account of how political rivals tried to turn a narrow diplomatic opening into an agreement before the transfer of power.

Secure rooms in the US Capitol are cavernous compared to the White House Situation Room. They are designed for full committees or larger gatherings, not intimate discussions. On Nov. 20, 2024, Jake Sullivan and I had gone to one of those rooms to brief our successors two weeks after Donald Trump resoundingly defeated Kamala Harris.

Sullivan was Biden’s national security advisor. His named successor was Mike Waltz, a congressman from Florida. I was Biden’s lead on the Middle East and a chief negotiator on talks to free hostages held by Hamas in Gaza in exchange for a ceasefire with Israel. My named successor was Steve Witkoff — a real-estate tycoon and Trump’s best friend.

Shortly after the election, I had called Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and former Middle East hand. My message was that we had a chance to secure a Gaza deal so long as we could be seen as working together without any daylight between the incoming and outgoing teams. That was a tall order given the polarization in Washington, but it was the only chance we had — and for the first time in months, circumstances trended in our favor.

The hostage talks had collapsed in August, when shortly after Biden, together with the leaders of Egypt and Qatar, presented a new proposal endorsed by Israel, Hamas terrorists murdered six hostages in a tunnel under Rafah, a city in southern Gaza. One of those hostages was Hersh Goldberg-Polin, an American who had been grievously wounded and lost an arm in Hamas’s attacks at the Nova music festival on Oct. 7, 2023, before being taken captive.

Avishag Shaar-Yashuv/The New York Times/Redux

Following the collapse of the negotiations, Israel had won a string of military victories. It started on Sept. 17, 2024, with an operation that exploded thousands of beepers carried by Hezbollah militants in Lebanon. I first heard about what became known as Operation Grim Beeper from a contact in Mossad, Israel’s external intelligence service, who told me, “We just blew the dicks off Hezbollah.”

In many cases, that was not metaphorical.

Hezbollah, like Hamas, a terrorist group backed by Iran, had made the fateful decision to join in the Hamas attack on Israel. On Oct. 8, 2023, it began firing daily rocket barrages into northern Israel, eventually displacing nearly 80,000 people. Israel had been prepared to forgo an operation against Hezbollah if there was a hostage deal. But with no deal in sight, Israel soon followed the beeper operation with a ground assault into the Hezbollah strongholds of southern Lebanon.

By the end of September, Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, was dead, together with most of his senior lieutenants, buried in an underground Beirut compound.

On Oct. 1, following Nasrallah’s death, Iran made its own foolish — and fateful — decision to launch another massive ballistic missile attack against Israel, following on a failed attack it had launched months earlier. This time, Iran launched nearly two hundred missiles at once, exceeding its earlier salvo.

In the Situation Room that afternoon, as interceptors destroyed incoming missiles at the edge of outer space, we received reports of a direct hit on a college dormitory in Tel Aviv. I was seated just across from Harris, less than five weeks from Election Day. She mouthed, “Oh, shit.” We knew that if Iran inflicted significant Israeli casualties, the Israelis were prepared to launch a massive counterattack into Iran.

Kent Nishimura/Getty Images

Fortunately, that report, like many first reports, was wrong. Only remnants of a destroyed missile struck the building, causing little damage. The attack was mostly defeated, dismaying the Iranians, who had believed their larger salvo of missiles would be successful.

About two weeks later, on Oct. 16, Israeli forces killed Hamas’s leader, Yahya Sinwar. He was found in Rafah, not far from where Hersh and five other hostages had been shot to death in a tunnel. Sinwar’s death removed a major obstacle to a deal — him — and allowed the Israelis to be more flexible on some terms now that the mastermind of the Oct. 7 attacks could no longer reclaim power. For Israel, it was akin to the United States military killing Osama bin Laden after 9/11.

Finally, on Oct. 26, Israel conducted stealth air attacks against Iran, targeting and destroying many of its strategic air defense systems. We worked closely with the Israelis on this counterattack, walking the Israelis back from a more aggressive response.

Biden told Netanyahu that we would deploy more air defenses to Israel and received assurance from Netanyahu in return that Israel’s response would focus on Iran’s own air defense batteries. The aim was to change the balance of power without triggering a wider war. We messaged Iran’s leaders afterward that their country was now wide open to air attacks should Israel (or the United States) choose to launch them. With Russia bogged down in Ukraine, Iran could not soon replace the destroyed air defense batteries, most of which were Russian and had proved ineffective against Israel’s capabilities. Iran never responded to Israel’s counterattack.

