Nearly two weeks into the ceasefire with Gaza, Israeli society is grappling with hope, trauma, and unsettling questions about who actually won.

In this episode, Donniel Hartman and Yossi Klein Halevi unpack Hamas’ ceasefire violations, Trump’s bear-hug diplomacy, and why 48% of Israelis believe nobody emerged victorious from this conflict.   

Watch the video version of our podcast on the new For Heaven’s Sake YouTube channel. 

Day 13 Transcript

Note: This is a lightly edited transcript of a conversation, please excuse any errors.

Yossi: Did we really go through this for two years? We’ve never had a war like this.

Donniel: Hamas is far from defeated, and it’s beginning to re-establish itself all over Gaza.

Yossi: There’s a widespread sense of drift. It’s almost as if now we can allow ourselves to be in PTSD.

Donniel: Is Israel going to stay behind this treaty, or are the violations too much?

This is just a map, and there are probably five or six other things that we’ve seen over the last 13 days. It’s been an intense 13 days of joy, exhilaration, fear, anger, mourning, as each dead hostage is returned. Day 13, since the ceasefire was signed, and it feels like a lifetime ago.

Hi friends, this is Donniel Hartman and Yossi Klein Halevi from the Shalom Hartman Institute. And this is our podcast, For Heaven’s Sake, a collaboration between the Hartman Institute and Ark Media.

We’ve been counting a lot of days, for 760 plus days. We’ve been counting.

Yossi: Wow, wow. You know, it’s all so vague to me.

Donniel: And we stopped counting. And today we decided to call our podcast “Day 13.” Day 13, since the ceasefire was signed. And it feels like a lifetime ago.

During these last 13 days, we had the exhilaration of the signing with the aspiration and the hope that the hostages would return. We saw the hostages coming back. 72 hours as promised, all live hostages returned in two rounds.

We saw Hamas violating the agreement as it came to the dead hostages, playing games going slower than we had expected. We see Hamas beginning to reassert its control. Hamas is far from defeated. They don’t have missiles, but you don’t need missiles. You need kalashnikovs and you need bodies. And you need infrastructure, and it’s beginning to reestablish itself all over Gaza.

And these 13 days, we’ve seen them assassinate those who they determined are collaborators. Assassinating the marketplace.

Yossi: And filming it.

Donniel: And filming it and the barbarism of it. And so we’ve seen that level of barbarism return. We’ve seen Hamas violate the agreement again by attacking our troops and killing two Israeli soldiers. Something I don’t know if you notice in the newspapers. “Israel bombs over what it called—”

Yossi: Right. A violation of the ceasefire.

Donniel: “Over what it called, over what it claimed was a violation,” as if the soldiers just died by themselves. We’ve seen the—

Yossi: Those were not the headlines in the Israeli media, one could say.

Donniel: In the Israeli media. We’ve seen the fear that maybe the whole deal will unravel. We’ve seen the tremendous involvement of President Trump and the administration, of Witkoff and Kushner. Today we see the Vice President of the United States coming to Israel because they’re worried: Is Israel going to stay behind this treaty or are the violations too much? So this is just a map.

And there’s probably five or six other things that we’ve seen over the last 13 days. It’s been an intense 13 days of joy, exhilaration, fear, anger, mourning, as each dead hostage is returned. It’s very different. It’s like another face is being taken off of the posters. This is where we sort of are.

And so our podcast is, where do we think Israelis are on day 13? Where are we vis-a-vis the deal, the process? And also, you know, in our world, 13 days feels like a lifetime. You have a 13 day perspective now. What are, is an Israeli perspective on what’s happening? So let’s start with you. 13 days. What are you feeling?

Yossi: So that’s, you know, I would like to start more with the emotional piece of this. And my sense is that the assumption, the widespread assumption among Israelis is that for all the uncertainty in Gaza, the war is basically over. There’ll be ups and downs, but Trump is not going to allow Netanyahu to resume the war. It’s explicit. And he’s just sent fans in to make sure they’re all here Witkoff, Kushner, and now Vance to watch over Netanyahu.

Donniel: That’s the feeling we’re getting.

Yossi: Yeah, very much so. And so in this sense that so many of us have that the war really is more or less over, at least this phase of the war. We’ll leave Iran for another conversation. But I think that along with this tremendous relief and what discussed last week, the ecstasy—it was more than joy, it was cathartic—with the return of the hostages.

