This past Wednesday, Nov. 6, two days before the breakthrough and shortly before a historic agreement between Iran and the world powers is penned, a well-versed senior Israeli official told me that Israel was concerned by the “back-channel” negotiations between the United States and Iran. That channel, according to the Israeli source, has been very much alive and productive in recent weeks, having begun well before the start of the official negotiations between Iran and the powers, and that’s the main track where agreements and progress are being made. 

Israel, the senior official added, has information about what’s going on in Iran. It also knows to a great extent what is going on in the negotiations between Iran and the Western powers (5+1). What it doesn’t know anything about, is what the Americans and the Iranians are concocting in the back rooms.

Today, Friday, Nov. 8, as I’m writing this article, it has become apparent that these apprehensions were not unfounded. It seems that we’re headed toward a “historic” interim agreement that might pave the way to a final agreement that would put an end to the nuclear crisis between Iran and the powers.

The report on the agreement-in-the-making provoked a bona fide drama which took place on Friday before noon during that last meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US Secretary of State John Kerry.