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The Importance of Gilad Shalit

[Commentary] Jonathan Tobin - Three years ago, Hamas terrorists crossed the international border between Gaza and Israel to attack an Israeli army post. They killed two Israelis and kidnapped Corporal Gilad Shalit. He remains their prisoner to this day, held somewhere inside Gaza. Unlike Hamas killers held by Israel, Shalit has received no Red Cross visits. How can it be okay for Hamas to hold an Israeli soldier hostage but not okay for Israel to attack Hamas terror bases and infrastructure as it did last December and January? Why is it an imperative for Israel to lift the limited blockade on Gaza (which attempts to prevent Hamas from rebuilding its military infrastructure while letting in food and medicine) so long as it is illegally holding an Israeli prisoner? Israel is being asked to make concessions on security and territory as a precondition of discussing peace. This insistence on pressuring Israel takes no account of the realities of Palestinian politics and society that render the entire project a fool's errand. Hamas remains in power in Gaza, and might well be in charge of the West Bank too if Palestinians there were offered a free choice. Those who blithely talk of the need for Israel to freeze settlements ignore the nature of Hamas - a military/political entity that continues to support the eradication of Israel and the massacre of its Jewish population. They forget that a total withdrawal of Israeli settlements and soldiers from Gaza four years ago didn't bring peace or even an attempt by the Palestinians to build their economy. Instead it brought Hamas into power and the conversion of Gaza into a vast terror base.
2009-06-26 06:00:00
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