I’m wondering what the proportions are. Here’s the wiki:
Some quick facts:
An Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, was taken hostage by Hamas in 2006. Recently, he was exchanged for 1,027 Palestinian, Arab-Israeli and Syrian prisoners.
Among the 1,027 prisoners expected to be released there are about 280 murderers sentenced to life imprisonment.
If you had been an Israeli and the decision to accept or refuse the deal had been yours, would you have taken it?
I am only allowing yes/no answers in the poll because allowing “something like the deal but different” would go into too many directions. If you think some other solution should have been used, detail it in the comments.
In the end, it boils down to an unspoken “All for one and one for all” Israeli aethos – the same reason that people will follow the story of any Israeli who gets lost in some jungle in the farthest corner of the world, and people here will donate their time and money to go looking for him/her. I can’t really explain, it’s something in the Cultural Genome
And of course, the misgivings and downsides don’t really need explaining – it motivates Hamas and other groups to try and kidnap more Israelis; it strengthens Hamas and by proxy other violence-backing groups against the relatively moderate Fatah; it motivates individuals to commit acts of terrorism knowing or at least hoping that they will be released in the next deal… And last but not least it is a breach of a promise we make to the families of previous victims that we will catch and punish the perpetrators.
And still, the blood of one living person really is redder than that of all those who have died. And while the silly grin on the faces of everyone yesterday, from the man on street up to the most hard-boiled newscasters, may in fact be a sign of a nation gone mad, it’s still a Beautiful Madness IMO.
Or, to put it differently, there comes a time when you just have to do something in order to be able to live with yourself. Even if you know you’ll pay the price later. And when all is said and done, yesterday I was proud of my country, and proud to be an Israeli.
If I were an Israeli (this being hypothetical in the extreme as I have no idea what it’s like to be brought up there or to live there), I think I’d consider:
This sends a very dodgy message to Hamas. Want more concessions? Grab some more IDF guys or gals.
Strengthens Hamas’s standing against the more moderate Fatah.
Allows Palestinian triumphalism.
Lets murderers* out of jail.
Creates a potential new source of embittered recruits.
The only positives I can see are:
It indicates that one Israeli is worth a thousand Palestinians.
The ‘feelgood’ factor of having him back.
Maybe, just maybe, it will make the Palestinians think less badly of the Israeli government, or create an atmosphere more conducive to detante.
I hope the Israeli dopers will forgive me for answering this without having walked in their shoes. And in fact now I think about it, if I were Israeli I would probably not bias the above reasons, which are probably informed by my being outside the situation.
*Even though I, as an internationalist, think that in addition to some of the heinous criminals that have been released, many of the convictions that put other prisoners there are likely to be unsound, and in the cases of not dubious conviction, the sentences way harsher than for an Israeli committing a similar crime.
Never. If the prisoners being released are even a tenth as effective as they were before they were captured, there will be dozens of innocent people murdered to buy Shalit’s release.
No. It sends the message that one Israeli is worth a thousand Palestinians. Israel is already perceived as a country full of arrogant exceptionlists by the Arab world. Despite the Palestinians getting the better end of this deal, they are now going to use this against Israel. If Israel wants it’s people back it should do it through diplomatic solutions that do not involve concessions or through a sting operation.
My answer is emphatically no, for all the reasons that jjimm outlined. Frankly, the deal is so lopsided and bad for Israel, it leaves you with the unsettling feeling that Netanyahu and company would be happy with a more violent Gaza to better justify their intransigence.
As a thought experiment, imagine if Pat Tillman had been captured and held hostage for five years (instead of killed by his own troops). Would you be willing to trade Khalid Sheikh Mohammed for his freedom? I don’t think anyone would think that’s a good idea.
No, but the fact is, I am not Israeli, and the Israeli mindset is an admirable one. In the other thread, they said something like the Israeli public gives their children up to the military, and thus the government is obligated and has promised to protect those children. That puts a different light on it. I still don’t entirely agree with the decision, but I can see why the Israelis did it.
I say refuse the deal, and I say that as an Israeli and as a parent of a daughter in the IDF. It sets a bad, bad precedent, one that I’m sure Hamas is already working on exploiting.
Let it be known that I WOULD deal with terrorists. The more important thing is to get our people back in one piece, not to look tough. If it spurs more kidnapping and ransoming, so be it.
And what happens when said terrorists return to a life of murder? What do you tell the families of the victims? Sorry? One soldier’s life is more important than the member of your family who was murdered?
What a short-sighted and foolish decision. I can’t see how this one particular individual trumps all the other people who will be kidnapped and killed because of the released Palestinians. And when it happens again (which it will), the fact that Israel no longer has all these prisoners will weaken their negotiation position. I recognize that my sort of approach probably is not practical, but if I were in charge, the kind of deal I would have made would have been more like “Release him immediately or we will execute one of your people every hour until you do”. Even if that did provoke them to kill him anyway, soldiers do need to be prepared to die for their country unfortunately, and it’s inevitable that people are going to die in the midst of this kind of struggle. The message to be sent should be that Israelis are not to fucked with, not that they are going to cave so easily anytime one of their people is threatened. That is just asking for more threats to more people.