I think that now many of us, I’m certainly speaking for myself, but also for friends, people I’ve been speaking to, emails I’ve been getting from Israelis, there’s a widespread sense of drift. And it’s almost as if now we can allow ourselves to be in PTSD. And with the emphasis on P, on the post, when you’re living the trauma—and this is a very Israeli response to trauma—you gird your loins and you tough it out and you get through another day, you get through another disaster, and you always know that there’ll be a morning after. That’s the mode. That’s how we endure.

But now when it’s over, especially these last terrible two years, I sense, I’ll start with myself, this overwhelming sadness. More than that, grief, a sense of disbelief. Did we really go through this for two years? We’ve never had a war like this, not since 1948. And this war actually was even longer. And the agony, and so that’s what I’m feeling. And that’s what I feel around me is, now the PTSD can finally begin.

Donniel: We’re different people. And as a result, we probably have different friends except for each other. How we’re friends with each other is interesting.

Yossi: You’re always the exception when I make these generalizations of my friends.

Donniel: I’m the one who enables you to claim that you’re a pluralist, right?

Yossi: That’s it.

Donniel: The dominant feeling that I’m personally feeling and that those around me is relief. The war’s over. I’m living in the midst of most people who just didn’t want to keep on fighting. The war could not end for my circle until the hostages came back. That was self-evident. But on top of this hostage story, it’s enough already. It’s enough. It’s been my fourth, my fifth round of reserves, my fighting again. My, where is your kid? My kid is in Gaza. That cycle, it’s not the trauma. There’s just a relief that it’s over and an unbelievable gratitude that the United States is not letting us go back to war. They’re protecting us from Netanyahu.

Listen, the minute that Hamas fired an RPG on Israeli troops, Smotrich and Ben Gvir declare, “Time to go back to war.”

Yossi: Did you see the actual wording of Smotrich’s tweet? It was one word, “Milchama!” exclamation mark, war.

Donniel: War. War. It’s time to go full, all in.

Yossi: The exclamation mark was the giveaway.

Donniel: They should have almost had an emoji with a smile. “War! We’re back again.”

And Naftali Bennett, who is still hoping to maybe siphon off one right-wing voter from Netanyahu, says, “We have to destroy Hamas.” Lieberman said—

Yossi: I missed that.

Donniel: Oh, Lieberman again, same thing. We have to destroy Hamas. Benny Gantz, who nobody knows exactly what he stands for—

Yossi: Nobody knows he exists anymore.

Donniel: We do know, but it’s like, but, says, “The military option must remain on the table.”

Yossi: As long as the Gantz option is removed from the table.

Donniel: That’s something else, but he just removed it from the table, but it’s still on the table, all humor aside. This was the response. All of us have our proverbial taxi driver. You know what I mean? It’s just like, we all knew there was going to be valleys and hills. There was going to be ups and downs, and we all knew that Netanyahu—but it was very clear, and there was a phenomenal article, really very well put in the Jerusalem Post, which spoke about how we’ve never had a better friend, and we’ve never been less independent in our history.

Yossi: Right.

Donniel: Never been less independent. We don’t decide anymore. We don’t decide.

Yossi: In fact, Trump said the other day, when he was talking about Hamas violations, he said, “Well, maybe we’ll tell our proxies to deal with it.” He actually called us a proxy.

Donniel: Oh!

Yossi: We’re the proxies.

Donniel: Oh, I don’t think he was.

Yossi: Oh, sure he was. What other proxies?

Donniel: Turkey, he was talking about the—

Yossi: No, he was talking about militarily. He’s not sending the Turkish army again.

Donniel: But the whole thing was like, it was just very clear. When Hamas starts assassinating people, he says, “That’s not so terrible. He’s getting rid of a couple of gangs.” And he said from the beginning, “No, this didn’t come from Hamas leadership. It was some side little group,” all of which is possible, by the way, but he made sure, “Israel, you could do whatever you want to do. You are not undermining and taking apart this treaty.”

But I’m sensing, I feel like there’s a term in Hebrew, it’s called, “mevugar achrei,” who is the responsible adult, the designated driver? And here, we could be careening off the road. And I feel like this is day 13. There’s been ups and downs. There’s been emotional takes and pulls, but we’re traveling. And I feel there’s a tremendous relief for everybody. That’s what I’m hearing.

So as we said, we both represent the average Israeli. And with our circles of friends, we have these different feelings. 13 days in, I told a story. What is your sense of the treaty 13 days in? Like what reality are we living with?

