Day: February 27, 2024

Based on the transcript from the detention hearing, one reason Principal Senior Assistant Special Counsel Leo Wise failed to convince Nevada Magistrate Judge Daniel Albregts to detain Alexander Smirnov pretrial, is that in arguing Smirnov was a flight risk, Wise focused primarily on Smirnov’s ties to Russian intelligence, not other spy agencies.

That made it easier for Albregts to argue — repeating something Smirnov’s attorney, David Chesnoff, said — that Russian spooks are probably not too enamored of Smirnov right now, given the details included in court filings describing his reporting on Russian spies.

I — you know, I understand the concern about foreign intelligence agencies potentially resettling Mr. Smirnov outside of the United States/ his connections to them, but I think on some level that’s speculative as well because, as Mr. Chesnoff points out, I don’t know what Mr. Smirnov will be thought of in Russia/ but my guess is at this stage he probably thinks that’s not the most attractive place to go either if he was in fact inclined to go hide somewhere. So while I notice and note that that’s a concern and certainly raised by the Government that I should consider it, I just don’t know in the context of what’s happened in the last couple of weeks with his arrest and everything else that that is as grave a concern as the Government outlines.

This misunderstands the implied relationship of Smirnov to the Russians. For example, while Wise notes that Smirnov is not charged with spying (he’d have a tough time charging Smirnov with acting as a foreign agent without informing the Attorney General, given that the then-Attorney General was gleefully cheering what he was doing when he allegedly lied), he insinuates that Smirnov’s charged 2020 lie was part of a Russian influence operation.

MR. WISE: Understood, Your Honor. The defendant’s lies in this case have captured the national imagination. And while the — while the filing says they do not involve espionage, of course the charges do involve foreign intelligence services. The defendant claims to have met with Russian intelligence agencies on multiple occasions, and the U.S. intelligence community has concluded that Russian intelligence interfered in the 2020 election and continues to interfere in our elections by spreading misinformation.

What Wise didn’t emphasize, but which is no doubt the source of urgent concern, is that it’s not just Russian intelligence. As Wise addressed the limits of US extradition authority, he briefly noted there were other countries that, like Russia, would refuse to extradite Smirnov.

MR. WISE: These contacts make this defendant different from other defendants who merely have foreign ties, and they heighten the risk of flight dramatically. And that is because he can use these contacts with foreign intelligence services to flee and to resettle overseas, something I would again venture to say is almost unique in the presentation of a defendant being considered for the pretrial release.

THE COURT: So let’s say that happens. You don’t think that the Federal Government would have the ability to find him and take action to bring him back? You think that these Russian ties that you’re talking about are the type of people that would literally take him and secrete him from prosecution?

MR. WISE: If he were to resettle in Russian, we couldn’t extradite him. Russian won’t extradite under thesecircumstances. If he were to resettle in other — in third countries, we couldn’t extradite him. And so, yes, I think that is the case.

THE COURT: All right. Go ahead. I’ll —

MR. WISE: That’s even assuming we could find him. That’s even assuming we could find him.

For a dual Israeli citizen like Smirnov, those countries would, by law, include Israel. CNN reported last week that the FBI knew that Smirnov has also served as a source for Israel.

And while this is changing, those countries that would refuse extradition also likely include UAE, almost certainly another of the countries where Smirnov has been hanging out on mega yachts with Russian oligarchs.

Most of the details of Smirnov’s recent activity that David Weiss’ team chose to burn — and so the things that Albregts saw and Los Angeles Judge Otis Wright also received in their detention motion — does pertain to Russia.

The government put that reporting out of order in the detention memo, which obscures the timeline. I’m going to do the same, so as to first show the picture of Russian ties the government establishes. But as I’ll get to, those ties are built on two other relationships, relationships in Ukraine and Israel, that are critical to understanding Smirnov’s Russian relationships. [Note: I’ll be linking to the NV detention memo rather than the LA one; the declassified descriptions of his reporting are the same in both, but probably because of page limits, the LA one does not have most of the discussion about how Weiss intends to prove the case against Smirnov, which appears on pages 8-15 of the NV one.]