With the tables turned on Iran, Sinwar dead, and Hezbollah’s leadership decimated, we predicted that Hezbollah would soon accept a ceasefire deal with Israel. That would be the moment to return to the Gaza deal — picking up where we had left off in August.

Penguin Random House

My case to Kushner was straightforward. If Israel and Hamas knew that Trump would implement the deal on the table, we had a chance to close it before he took office. But if not, we would lose the best chance we had had since the war began. It was time to seize the moment, and the only way to do that was by working together.

Kushner fully agreed.

He told me that he would not be joining the new administration but said my successor on the Middle East was someone close to Trump, a pragmatic problem-solver who would want to work with me to the extent appropriate. He did not mention Witkoff, whose name emerged days later as Trump’s likely Middle East envoy.

Biden invited Trump to the Oval on Nov. 13, 2024, mostly for a one-on-one. When the cameras came in briefly, Biden promised a smooth transition. “Politics is tough,” Trump said. “And it’s in many cases not a very nice world, but it is a nice world today, and I appreciate very much a transition that is so smooth, it’ll be as smooth as it can get.”

Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

I saw Biden afterward. Unlike many Democrats at the time who saw the election as an existential disaster, Biden — at least with me — was focused on working with the incoming team wherever we could. That was especially so on the hostage crisis.

According to Biden, the two presidents agreed to coordinate, setting the stage for my meeting with Sullivan, Waltz, and Witkoff seven days later.

In the secure room at the Capitol, Sullivan snapped open a document pouch and arrayed briefing materials in front of him, including maps of the region and background on Iran’s nuclear program. We sat alone at a large table, waiting for Trump’s team to arrive.

Waltz entered, followed by Witkoff. The former was a retired military officer with perfect hair and rod-straight posture. The latter was a brash real estate developer known for carrying a pistol in a sock through the alleys and streets of New York, where he built a multibillion-dollar empire. Both exhibited a lighthearted manner, something that I had lost handling the Gaza crisis, where tens of thousands had died, over one hundred hostages remained in tunnels underground and the region stood on the brink of an all-out war.

The meeting began awkwardly, the four of us standing at the corner of the large table in the oversize room, introducing ourselves by titles. Waltz took his seat, and we followed.

“Trump told us to solve everything, that’s our mission,” Witkoff said, laughing.

“Solve it!” Waltz added.

Senator JD Vance, the incoming vice president, popped in unexpectedly. We stood. He asked what we were talking about, and when we said the Middle East, he told us that was his cue to leave. (Run as fast as you can, I thought.) Vance, Waltz, and Witkoff discussed recent calls they’d each had with Trump, comparing notes on what they had heard — apparently different things. The calls had come at all hours, and Waltz asked both men whether Trump ever slept. Witkoff answered, “I’ve known him for forty years, the answer is — no, not very much.”

“Force of nature,” Waltz remarked.

Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP/Getty Images

Witkoff explained that he had been Trump’s real-estate attorney before branching out on his own. “I’ve had success, but there’s only one Trump,” he told us. Vance came around the table to shake my hand, and Sullivan’s. He said he wanted to work with us during the transition period, which seemed sincere, and then left the room.

With a map on the table, Sullivan walked through what had changed in the Middle East since the hostage talks collapsed in August. It was head-spinning even for those of us who had been living and breathing the issues every day since then. For Witkoff, I recounted my difficult experience on the hostage talks, and explained why we might now, finally, have a shot.

Of course, for that to happen we had to be seen — by both Hamas and Israel — as working together, as both parties would demand to know Trump’s views.

“The only reason I’m here is to save lives,” Witkoff said. “It’s the most noble thing anyone can do with their life, to save another life. So, I’m all in, count on it.”

He asked what we needed from him, and from Trump. I took out the text. Every detail of a carefully negotiated agreement — from the extent of Israel’s redeployment during a ceasefire, to the timing and sequence of hostages and prisoner exchanges, to the minute-by-minute details on delivery of humanitarian assistance with the guns silent — was reflected in a package of texts that had been hammered over months shuttling between Doha, Jerusalem, and Cairo.

Saher Alghorra/The New York Times/Redux

The outstanding issue was agreement from Hamas on the hostages to come out during the first stage of the ceasefire, a category that included women, the elderly, and the sick or wounded, something the group still had never seriously engaged on. There would not be a hostage deal, I explained, without an agreed list of the hostages to be released.

Witkoff claimed that he knew most of the leaders in the Middle East from his real-estate business, and he asked whether we’d be comfortable with his traveling to the region to reengage and to preview his new role. Sullivan said that would be fine, so long as he was not negotiating, and kept in close contact with me before and afterward. Witkoff wrote down his number, and we agreed to speak regularly from that moment forward.