Yossi: Well, just to briefly respond to what you said, I don’t see any contradiction in feeling relief, which I share with you, and I think most Israelis feel that as well, along with allowing oneself to begin entering the process of PTSD. I think that Israeli society—

Donniel: Sure. So maybe we can be friends.

Yossi: Maybe we can be. But emotionally, I think there are so many layers in this society.

Donniel: Sure, sure, sure.

Yossi: And some of the layers harmonize and some contradict, but this is emotionally, this is a very complicated country today. So in terms of, let’s say, a more concrete understanding of where we are in Gaza, and what’s happened to us over the last two years there, maybe a very simplistic but useful way of rephrasing the question is, who do Israelis think won? And there was a poll, there’s always a poll. The poll was taken that showed, I don’t remember exactly, something like 30% said we won, and it’s always 30%. That’s Netanyahu’s hardest core.

And 48% roughly—

Donniel: It might be 46, we’ll give you that.

Yossi: It truly might be—said no one won, which I thought was very interesting. And then it was—

Donniel: That’s clever.

Yossi: That was very, I thought that showed a great deal of sophistication.

Donniel: No, the pollsters gave them the choice.

Yossi: Right, they did.

Donniel: So that’s the way they skewed it.

Yossi: But there was also the choice of the Hamas win, and there was a small percentage of the Hamas won. That was last week. My sense, again, from speaking to my vast and very diverse group of friends, and basically my son, my son Gvbriel, who is my oracle on events and also on the Israeli public. And Gavriel said to me the other day, he said, “You know, we lost.” And I’m hearing that from other people. And that’s something that we didn’t hear a week ago. My feeling a week ago was we didn’t win, but we didn’t lose.

I don’t know this week. For a very simple reason—what you opened with, which is, Hamas is very much in control. And I found the executions besides being a useful reminder for what we’re up against. But I found that a no less useful reminder of the message Hamas is conveying. We’re back. And not only are we back, but Trump isn’t going to substantially change the balance here.

The other piece of this that I think is starting to become part of Israeli unease is the fact that the dominant forces that Trump is relying on in Gaza are not the Saudis in the Gulf States, which is what we hoped for, but the Turks and the Qataris, who are both Muslim brotherhood regimes and the sponsors of Hamas. Now, it is in their perceived interests to do everything they can to minimize the defeat of Hamas.

And so we’re starting, it’s starting to settle in that when Trump spoke in the Knesset, and he turns to Netanyahu and he said, “You won.” He was giving him an electoral line. Use this in your elections. And he was also binding him to the—it was psychologically brilliant—he was binding him to this agreement. You already won. Now you’re going to take the risk of losing? You won. Pocket it. And Netanyahu got the message and ran with it and convinced a large part of the public. I don’t think we’re there anymore.

Donniel: Interesting. As I think about this, in our history, we were used to counting the days of our wars, but because they were a six-day war, a 12-day war, a three-week war, a 760-plus-day war aren’t days that you count the war, you’re counting the reality. But I think we have to adjust.

And I think you’re right that there’s a lot of confusion and we don’t like what we see out of Gaza. And Netanyahu could claim total victory, but we know it’s not simple for the reasons that you mention. But we have to get used to the fact that this wasn’t a six-day war or a 12-day war, and there isn’t going to be a six-day or a 13-day peace treaty or ceasefire. It’s not “everything is solved.” There’s a process that’s unfolding and there’s an impatience where people are very quick to bury the deal. Bury it. “Here, look what they’ve done. Hamas is—”

Yeah, we haven’t started stage two yet. Even stage one is not completely finished. So people say, “Well, because stage one, look what they’re doing in stage one, what hope you have with stage two.” Stage two, you’re right, is a very, very hard process. It wasn’t filled with details, but there is a clear interest and pressure to see it through. Now we have to see what happens. It’s going to take time.

And so part of what happens is that this complete victory picture that we wanted, Netanyahu wanted the white flag. What did he get? The flag that he got was Trump saying, “You won.” And I think it’s a very astute comment that, “Netanyahu, you could claim complete victory because I am your victory. Not only have I declared that you’re victorious, I’ve declared that you’re wonderful, I’ve declared that you’re an ideal partner, I’ve declared that the Israeli army is phenomenal and could do anything it wants to, I looked at your chief of staff and said, ‘Look at him, he’s such a fighter,’ and I gave you all—

Yossi: “And take a bow, Mr. Prime Minister. Stand up and take a bow.” What a moment that was.