Here’s most of the timeline Smirnov gave his handler of how, along with discussing a way to end the Ukraine war, he also learned of a kompromat effort probably intending to use deep fake recordings of Hunter Biden. Note that the really interesting discussions post-date the September 27, 2023 FBI interview (marked in bold) at which Smirnov backtracked off some parts of his 2020 story and offered up details of another kompromat plan targeting the Bidens, which he already sourced in September 2023 to four Russian spies.

• August 2023: Smirnov “had been introduced” to RI 2 (the unclassified report does not say, by whom), who was organizing a birthday party on his mega yacht that RO 2 would attend. At that point, the ties between two or three of the oligarchs involved and RO 2 are not yet clear.
• September 27, 2023: Smirnov interviewed by different FBI agents, to whom he describes Premier Palace plan.
• October 2023: Smirnov scores an invite to the birthday party on a Russian oligarch’s yacht in a Middle Eastern country (probably UAE). RO 1 and RI 1 were expected to attend.
• October 2023: RO 1 is expected to attend the birthday party; Smirnov got a copy of RO 1’s passport.
• November 2023: Smirnov has now met RO 1. RO 1 boasted that he has direct access to the “highest levels of the Russian government.” RO 1 is a top, unofficial representative to Country B. Smirnov got a picture of RO 1 in November 2023, while he was in Country A (meaning RO 1 stayed past the birthday party).
• November 2023: RO 1 described the assassin teams in Ukraine, and offered to stop those efforts if Ukraine would stop targeting civilian family members of Russian officials living in Moscow. RO 1 also told Smirnov of plans for a winter attack in Ukraine and its intentions for that war.
• December 2023: Smirnov attended a meeting at which RO 2 attended. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss a resolution to the Ukraine war. He had a separate conversation in which RO 1 told him about the kompromat operation at a “club” in a particular Ukrainian hotel, probably the Premier Palace. He explained they might use kompromat from the hotel in an election year operation. A Ukrainian government official later confirmed that kompromat operation was common knowledge.
• December 2023: RO 1 and others tell Smirnov that RO 3 is the representative of RO 4, now listed as the former head of a particular unit of Russian intelligence.
• January 2024: Smirnov told his handler he’d be traveling to Country A (probably UAE) to discuss a prisoner exchange between Ukraine and Russia with RO 1. [my emphasis]

Here are descriptions of the kinds of Russians with whom Smirnov was partying on mega yachts in the Middle East:

Russian Official 1: Son of former high-ranking RU government official, controls two groups of assassins, a RU representative to another country, ties to a particular RU intelligence service.

Russian Official 2: High-ranking member of specific RIS central to discussions of ending the Ukraine war. He has ties to both RI 1 (the senior member of a defense conglomerate) and RI 2 (the senior member of a RU steel company).

Russian Official 3: The representative of Russian Official 4.

Russian Official 4: Head of a particular unit of a RU intelligence service, ran a kompromat operation at a hotel, probably Premier Palace.

Russian Official 5: A Russian spy that Smirnov helped to flip for Country D, probably Israel. In 2019, RO 5 expressed some opposition to Putin.

Russian Official 6: RO 5 had familial ties to RO 6, a former high-ranking member of a Russian intelligence service. In 2019, RO 5 told Smirnov that RO 6 was also not happy with Putin, and said he RO 6 was close friends with RO 2.

Russian Individual 1: A high ranking member of a RU state-owned defense conglomerate.

Russian Individual 2: A high-ranking member of a RU steel company — the guy who owns the mega yacht that was in a Middle Eastern country in October 2023.

According to the timeline of reporting to his handler, Smirnov was just learning about the assassin teams in November and the Premier Palace kompromat plan in December, both from Russian Official 1, whom he describes first meeting in November.

