Frimet Roth
JPost
07 September 09
Once again, hope for the return of kidnapped soldier Gilad Schalit was raised and then dashed within days. The familiar roller coaster invites the question: Why have our leaders failed to free Schalit?
This year several high-profile missions were carried out to rescue Western hostages. Their success could be instructive for Israel. First, Ingrid Betancourt, a Colombian politician, was freed along with 14 other hostages from jungle captivity in July 2008 in a daring, Hollywoodesque infiltration of guerrilla camps.
Then, on August 5, 2009, former US president Bill Clinton's visit to North Korea scored the surprise release of two American journalists who had been sentenced to 12 years' hard labor by a Pyongyang court. The women were whisked to freedom with Clinton only 20 hours after he landed there.
Next, on August 16, 2009, a visit by US Senator Jim Webb of Virginia to Myanmar secured the return of an American imprisoned there.
Elation over these homecomings has been tempered by concern over the ramifications of the deals cut. As an Associated Press report put it: "Such visits, argue experts, can give regime leaders an aura of respect and recognition that may make it harder for the US to press for sanctions or continue isolation policies aimed at forcing change in everything from humans rights to nuclear power."
ISRAEL IS primed to pay astronomically more for Gilad Schalit. Yet our leaders are indifferent to the deadly ramifications. The release of mass murderers in return for Schalit's freedom poses an irrefutable risk. Yet for three years it has been touted as the single option available.
The day after Schalit's disappearance, his kidnappers offered information about him if Israel agreed to release all female and under-18-year-old Palestinian prisoners.
Since then, while the list of prisoners has grown, no other avenue of rescue has ever been shown, let alone rumored, to be on the cards. Not even the massive Operation Cast Lead produced evidence of any rescue attempt.
Instead, Hamas has been sitting pretty all these years. The only pressure exerted on it has been to delete several prisoners from its list and to approve the exile of several others after release. Moreover, the sine qua non of any deal, the release of all female prisoners, has never been challenged. It is accepted by all as a compassionate stipulation.
One of those women is Ahlam Tamimi. This journalist-cum-university student was involved in the reconnaissance and planning of the August 9, 2001 terror attack on Jerusalem's Sbarro restaurant.
That morning, Tamimi, along with a suicide bomber and 10 kg of explosives, took a taxi from Ramallah. At the checkpoint between east and west Jerusalem, her accomplice, Izzadin al-Masri, got out and walked past the IDF soldiers empty-handed. Tamimi remained in the taxi, passing through unsearched, while the explosives lay beside her.
Once past the checkpoint, Tamimi rejoined Masri on foot. The pair then walked toward the center of Jerusalem. Tamimi carried a camera and the two conversed aloud in English to pass for tourists.
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