For the remainder of the briefing, we discussed Iran. With Trump entering office and Iran now vulnerable to direct attack, the Israelis believed Tehran might race to enrich uranium to weapons grade — the precursor for a nuclear bomb. Throughout the crisis, since Oct. 7, Iran had been enriching uranium to 60% grade, a step away from the 90% required for a bomb. It was the only country in the world without a weapons program to do so.

The previous week, Sullivan had convened the Principals Committee to war-game the scenario of Iran enriching to weapons grade. Participants were unanimous that if we saw such indications, we’d recommend a US military strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities, including its deeply buried facility at Fordow. The operation had been rehearsed over the past year should the president — or a future president — need it. We dispatched a message to Iran’s leaders warning them not to think about escalating their nuclear program.

Witkoff raised his hands. “Trump says I’ve got Iran, but maybe I don’t want it. Are you f**king kidding with all of this?”

Finally, Saudi Arabia. We reviewed a package of agreements that we had completed on a deal for normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia, before the Oct. 7 crisis. I explained that the deal might be possible over Trump’s term, so long as Gaza could be settled. Netanyahu’s hard-right coalition government made everything more difficult, but it might not outlast Israel’s next election in 2026. (These elections are now scheduled for later this month.)

Witkoff came around to my side of the table. He extended his hand: “I’m here to save lives. I don’t give one shit about politics. If we save one life, we save the world.”

The table was now set for that, I assured him.

CNN全球事务分析师布雷特·麦格克（Brett McGurk）的新书《边缘：解救10月7日人质的内幕》（Brink: Inside the Race to Free the October 7th Hostages）将于明日出版。该书以第一手资料记录了加沙人质谈判以及10月7日之后更广泛的中东危机。以下节选详细描述了即将卸任的拜登政府和即将上任的特朗普团队之间为达成加沙人质和停火协议而展开的看似不可能的合作。书中从内部视角讲述了政治对手如何在权力交接前，努力将有限的外交契机转化为协议。

与白宫战情室相比，美国国会大厦的安保房间宽敞得多。这些房间是为全体委员会会议或大型集会而设计的，而非用于私密讨论。2024年11月20日，在唐纳德·特朗普以压倒性优势击败卡马拉·哈里斯两周后，我和杰克·沙利文曾前往其中一个房间，向我们的继任者汇报情况。

苏利文是拜登的国家安全顾问。他的继任者是来自佛罗里达州的国会议员迈克·沃尔兹。我曾是拜登负责中东事务的首席顾问，也是与哈马斯就释放加沙地带人质以换取以色列停火进行谈判的首席谈判代表。我的继任者是史蒂夫·威特科夫——一位房地产大亨，也是特朗普的密友。

大选后不久，我给特朗普的女婿、前中东事务专家贾里德·库什纳打了电话。我的意思是，只要我们能够展现出合作的姿态，让即将卸任和即将卸任的团队之间没有任何隔阂，我们就有机会达成加沙协议。考虑到华盛顿的政治极化，这无疑是一项艰巨的任务，但这却是我们唯一的希望——而且几个月来，形势第一次对我们有利。

8月份，人质谈判破裂。就在拜登与埃及和卡塔尔领导人共同提出一项得到以色列支持的新方案后不久，哈马斯恐怖分子在加沙南部城市拉法的一条隧道中杀害了六名人质。其中一名人质是赫什·戈德堡-波林，这位美国人在2023年10月7日哈马斯对诺瓦音乐节的袭击中身负重伤，失去了一只手臂，之后被哈马斯劫持。

阿维沙格·沙尔-亚舒夫/《纽约时报》/Redux

谈判破裂后，以色列取得了一系列军事胜利。这一切始于2024年9月17日，当时以色列在黎巴嫩发动了一次行动，炸毁了数千个真主党武装分子携带的寻呼机。我第一次听说这次后来被称为“死亡寻呼机行动”的事件，是从以色列对外情报机构摩萨德的一位线人那里听说的，他告诉我：“我们把真主党的家伙们都炸飞了。”

在很多情况下，这并非比喻。

与受伊朗支持的恐怖组织哈马斯一样，真主党也做出了加入哈马斯对以色列袭击的致命决定。2023年10月8日，真主党开始每天向以色列北部发射火箭弹，最终导致近8万人流离失所。以色列原本准备，如果能达成人质协议，就放弃对真主党的军事行动。但由于协议迟迟未能达成，以色列很快便在发射火箭弹后，对黎巴嫩南部的真主党据点发动了地面进攻。