But as the indictment describes, after Smirnov reportedly stood by all his reporting in a conversation with his handler in July 2023, when his FD-1023 first got released, in August, the handler turned over a bunch of things that made it clear Smirnov was lying.

43. On August 29, 2023, FBI investigators spoke with the Handler in reference to the 2020 1023. During that conversation, the Handler indicated that he and the Defendant had reviewed the 2020 1023 following its public release by members of Congress in July 2023, and the Defendant reaffirmed the accuracy of the statements contained in it.

44. The Handler provided investigators with messages he had with the Defendant, including the ones described above. Additionally, the Handler identified and reviewed with the Defendant travel records associated with both Associate 2 and the Defendant. The travel records were inconsistent with what the Defendant had previously told the Handler that was memorialized in the 2020 1023. The Defendant also provided email communications with both Associate 2 and Burisma personnel beginning in 2017 to the Handler, which the Handler reviewed with the Defendant and shared with FBI investigators. [my emphasis]

Remember: Scott Brady testified that they asked the handler about travel information in 2020 and (while Brady refused to address the particulars on follow-up), the result of that was a determination that the travel records corroborated the claim.

Mr. Brady. So we attempted to use open-source material to check against what was stated in the 1023. We also interfaced with the CHS’ handler about certain statements relating to travel and meetings to see if they were consistent with his or her understanding.

Q And did you determine if the information was consistent with the handler’s understanding?

A What we were able to identify, we found that it was consistent. And so we felt that there were sufficient indicia of credibility in this 1023 to pass it on to an office that had a predicated grand jury investigation.

Someone, or someones, are lying about the travel records corroborating Smirnov’s claims, either Brady and/or the handler.

Chesnoff — Smirnov’s lawyer — seems to plan to bring this handler down with Smirnov, because he revealed that Smirnov and the handler communicated via the handler’s private phone.

I can tell you. Your Honor, that there will be a vehement defense to the argument that in fact he was not truthful. He had this personal relationship with the handler. It was so personal, Your Honor, that he wouldn’t even call him on his FBI phone; he would call him on his personal phone. So we’re going to dig down once we start defending this case and we’re going to find out who knew what when.

We may yet learn that all the texts in the indictment showing that Smirnov explicitly responded to a story about Andrii Derkach manufacturing dirt by slamming Joe Biden happened on the handler’s phone.

Given what I know of David Weiss’ sawdust-as-cocaine clown show thus far, my guess is they haven’t actually nailed down what this handler knew when, and what he meant when he said, “that would be a game changer.”

Indeed, what appears to have happened is that either the handler warned Smirnov or (more likely) Smirnov figured out, as his lies started crumbling in his September 2023 interview, that his story was in trouble, so tried to throw out new information to Weiss’ team to “help” their criminal investigation of the President and his son.

After the indictment describes the many things Smirnov said in his September 27 interview that thoroughly discredited the story, he describes Smirnov telling Weiss’ team that he already knew of the Premier Palace kompromat and advising them they should check Hunter Biden’s travel records, which they didn’t have to do to know that the Premier Palace kompromat was based on a lie.

51. The Defendant also shared a new story with investigators. He wanted them to look into whether Businessperson 1 was recorded in a hotel in Kiev called the Premier Palace. The Defendant told investigators that the entire Premier Palace Hotel is “wired” and under the control of the Russians. The Defendant claimed that Businessperson 1 went to the hotel many times and that he had seen video footage of Businessperson 1 entering the Premier Palace Hotel.

52. The Defendant suggested that investigators check to see if Businessperson 1 made telephone calls from the Premier Palace Hotel since those calls would have been recorded by the Russians. The Defendant claimed to have obtained this information a month earlier by calling a high-level official in a foreign country. The Defendant also claimed to have learned this information from four different Russian officials.

