I spent hours this week trying to convince my main Hamas contact to speak to his leaders to call for an immediate, unconditional, 24-hour ceasefire in order to stop the escalation.
My message made it all the way up to Khaled Mashal, Hamas's leader. I wanted to help prevent the inevitable deaths of innocent people and the destruction that this war would cause.
I tried to impress upon him the seriousness of Israel's preparations for a ground attack, including the fact that it has called up 40,000 reserve soldiers. I tried to appeal to his sensibilities regarding the unnecessary deaths of so many innocent people. I am quite sure, having known him for eight years, that he agreed with me.
The Hamas leadership decided to ignore the possibility of a ceasefire and instead challenged Israel to "bring on" the battle. These irresponsible leaders are criminals to their own people.