Donniel: All of the above, and I threw into the side, you know, he’s so great. Forget about the champagne and the cigars. That was your victory. Netanyahu’s complete victory was Monday in the Knesset. It was that theater, the three-hour theater in the Knesset. That was his victory.

Yossi: That’s great. That’s right.

Donniel: So he gave him that. But now we have to get used to the fact that, listen, the deal was all that we could hope for, but it’s going to take time. And it’s interesting, Israelis are very impatient. We like, you know, we want it. Peace now. We want complete victory now. We love the beepers. We love the in-out. And this is going to require a process of breathing. And Netanyahu’s own people—like what does Smotrich and Ben Gvir, they’re just sitting there at each second, and also now Bennett and Lieberman are doing the same thing, like every moment, “Ah, you said there was a complete victory. I don’t see a complete victory. Look what Hamas is doing.” Wait, give it some time.

Yossi: But, you know, maybe there’s another way of looking at the mood here, which is that a majority of Israelis, and again, the polls consistently showed between 60 and 70 percent, prioritize the release of hostages over a Hamas victory, which means that the Israeli—

Donniel: Doesn’t mean they’re not ambivalent about it.

Yossi: Ah, okay. Now that’s interesting. But it means that the Israeli public got what it wanted. In fact, it got more than it wanted because, yes, we had to release terrorists. And we haven’t talked about that. That’s sitting somewhere in the Israeli country.

Donniel: Do you know that was barely covered in the Israeli newspapers?

Yossi: I know. I know. Because of the joy of the hostages.

Donniel: We didn’t show the pictures of the joy on their side.

Yossi: We couldn’t bear it.

Donniel: They even ridiculed early on where they showed a picture of our hostages coming back and a picture of buses of murderers. And they compared the two. The joy of both societies.

Yossi: Well, in the New York Times, there was a caption that said, “Exchange of hostages.” Suddenly, they’re using the word “hostages,” which they never did before for Palestinian prisoners in Israel.

Donniel: It was so… So we saw it.

Yossi: We saw it.

Donniel: And we said it was too much, and we’re not covering it anymore.

Yossi: That’s right. But they’re still… And you’re right. Israelis might want more now. They might actually say, “Okay, we got the hostages back. Now let’s deal with Hamas.” But, you know, as they say, I’m old enough to remember when the Israeli public said, “We’ll accept the hostages, even if it means not also getting victory over Hamas.” So we got what we wanted, but we got more than we wanted.

And that was also the feeling of victory last week, because the Israeli army wasn’t forced to go back to the border with the Kibbutzim. The Israeli army is still deep in Gaza. And so now, for you, I understand—for those of you who aren’t watching this but are listening, Donniel’s facial expression at that moment revealed volumes. But…

Donniel: Can I explain my facial expression?

Yossi: Please

Donniel: Because the difference between the Israeli army is now, and whether they’re outside of Gaza, is a 15-minute tank drive. It means our tanks would take 15 more minutes, and we’re not dealing with an enemy that could deal with our tanks. We’re dealing with an enemy that only encounters us from the tunnels. That’s where they threaten us. This is a cycle… This is saying, “We’re here. Look, we’re still in.”

Yossi: I haven’t thought this through, so I won’t argue the point. But I think on some level, we have to acknowledge that we got what we want and a little bit more.

Yossi: And that, I think, contributed to the widespread sense of, “You know, it turned out okay.”

Donniel: No, the widespread sense. It was that it turned out okay. And you’re right that we got more, but it wasn’t that the army—Netanyahu wasn’t saying—

Yossi: He was talking about the ultimate victory.

Donniel: And his advocates that, no, and his advocates saying, this was a great deal, because our troops are still in. No, we got what we wanted because we have a larger, soon—and this is a point that you presented—we have a large coalition, and with the support of the United States to completely remove Hamas from Gaza, whether they’re going to be able to or not, is a separate question.

But that is a major achievement. And I give Netanyahu tremendous credit. We did get more, but part of what we’re talking about now is that we’re having to live, though, with the fact that this is going to be a process. This is going to be a process and every single time, you know, there’s going to be another Hamas spokesperson. And every single time a Hamas spokesperson burps, it’s going to be front page of every single newspaper. A Hamas spokesperson says, “Ah, we didn’t really agree to disarm. We’ll do the nightmare of Israelis, which was we’ll give you a hudna,”—which is a temporary few years ceasefire, which brings us back exactly to October 6th. “We’re not going to be removed.” And we hear that and we see their action and we just need to breathe. We need to find…

Yossi: That’s a great way to put it.

