Hamas insists that the next hostage deal must include three prominent prisoners, only one of whom is considered a member of Hamas.
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Hamas' insistence on the inclusion of the two additional senior figures indicates that the terrorist organization is already planning for the day after the war and considering the relationships between Hamas, the Fatah movement and other Palestinian factions.
The list includes some Palestinian heavyweights capable of altering the landscape of the Palestinian Authority. At the forefront is senior Fatah member Marwan Barghouti, who, in the latest poll conducted in the West Bank, is favored to lead the PA after sitting President Mahmoud Abbas. Barghouti has been sentenced to five consecutive life terms plus 40 years for orchestrating terrorist attacks in which five Israelis were killed and many were injured.
Earlier this week, Palestinian human rights organizations reported that the Israel Prison Service (IPS) transferred Barghouti from Ofer Prison to solitary confinement. In a statement released this week, organizations working for Palestinian prisoners said they hold the IPS responsible for Barghouti's life, implying that Israel might intend to harm him.
Some countries are interested in a "revitalized" Palestinian Authority in the day after the war, with ongoing debates about the PA’s future, its relations with Gaza and a potential successor to Abbas, with Barghouti's name being floated around. Reuters reported that the U.S. believes the proposal to include Barghouti is inappropriate. Practically, Israel would not want to release him.
Barghouti served as the secretary-general of the Fatah movement in the West Bank and was arrested on April 15, 2002. Like other Palestinian prisoners serving long sentences for terrorist offenses, he is very popular among the Palestinian public. Unlike those prisoners, Barghouti is a political figure, which makes him even more favored.
The second name Hamas insists on is Ahmad Sa'adat, secretary-general of the Marxist-Leninist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the planner of the assassination of government minister Rehavam Ze'evi in 2001. A decade later, Israel refused to release Sa'adat as part of a deal for the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit. Like Barghouti, Sa'adat is also considered a prominent and popular figure in Palestinian society.
Following Ze'evi’s assassination, Sa'adat fled to the Mukataa in Ramallah – the administrative center of the Palestinian Authority. Then-president Yasser Arafat refused to extradite him, prompting Israel to lay siege on the compound.
After negotiations mediated by the U.S. and the UK, the parties reached the so-called Ramallah Agreement under which Sa'adat was sent to Jericho prison, guarded by British and American wardens. Following Hamas' electoral victory in 2005, he was captured and brought to an Israeli prison. In December 2008, he was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
Abdullah Barghouti, a Hamas member and former commander of the terror organization's military wing in the West Bank, is the third name on Hamas's shortlist. Barghouti is currently serving 67 life sentences, an unprecedented punishment in Israel.
Hamas failed to secure his release in the Shalit deal and now insists that he must be freed in the next exchange, along with the two other senior figures mentioned.
Abdullah Barghouti used his engineering skills to manufacture explosive devices. He is accused of involvement in dozens of attacks in the early 2000s, in which 66 Israelis were killed and about 500 were wounded.