53. The Defendant told investigators that the four different Russian officials are all top officials and two are the heads of the entities they represent. These Russians said that conversations with Ukrainians about ending the war will include the next U.S. election. The Defendant told investigators he is involved in negotiations over ending the war and had been for the previous four months. According to the Defendant, the Russians want Ukraine to assist in influencing the U.S. election, and the Defendant thinks the tapes of Businessperson 1 at the Premier Palace Hotel is all they have. The Defendant told investigators he wants them to ask Businessperson 1 how many times he visited and what he did while at the Premier Palace Hotel.

54. Businessperson 1 has never traveled to Ukraine. The few Burisma Board meetings that Businessperson 1 did attend were all outside of Ukraine. [my emphasis]

In an effort to claim he was getting useful information about Hunter Biden, then, Smirnov offered up the Premier Palace story and sourced it, already, to four top Russian officials.

It’s totally unclear what Smirnov told his hander. Weiss’ team might be hiding that intentionally, or it may be the case that Smirnov didn’t tell his handler that he was involved in another election influence operation until months later, sourcing it from Russian spies he had or claimed to have met in the interim. But the record at least implies that he told Weiss’ team about the assassination teams and the Premier Palace in September, then found a way to source it anew over the next several months to RO 1, whom Smirnov claimed to have met for the first time on some oligarch’s yacht in October.

In the same interview, Smirnov also claimed that, sometime no later than 2016, he developed ties with Viktor Shokin and Petro Poroshenko.

50. The Defendant told investigators that he had asked the then-Ukrainian President to arrange a meeting between himself and the then-Ukrainian Prosecutor General to talk about Burisma. The Defendant told investigators that this meeting occurred before the then-Ukrainian Prosecutor General resigned, which was early 2016. The Defendant also told investigators this meeting occurred before his meeting with Burisma Official 1 in the coffee shop in a German speaking country. The Defendant told investigators that after he met with the thenUkrainian Prosecutor General, he met with the then-Ukrainian President. The Defendant did not provide any of this information to the Handler in 2020.

With all that in mind, consider the rest of the timeline, the stuff that happened (or that Smirnov claimed happened) before the reporting laid out above.

• 1992 to 2006: Smirnov lives in Israel, where his family still lives.
• 2002: Smirnov helps flip RO 5 at the behest of Country D (probably Israel).
• October 1, 2010: Smirnov starts to serve as a source for the FBI.
• 2016 or earlier: Smirnov has direct communications with Shokin and Petro Poroshenko.
• 2019: Smirnov first tells his handler about flipping RO 5 in 2002.
• January 2022: RO 5 set up a meeting helped introduce Smirnov to RO 2. Then, Smirnov set up a meeting between RO 2 and a high-ranking official of Ukraine.
• January 2022: Smirnov asked RO 2 for a favor — to protect a Ukrainian associate during any Russian invasion. RO 2 told Smirnov that based on RO 5’s representation that Smirnov was a “good guy,” he’d protect Smirnov’s associate. (Note that the FD-1023 described that Alexander Ostapenko, the guy who introduced Smirnov to Burisma, worked in the Zelenskyy administration.) RO 2 also told Smirnov that there was a 99% chance that, rather than full-blown war, the invasion would only be a skirmish.
• February 2022: Smirnov provides his handler the back story to his relationship with RO 5 and through him RO 2. When working in Country D (probably Israel) in 2002, Smirnov helped flip two spies, including RO 5, for Country D. Country D had caught RO 5 spying, but gave him 48 hours to leave the country rather than expelling him. RO 5 continued to provide Smirnov intelligence, but never anything adverse to Russia. In 2019, RO 5, whose wife is related to a former Russian spook, RO 6, had described what Russia might look like under different leadership. Smirnov never met RO 6, but once spoke to him briefly over a car speaker phone.
• February 28, 2022: Smirnov’s partner buys a condo in Las Vegas, using his money, for $1,425,000.
• December 2022: A RU spy (not any of the identified ones) tells Smirnov the identity of a Russian spy living outside of RU.
• January 2023: Smirnov confirms, from a different non-identified RU spy, the first name of the RU spy living outside of RU.
• May 2023: Smirnov participates in discussions to end the Ukraine war
• By September 2023: Smirnov already claimed knowledge of the Premier Palace kompromat, sourcing that knowledge to four RU Officials, almost certainly one he described meeting in later months.

