Gershon Baskin, Ph.D., was the initiator and negotiator of the secret back channel between Israel and Hamas for the release of 1,027 prisoners – mainly Palestinians and Arab-Israelis of which 280 were sentenced to life in prison, including Yahya Sinwar, the former Palestinian leader of the Hamas, in the Gaza Strip. The prisoners were imprisoned for planning and perpetrating various attacks against Jewish targets that resulted in the killing of 569 Israelis in exchange for one Israeli soldier, Gilad Schalit.

Dr. Baskin, together with Samer Sinijlawi, Co-Founded and currently Co-Direct the Alliance for Two States (since February 2025). He was the Israeli Co-Director and founder of the Israeli-Palestinian Public Policy Institute (formerly the Israel/Palestine Center for Research and Information) (IPCRI) – a joint Israeli-Palestinian public policy think and “do”-tank located in Jerusalem. Since January 2012 he is the Co-Chairman of IPCRI’s Board of Directors. He initiated the founding of IPCRI in 1988 following ten years of work in the field of Jewish-Arab relations within Israel, in Interns for Peace where he lived for two years in the Israeli-Palestinian village of Kufr Qara, the Ministry of Education and as Executive Director of the Institute for Education for Jewish-Arab Coexistence (established by the Israeli Ministry of Education and the Prime Minister’s Office at Baskin’s initiative). Click here for Gershon Baskin’s Professional Experience