Donniel: We need a way to sort of let the process play itself out because the pressure… I think Netanyahu is mature enough and I think he’s read the map and Netanyahu, to his credit, has always understood when he…

Yossi: You lost me there.

Donniel: When we could push the United States and when we can’t. He knows now that the war is over and that’s why…

Yossi: Well he knows because Trump has bullied him.

Donniel: Either way. But I’m just…

Yossi: But the fact is he knows.

Donniel: He knows it. And that’s why when he decides on what the military response is going to be after Hamas violated the agreement, he didn’t bring in the whole cabinet. He didn’t have a conversation with Smotrich. He and Katz, who is basically his assistant minister of defense, Netanyahu’s minister of defense, he comes, gives instructions to the military, gets it pre-screened by the United States, by the administration. We’re going to do this and this and this. After the targets, the whole thing is agreed upon. It’s a completely different story. So there’s going to be this process, but it’s going to take time.

Yossi: It’s interesting. I think you’re right. And you know, there’s only one leader in this very complicated picture who got the victory he wanted and that’s Trump. Trump wanted two things. And he laid this out from the beginning. I want the hostages back and I want the end to the war. The details didn’t matter. That’s why they’re not negotiated. That’s why it’s all so open-ended. Trump got exactly what he wanted. And the rest of it, as we say in the Middle East, God is great.

Donniel: See, it’s interesting. I don’t have that sense of the United States administration. And I’m saying “United States administration” to help some of our audience, because every time we speak about Trump in non-negative terms, we give people either an emotional trauma or a rash.

Yossi: And I understand that.

Donniel: And I understand that too.

Yossi: And so do you.

Donniel: Oh, of course I do. And it’s not just him. I don’t think that the administration just wanted a declaration of a treaty or a ceasefire or whatever we want to call it. It has to be closed before this day so that there’s a chance that he can get the Nobel Peace Prize. Listen, Vice President Vance just came to Israel again today. Witkoff and Jared Kushner, you know, they should buy real estate here in Jerusalem, the amount of time they’re going to be here to hold our hands, because they’re not trying to hold Hamas’s hand. They’re holding our hand.

Yossi: They’re all in. Holding our hand meaning also restraining us.

Donniel: That’s correct. Supporting us and making it very clear. So I don’t think this administration just wanted a photo op. It’s true the details need to get worked out. It’s true that we need an international force there quickly, because every day that passes, that Hamas re-establishes itself, the psyche of Gazans, again, of returning back to October 6th, all of that time is of essence. But it’s not going to be three days. It’s not going to be six days. It’s not going to be 13.

So part of what I feel is we’re encountering a very serious administration. And now we need to see that serious administration translate its principles into plans. But you said, we’re going to be facing also a lot of difficulty because it’s true. Egypt, Turkey, Qatar is one thing. The Emirates were saying, I’m willing to come in and we want to change the educational system and we want to moderate Islam.

Yossi: Yeah, under Qatar and Turkey, that’s not going to happen.

Donniel: So this is part of a process. But together with the relief that the war is over, I have a tremendous sense of confidence in the process, that the process is going to be a serious one and it’s going to take time.

Netanyahu, I think, is now acting like an adult. As you said, he knows the parameters that basically he has no free will. Israel is less independent now, and maybe that’s for the good, because we have a government—

Yossi: Let’s finish the sentence, “less independent now than…?”

Donniel: Then it’s been in… Maybe ever. I hate the “maybe ever.”

Yossi: But I think there’s an argument to be made.

Donniel: At least in the last…

Yossi: Trump has us in a bear hug.

Donniel: In a complete and total bear hug. But we have profoundly impulsive people, not just in the government, the contenders to replace Netanyahu aren’t speaking about a vision of hope. Lapid did in his speech, a beautiful speech in the Knesset. But they’re not trying to offer an alternative to Netanyahu by saying, “Let’s now use this for a better future.” They’re trying to cut him from the right, whatever it is, la’agof, you know, to cut him off from the right and to say, “Oh, we are much more serious than that. We’re the security people. Not you, Netanyahu. You’re not the security guy. We’re the security guys. Look what he’s doing now. This is—you’re acting just like you acted to cause October 7th.”

