The gas-rich nation of Qatar has become a key intermediary in the fate of the 220 hostages currently held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip following the terror group’s deadly attack on Israel on October 7, once again putting the small Arabian Peninsula country in the spotlight.

The negotiations have also thrust Qatar into a delicate international balancing act as it maintains a relationship with those viewed as terrorist groups by the West, while trying to preserve its close security ties with the United States.

Under arrangements stemming from past Hamas ceasefire understandings with Israel, the gas-rich emirate of Qatar has in recent years paid the salaries of civil servants in the Gaza Strip, provided direct cash transfers to poor families and offered other kinds of humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza.

Qatar has also hosted Hamas’s political office in its capital of Doha for over a decade. Among officials based there is Khaled Mashaal, the former head of Hamas who survived a 1997 Israeli assassination attempt in Jordan that threatened to derail that country’s peace deal with Israel; and Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s current chief.

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