到9月底，真主党领导人哈桑·纳斯鲁拉及其大部分高级副手都已去世，被埋葬在贝鲁特的一个地下墓地。

10月1日，纳斯鲁拉去世后，伊朗做出了一个愚蠢且致命的决定，即再次对以色列发动大规模弹道导弹袭击。此前数月，伊朗曾发动过一次袭击，但以失败告终。这一次，伊朗一次性发射了近200枚导弹，数量超过了之前的齐射。

那天下午，在战情室里，拦截器在外太空边缘摧毁来袭导弹的同时，我们收到报告称特拉维夫一所大学宿舍遭到直接命中。当时距离大选日不到五周，我就坐在哈里斯对面。她无声地说了句“糟了”。我们知道，如果伊朗对以色列造成重大伤亡，以色列已做好对伊朗发动大规模反击的准备。

Kent Nishimura/Getty Images

幸运的是，这份报告和许多最初的报告一样，是错误的。只有一枚被摧毁的导弹残骸击中了建筑物，造成的损失很小。这次袭击基本被挫败，令伊朗人大失所望，他们原本以为更大规模的导弹齐射会取得成功。

大约两周后，10月16日，以色列军队击毙了哈马斯领导人叶海亚·辛瓦尔。他的尸体在拉法被发现，距离赫什和其他五名人质在隧道中被枪杀的地方不远。辛瓦尔的死扫除了达成协议的一个主要障碍——他本人——也使得以色列在某些条款上有了更大的灵活性，因为10月7日袭击事件的幕后主使已无法重新掌权。对以色列而言，这类似于美国军方在9·11事件后击毙奥萨马·本·拉登。

最终，10月26日，以色列对伊朗发动了隐蔽空袭，摧毁了伊朗的多个战略防空系统。我们与以色列密切合作，促成了这次反击，并引导以色列放弃了更具侵略性的回应。

拜登告诉内塔尼亚胡，我们将向以色列部署更多防空系统，内塔尼亚胡则保证以色列的反击将集中于伊朗自身的防空阵地。此举旨在改变力量平衡，避免引发更大规模的战争。之后，我们向伊朗领导人发出警告，如果以色列（或美国）选择发动空袭，伊朗将完全暴露在外。由于俄罗斯深陷乌克兰战事，伊朗无法迅速重建被摧毁的防空系统，而这些系统大多是俄罗斯制造的，事实证明它们对以色列的防御能力毫无作用。伊朗从未对以色列的反击做出回应。

随着局势对伊朗的逆转、辛瓦尔的死亡以及真主党领导层的覆灭，我们预测真主党很快就会接受与以色列的停火协议。届时，我们将重新讨论加沙协议——继续我们在八月份中断的工作。

企鹅兰登书屋

我向库什纳提出的理由很简单。如果以色列和哈马斯知道特朗普会落实摆在桌面上的协议，我们就有机会在他上任前完成谈判。但如果他们不知道，我们将错失自战争爆发以来最好的机会。现在是抓住时机的时候了，而唯一的方法就是携手合作。

库什纳完全同意。

他告诉我他不会加入新政府，但说我的中东事务继任者是特朗普的亲信，一位务实的解决问题能手，愿意在适当范围内与我合作。他没有提到维特科夫，几天后，维特科夫的名字就出现在公众视野，成为特朗普可能的中东特使。

拜登邀请特朗普于2024年11月13日到椭圆形办公室会面，主要目的是进行一对一会谈。当摄像机短暂进入画面时，拜登承诺权力交接将平稳进行。“政治很艰难，”特朗普说，“在很多情况下，这个世界并不美好，但今天这个世界很美好，我非常赞赏如此平稳的权力交接，我会尽我所能做到最平稳。”

Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

之后我见到了拜登。与当时许多将选举视为生死攸关的灾难的民主党人不同，至少在我看来，拜登专注于尽可能地与新团队合作。在人质危机问题上，这一点尤为突出。

据拜登称，两位总统同意协调，为我七天后与沙利文、沃尔兹和威特科夫的会面奠定了基础。

在国会大厦的密室里，沙利文迅速打开文件袋，将简报材料摆放在面前，其中包括该地区的地图和伊朗核计划的背景资料。我们独自坐在大桌旁，等待特朗普的团队到来。

沃尔兹走了进来，紧随其后的是维特科夫。前者是一位退役军官，头发一丝不苟，身姿笔直。后者是一位行事张扬的房地产开发商，以在纽约的街巷里藏着手枪而闻名，他在那里建立了一个价值数十亿美元的商业帝国。两人都表现得轻松自在，而我在处理加沙危机时早已失去了这种特质。在那场危机中，数万人丧生，一百多名人质仍被困在地下隧道中，整个地区濒临全面战争的边缘。