All of this, this environment needs to be watched. And Israeli society is going to hear all the different voices. It’s going to be day by day. It’s not even day by day. It’s going to be week by week. And in a sense, it’s also going to be month by month for us to be able to see whether we’re achieving what we hoped for.

Yossi, this is a moment for final reflections about day 13.

Yossi: I actually want to go to this piece that you wrote a few days ago, which was a terrific piece. And I urge our readers to look it up. It was in the Times of Israel. And remind me of the exact title?

Donniel: “What If?” It started with “What If?” and then they added “What if Peace is” something.

Yossi: No, no, it was beautiful. It was beautifully written. And the argument, really, the argument, which I personally don’t share, but the argument was a challenge to people like me saying, What if your skepticism is actually unfounded? Are you ready to let go of that?

And so, if I hear what you’re saying, Donniel, the hope that you feel is that a process has begun and there are going to be ups and downs, but that in some ways may be an irreversible process. That’s a big word. And I don’t want to put words in your mouth.

Donniel: No, a positive process.

Yossi: A positive process. And to some extent, I share a sense of hope for the long term. I think where we disagree is I think so many things can go wrong and many of them will go wrong.

Donniel: Enjoy, I’m looking at you and I’m saying, Yossi, enjoy the next few weeks or the next few months as each one of your expectations are fulfilled.

Yossi: But you know, it has a lot to do with looking at our government. And until this government is replaced, I don’t believe that we can really make progress. Now, I’m willing, I’m eager, in fact, for you to be right on this. And so, I go back to your article and I accept the challenge.

Donniel: Thank you.

Yossi: And it’s in my head. See, that’s one of the voices in my head, Donniel.

Donniel: In the article, I was speaking about also, instead of “what if… could go wrong,” “what if everything goes right, and what could that mean for the future of Israel in the long run?”

But in the short run, where I am right now, my final thoughts today are, let’s just look at Gaza for a moment. A process has begun. A process that has a tremendous amount of health in it, because it doesn’t say to Hamas, “rehabilitate yourself.” It doesn’t say to the Palestinians, “Okay, you muffed up. Here’s Gaza. Fix it.” It’s a process in which forces much larger than the Palestinians, and just like forces larger than Israel, are now taking over and saying, “You attacked, you fought, you’ve killed, you’ve done. Could you go forward?” And the answer was, “You can’t.” So, I’m going to put in a process that you’re going to go forward, and I’m going to remind you, and I’m going to limit you, and I’m going to be there in the details.

Now, it could be that some of those details we’re going to feel more upset about than the administration would. It could be that sometimes it’s going to go more our way or less our way. But there is a process that has a logic to it. And in my mind, if the goal was to defang Hamas, not just of its missiles, but also of its kalashnikovs, of its control over Gaza, which it was able to maintain through the stealing of humanitarian aid, it was the only one who paid salaries that its control in those terms, there’s a process which at least is moving this forward.

And so, wait, we don’t know. You know, now everybody speaks about the mountains and the valleys, you know, like that’s the ups and the downs. Okay, but beyond that, we’re somewhere. Our kids aren’t fighting. They’re still in danger because when you’re static, you’re exposed to RPGs. We can’t go back in again in any massive way, but not like going back in a massive way would have changed anything dramatically in any event.

We’re in the process of trying something different and I’m very, together with the list on day 13, for me, hostages are home. 12 of the bodies are home and there was this interview of the mother. I apologize, just right now I’m blanking on the name of the latest hostage who was just returned. I’m sorry, you’ll look it up. They interviewed today on the radio at eight o’clock. The body was returned last night and she wanted to go on the radio and to talk to Israeli society and she was about to go wake up her children to tell them that Abba is home, but he’s home in a different way, but he’s home, and she was speaking very calmly.

It was like… it was—you’re sitting there and she’s like… where do you have a people like this? Who produces people like this? Like where do you get that? So there’s that. There’s some closure, the war is not being fought, and there’s a world that’s moving the sides in another direction. Maybe, let’s see. Yossi?

Yossi: Pleasure.

Donniel: It’s a pleasure being with you. We’ll see where we’re going to be on day 21, but I don’t think we’re going to keep on counting. I don’t want to go back to counting anymore because it’s not a day by day thing. It’s a bigger story and hopefully the process will continue. Thank you, Yossi.

Yossi: Thank you.