In other words, there are a bunch of things that lie behind all the reporting about parties with Russian oligarchs on yachts in (probably) UAE that Weiss’ team burned.

First, Smirnov’s entrée into Russian intelligence came by helping someone — probably Israel — flip RO 5, years ago, back in 2002. Smirnov may have thought he had flipped RO 5, but RO 5 never gave him any intelligence about Russia. In other words, in the process of flipping RO 5 for a country that likely is Israel, Russia learned that Smirnov was in the business of flipping people, and strung him along for years.

Smirnov allegedly lied about conversations with Zlochevsky in 2016 that implicated Joe Biden. But his currently operative story is that he had ties with Viktor Shokin from that period — someone who was absolutely central in the 2020 influence operation. It’s not clear that Smirnov ever revealed that to his handler, which surely would have changed the import of those texts sent in response to a story claiming there were secret recordings about Shokin’s firing.

That’s not the only important Ukraine tie. In January 2022, as Russia prepares to invade Ukraine, Smirnov used his tie to Russian spooks, the guy he thought he had flipped years before, RO 5, to meet RO 2. After brokering a meeting, Smirnov then asked for a favor, that Russia protect his associate when they invaded. Then, RO 2 lied about Russia’s intention.

That’s critical background to Smirnov’s claim to be involved in peace negotiations: His entire relationship with Russian spooks is built off a series of lies.

Then, finally, there’s the question of whether Smirnov retroactively provided reporting to cover up what he admitted to Weiss’ team in September: that for months, he had been part of an information operation that involved interfering in the US election and as part of that he had advance knowledge of a plan to frame Hunter Biden.

Again.

Weiss’ team has hinted that Smirnov’s entire relationship with Russian intelligence was built off that effort to flip RO 5 for another country, almost certainly Israel.

But they’re not telling us what they know, if anything, about Israel’s ongoing involvement with all this.

From 29 February to 2 March, there will be an intra-Palestinian meeting in Moscow under the Russian government’s auspices. Officials representing Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Fatah, and approximately ten other Palestinian factions received invitations and will participate.

“Moscow’s goal is to help the various Palestinian forces agree to unite their ranks politically,” said Mikhail Bogdanov, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s envoy for the Middle East and Africa.

While Israel, the US, and other Western governments recognise a host of these Palestinian organisations as terrorist entities, Moscow does not.

By hosting these factions, Russia is promoting a narrative about Moscow being a defender of the Palestinian cause, which sends a strong message to the wider Arab-Islamic world and the Global South at large.

This of course comes at a time in which Washington’s ironclad support for Israeli war crimes in Gaza has severely eroded US soft power influence outside the West.

“Moscow seeks to demonstrate to the rest of the world that Russia can host an inter-Palestinian dialogue without necessarily taking any faction’s side”

Moscow’s dealings with Hamas

Russia has a record of engaging Hamas. Over the years, Hamas representatives have paid visits to Moscow, which has constituted a source of tension in Russia’s relationship with Israel.

Nonetheless, Putin’s government has managed to avoid allowing its engagement with Hamas to create any major crisis in Moscow-Tel Aviv relations. From the Kremlin’s perspective, Hamas is an actor that Russia must deal with as Moscow strives to assert greater influence in the Middle East and, specifically, in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

In late October 2023, Russia invited Hamas representatives to Moscow. At the time, the Kremlin was focused on securing the release of dual Israeli-Russian citizens held hostage by Hamas in Gaza. Such efforts led to positive results.

After the Hamas members arrived in Moscow, they received a list of hostages with Russian citizenship whom the Russian government wanted the Palestinian group to free at once.