会议开始时气氛有些尴尬，我们四个人站在宽敞房间里一张大桌子的角落里，互相介绍自己的头衔。沃尔兹坐了下来，我们也跟着坐下。

“特朗普告诉我们要解决所有问题，这就是我们的使命，”维特科夫笑着说。

“解决它！”沃尔兹补充道。

即将上任的副总统参议员JD·万斯突然闯了进来。我们站了起来。他问我们在聊什么，当我们说是中东问题时，他告诉我们这是他该走了的信号。（我心想，赶紧跑吧。）万斯、沃尔兹和维特科夫讨论了他们最近各自与特朗普的通话，交流了各自听到的内容——显然，他们听到的内容各不相同。这些电话都是在很晚的时候打来的，沃尔兹问他们俩特朗普是不是从来不睡觉。维特科夫回答说：“我认识他四十年了，答案是——不，他睡得很少。”

“这是自然之力，”沃尔兹评论道。

Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/法新社/盖蒂图片社

维特科夫解释说，他曾是特朗普的房地产律师，后来才开始独立执业。“我取得了一些成功，但特朗普只有一个，”他告诉我们。万斯绕过桌子，和我以及苏利文握手。他说他想在过渡时期与我们合作，这听起来很真诚，然后他就离开了房间。

桌上放着地图，苏利文向我讲解了自八月人质谈判破裂以来中东局势的变化。即使对我们这些从那时起每天都密切关注局势的人来说，这些变化也令人眼花缭乱。我向维特科夫讲述了我在人质谈判中的艰难经历，并解释了为什么我们现在或许终于有了机会。

当然，要实现这一点，我们必须让哈马斯和以色列都认为我们在合作，因为双方都会要求了解特朗普的观点。

“我来这里唯一的目的就是救人，”维特科夫说。“拯救生命是人生中最崇高的事情。所以，我会全力以赴，这一点毋庸置疑。”

他问我们需要他做什么，以及需要特朗普做什么。我拿出了那份文本。一份经过精心谈判达成的协议，其每一个细节都囊括其中——从停火期间以色列的重新部署规模，到人质和战俘交换的时间和顺序，再到停火后人道主义援助物资的分秒必争——这些内容都体现在一份经过数月在多哈、耶路撒冷和开罗之间反复磋商的文本文件中。

Saher Alghorra/《纽约时报》/Redux

悬而未决的问题是哈马斯是否同意在第一阶段停火期间释放人质，这些人质包括妇女、老人以及伤病员，而哈马斯此前从未认真考虑过这个问题。我解释说，如果没有一份双方认可的待释放人质名单，就不可能达成人质协议。

维特科夫声称，他通过房地产生意认识了中东的大部分领导人，并询问我们是否介意他前往该地区重新接触各方，并提前介绍他的新角色。苏利文表示没问题，只要他不参与谈判，并且事先和之后都与我保持密切联系。维特科夫记下了他的电话号码，我们约定从此以后定期通话。

在简报的剩余时间里，我们讨论了伊朗问题。随着特朗普上任，伊朗如今面临直接攻击的风险，以色列方面认为德黑兰可能会加紧将铀浓缩至武器级——这是制造核弹的前体。自10月7日危机爆发以来，伊朗一直在将铀浓缩至60%，距离制造核弹所需的90%仅一步之遥。它是世界上唯一一个没有核武器计划却进行如此浓缩的国家。

上周，沙利文召集了主要委员会，就伊朗可能将铀浓缩至武器级的情况进行兵棋推演。与会人员一致认为，一旦发现此类迹象，就应建议美国对伊朗核设施，包括位于福尔多的深埋地下设施，发动军事打击。过去一年，这项行动一直在演练中，以备总统或未来的总统在必要时使用。我们已向伊朗领导人发出警告，告诫他们不要考虑升级其核计划。

维特科夫举起双手。“特朗普说我控制了伊朗，但也许我并不想要它。你们他妈的在开玩笑吗？”

最后，我们谈到了沙特阿拉伯。在10月7日危机爆发前，我们回顾了一系列关于以色列和沙特阿拉伯关系正常化的协议。我解释说，只要加沙问题能够得到解决，这项协议在特朗普任期内就有可能达成。内塔尼亚胡的极右翼联合政府让一切变得更加复杂，但它可能无法撑到2026年以色列大选之后。（以色列大选现已定于本月晚些时候举行。）

维特科夫走到我这边，伸出手说：“我来这里是为了救人。我根本不在乎政治。如果我们救了一条命，我们就拯救了世界。”

我向他保证，一切都已准备就绪。