It took just a few hours after Hamas¡¯ assault on Israel for Qatar¡¯s prime minister to assemble a team at an undisclosed location in the capital, Doha. As the images emerged of missile attacks, gunmen on motorbikes and hostages seized across the border from Gaza, the Gulf state¡¯s leadership knew what it needed to do.
As the days unfolded from Oct. 7, the round-the-clock operation worked the phone lines ¡ª one to Hamas, another to the Israelis ¡ª to mediate as retaliatory bombs rained on Gaza, according to a person familiar with the negotiations.
For Qatar, it was a case of cometh the hour, cometh the country. The nation has spent more than a decade trying to position itself as the Middle East¡¯s indispensable go-between, criticized by its neighbors for housing Hamas leaders while maintaining channels to Israel. The time had come to step up.
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