“We are very attentive to this list and will process it carefully because we look at Russia as our closest friend,” explained Mousa Abu Marzouk, a senior member of Hamas, while speaking to RIA Novosti news agency during Hamas’s visit to Moscow. “As soon as we find them, we’ll release them.”

By early November, Hamas made good on those words and released three Israeli-Russian hostages. One was Roni Krivoi, the first adult male hostage with an Israeli passport to be released by Hamas since 7 October.

“We are grateful to the leadership of the Hamas movement for their positive response to our urgent appeals,” said Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova after their release. “We will continue to strive for the speedy release of the remaining Russians held in the Gaza Strip.”

It can be taken for granted that securing the release of remaining hostages will be a priority for Moscow as it engages further with Hamas. Russia’s ability to leverage its relationship with Hamas serves Moscow’s interests vis-à-vis Tel Aviv.

Putin playing this card can help dissuade Israel from being tempted to join the West in imposing sanctions on Russia or arming Ukraine two years into Moscow’s war against its smaller neighbour.

Israel’s war on Gaza has killed over 30,000 Palestinians, including 12,000 children. [Getty]

Russian diplomacy amid the Gaza war

The upcoming inter-Palestinian meeting in Moscow needs to be understood within the wider context of Russia’s past few months of diplomacy vis-à-vis the Israeli war on Gaza. As Dr Samuel Ramani, an associate fellow at the London-based Royal United Services Institute, explained in an interview with The New Arab, Moscow has engaged in two layers of diplomacy since this war began. Both remain in motion.

First, the Kremlin is engaging the major state actors with stakes in Gaza, which include Egypt, Iran, Iraq, and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) members. Such shuttle diplomacy has been part of a grander Russian strategy of asserting Moscow’s clout in the Middle East and promoting multipolarity. Russia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) joining together as UN Security Council members in calling for a ceasefire is one example.

Second, because of tensions in Israeli-Russian relations, the Kremlin has focused on inter-Palestinian dialogue over dialogue between the Palestinians and Israel. Officials in Moscow are “looking toward the end of the war and they’re trying to use the fact that they can engage with the [Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO)], Hamas, and even Islamic Jihad,” according to Dr Ramani.

“Islamic Jihad has a different tune than Hamas, even on the hostages. They’re much more radical. They’re much more recalcitrant about any kind of diplomacy. If [the Russians] can bring them to Moscow and get them talking with the other factions that would be something noteworthy and interesting to think about too,” he added.

“Because of tensions in Israeli-Russian relations, the Kremlin has focused on inter-Palestinian dialogue over dialogue between the Palestinians and Israel”

A dialogue that helps Russia with optics

Moscow seeks to demonstrate to the rest of the world that Russia can host an inter-Palestinian dialogue without necessarily taking any faction’s side. This is important to Moscow’s balancing act in the Arab world, where different states have various views on Hamas.

For example, Qatar, on one end of the spectrum, accepts the reality of Hamas as a player in the Palestinian political space. But the UAE, on the other end, opposes the group largely due to ideological reasons – specifically Hamas’s Muslim Brotherhood origins.

Despite some commentators’ baseless claims of a Russia-Hamas “alliance”, Putin’s government chooses to not take sides in inter-Palestinian power struggles. Indeed, being overtly pro-Hamas would upset Abu Dhabi, which Russia is generally keen to avoid doing given that the UAE is, by far, Moscow’s best friend in the GCC.

Rather than taking sides in Palestinian politics, Moscow has decided to “act as a convening power that can bring together the PLO, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad for dialogue,” Dr Ramani told TNA.

Russia playing this diplomatic role two years after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine serves to counter Western efforts to isolate Moscow internationally. “Regardless of the outcome of the meeting, pro-Kremlin propaganda will use it to show that Russia is not isolated in the global arena,” explained Nikola Mikovic, a Belgrade-based political analyst, in a TNA interview.

While bringing various Palestinian factions together for this meeting bodes well for Russia in terms of optics, some analysts question whether this dialogue in Moscow has a shot at producing concrete results.

“Of course, it’s impossible to see Islamic Jihad making concessions right now…Very little substantive will come out of this,” said Dr Ramani, who also questions the likelihood of the PLO being willing to concede much to Hamas and other Palestinian groups on delicate issues.

“While bringing various Palestinian factions together for this meeting bodes well for Russia in terms of optics, some analysts question whether this dialogue has a shot at producing concrete results”

Other analysts have a similar assessment. “Russia’s influence in Palestine is very limited, and I don’t think Moscow is in a position to force Palestinian factions to unite, especially given that each group is supported by different regional actors,” Mikovic told TNA. “I will be very surprised if Moscow manages to persuade Hamas to form a partnership with the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority,” added the Serbian expert on Russian foreign policy.

“Hamas and other Palestinian groups are very naïve if they really think that Russia – a country that, two years after the invasion of Ukraine, has not achieved any of its goals in the Eastern European nation – can help them achieve their goals in the Middle East. Besides, if Russia never protects its ally Syria from Israeli airstrikes, it is rather questionable if the Kremlin really aims to help Palestinians in their struggle for independence,” explained Mikovic.

Russia hosted representatives of Palestinian groups and movements in Moscow for intra-Palestinian talks in February 2019. [Getty]

Looking ahead, there are several key questions to raise about what this inter-Palestinian meeting in Moscow will mean for the future of Russia’s foreign policy in the Middle East. It is unclear how Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and other Palestinian factions scattered across Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria, and other Middle Eastern countries will look at Russia after the dust eventually settles in Gaza.

Might these Palestinian groups ask Moscow to become more involved in diplomatic efforts aimed at resolving tensions between Palestinian groups, or perhaps as a bridge between the Palestinians and Israel?

Time will tell. But even if so, Egypt and Qatar – and not Russia – will probably remain the main mediators vis-à-vis Israel-Palestine. Dr Ramani doubts that this upcoming inter-Palestinian meeting in Moscow will lead to any “long-term seismic change in the geopolitical landscape” although he predicts a “temporary optical win for the Russians”.

Giorgio Cafiero is the CEO of Gulf State Analytics.

Follow him on Twitter: @GiorgioCafiero

This week, delegates from various Palestinian factions will travel to Moscow for talks on the Israel-Hamas war and other Middle Eastern topics at an “inter-Palestinian dialogue.”

Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told Russian state news agency TASS that between 12 and 14 organizations will attend the conference, which begins on February 29 and will run for two or three days. 

This includes representatives of the political arm of Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Fatah, the political organization running the occupied West Bank and the Palestine Liberation Organization, or PLO, the broader umbrella organization for all Palestinian groups.

The various groups take very different positions on topics like the recognition of Israel as a state. The Fatah-led PLO recognized Israel in 1993, partially in exchange for a possible Palestinian state. Hamas has rejected that stance for years, even though recently its rhetoric has softened. It is not part of the PLO.

Fatah manages the West Bank, which has also seen clashes between the Israeli military and PalestiniansImage: Majdi Mohammed/AP Photo/picture alliance

There has also been violence between the groups. After Hamas won elections in Gaza in 2006, it was unable to come to a power-sharing deal with the more moderate Fatah and fighting broke out. Fatah eventually left the Gaza Strip, leaving Hamas in charge there, and now manages the West Bank. Its governing authority there is also known as the Palestinian Authority, or PA.

‘Dialogue for dialogue’s sake’

This isn’t the first time a more unified Palestinian front has been discussed. As Ruslan Suleymanov, an independent Russian Middle East expert based in Baku, told DW, there has been mediation between the different groups before. “But they have never been effective,” he said.

In this case, “Russia does not have any road map for the Palestinian file, especially for the Gaza Strip as it would be necessary to have mediation functions and maintain good contacts with both Israel and the paramilitary wing of Hamas in Gaza,” said Suleymanov.

Instead, he thinks Moscow’s main goals are to show that it has some influence on Palestinian factions and to use the timing ahead of Russia’s presidential election to show off its geopolitical clout. Russians will go to the polls in mid-March, but there is no doubt that the incumbent, President Vladimir Putin, will win.

“It’s really just dialogue for dialogue’s sake,” Suleymanov added. 

PA head and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is increasingly unpopular and is unlikely to win elections, if they were heldImage: Christophe Ena/AP/dpa/picture alliance

This view was echoed by Hugh Lovatt, senior policy fellow with the Middle East and North Africa Program at the European Council on Foreign Relations.

“This Russian summit is a way to show that Russia has the diplomatic capacity to play a hands-on role in supporting Palestinian national unity,” he told DW. However, previous reconciliation talks that were hosted in Moscow, Algiers and Cairo have “also not succeeded in brokering a lasting reconciliation deal between the rivals,” he said.

Palestinian fragmentation

“The divergences between the Palestinian groups include far-reaching political differences relating to the peace process and national liberation strategy as well as technical questions in terms of how to bring the Palestinian Authority’s institutions back to Gaza,” said Lovatt.

Hamas, which is classified as a terrorist organization by Germany, the European Union, the United States and other governments, has run Gaza since 2007. Any future, postwar scenario that returns the Palestinian Authority to Gaza and integrates Hamas politically in the occupied West Bank would have to be based on some form of understanding between Hamas and the PA, Lovatt told DW.

For Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh, who handed in his resignation on February 26, this is a possibility. Earlier in February, he told reporters at the Munich Security Conference that Hamas was an integral part of the Palestinian political arena. “They need to come to our political agenda. Our ground is very clear. Two states on the borders of 1967, through peaceful means. The Palestinians need to be under one umbrella,” he said.

There are certainly problems with that idea. A number of countries have said Hamas should not be able to play a role in governance after the conflict ends. Israel, in particular, is opposed to this option. It’s also hard to know how Hamas’ harder attitude toward recognizing Israel would fit in with the PLO, which has already recognized Israel. 

And yet, for Russia, even if the meeting doesn’t go well, the continuing Palestinian divergence would not necessarily be a negative result. The meeting would still help consolidate Russia’s future role in the Middle East.

Russia as Middle East mediator

For many years, Russia managed to keep close ties with Israel despite also maintaining good relations with one of Israel’s regional opponents, Iran. Following Russia’s full-scale attack on Ukraine in February 2022, relations soured when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu didn’t show support for Russia’s invasion and thousands of Russians and Ukrainians fled to Israel.

Russian President Vladimir Putin (right) and Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu were close for many yearsImage: Maxim Shemetov/REUTERS

However, Baku-based analyst Suleymanov believes Russia can’t really “afford to lose Israel either.” The Russian-speaking community has been the largest minority in Israel since close to a million people of Jewish origin migrated to Israel following the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s.

Ties between Russia and Iran have also grown closer, though. Iran is known to support Hamas, Hezbollah in Lebanon, Iraqi paramilitary groups and the Houthi rebels in Yemen in one way or another. All of these consider the US and Israel as their enemies.

Russia has long maintained ties with Palestinian militants, and its contacts with Hamas have already led to some success. In October, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Bogdanov, who is also Putin’s special envoy for the Middle East, handed a list of kidnapped Israelis of Russian origin or dual nationality to the political representatives of Hamas in Qatar and asked for their release.

Putin has improved ties with Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi since Russia’s attack on Ukraine in February 2022Image: Sergei Bobylyov/AFP/Getty Images

Roni Krivoi, a Russian-Israeli sound technician, was released by Hamas on November 26 in addition to 13 Israelis who were freed as part of a temporary cease-fire brokered by Qatar and the United States. As The Washington Post noted at the time, “he became the first adult male with an Israeli passport set free, even as most of the exchanges involved women and children.” 

This article was updated on February 26 to reflect the resignation of Mohammad Shtayyeh as Palestinian prime minister.

DW’s Studio Riga contributed to this article.

Edited by: Cathrin Schaer