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Now that the obscene trade with Hezbollah is almost a done deal — supposedly it will take place on Wednesday, with brutal child-killer Samir Kuntar and others crossing the border into Lebanon at Rosh haNikra — we can start being afraid of what will be given up to Hamas in trade for Gilad Schalit.

This is much more problematic, because Schalit is almost certainly alive, while Hezbollah will be returning only bodies. Once again, Israel is being forced to make a “Sophie’s choice” between alternatives that are both horrible. Leave Schalit to die in captivity — or guarantee further kidnappings while releasing murderers who will certainly kill again.

And as always, there is an element of psychological torture involved.

YNet reports:

According to the report, Israel and Hamas previously had agreed that during the first stage of the prisoner swap 350 Palestinian prisoners will be released in exchange for Shalit’s transfer to Egyptian custody. In the second phase an additional 100 prisoners will be freed upon the soldier’s arrival in Israel, and 500 more Palestinians will be returned two months after Shalit’s release.

The Palestinian source said Israel has also backed down from its agreement to release all of the female Palestinian prisoners and is particularly against freeing Amna Muna, who was charged and convicted for her involvement in the murder of 16-year-old Ofir [R]ahum in January 2001.

Amna Muna is another great hero of the Palestinian  ‘resistance’. Like Bus of Blood murderer Dalal Mughrabi, she is loved and venerated as an example for Palestinian womanhood. Muna (also spelled ‘Mona’ or ‘Mouna’) was 25 and working as a journalist in Ramallah when she met Ofir in an Israeli chat room. Posing as a tourist or new immigrant (accounts vary) named ‘Sali’, she established an online relationship with him over a period of months, and ultimately arranged a meeting. Ofir traveled from his home in Ashkelon to the bus station in Jerusalem, where Muna picked him up. She drove him to a secluded spot near Ramallah, where they met her confederates, several Fatah terrorists who shot Ofir 15 times and buried his body.

Here’s an excerpt from their last chat, the day before the murder, from Newsweek:

ofir 15/01/01 i don’t know if iI have enough to come back to ashkelon

sali 15/01/01 16:04 i told you I will bring you back to tel aviv in my friends car but she will be with us..is it ok coz I am afraid to drive at night

sali 15/0101 16:35 you don’t know how much I am waiting for wednesday but we have to say bye till wednesday

ofir 15/01/01 16:35 bye

sali 15/01/01 16:35 love you dear

In prison she has become something of an activist, recently leading a hunger strike for better treatment of what are called Palestinian political prisoners. There’s no doubt in my mind that she will go home — if not in this prisoner exchange then in the next one — to a festive Fatah celebration.

There is a way to stop this, at least in the future, and that is to establish a death penalty for terrorist murderers. Perhaps now Israelis have had enough, and it will be possible. The European Union would scream bloody murder (so to speak), but I wonder how long it will take before they are placed in exactly the same position?

Technorati Tags: Israel, Amna Muna, Ofir Rahum, Samir Kuntar, Gilad Schalit, death penalty, terrorism

In July of  2006, Iranian-sponsored Hezbollah forces crossed the Lebanese border with Israel, killed 8 Israeli soldiers and kidnapped two. Israel responded with an incursion that developed into a war in which 119 IDF soldiers and 43 Israeli civilians were killed. Over 1000 Lebanese were claimed to have been killed (this figure is in dispute), 500-600 of them Hezbollah fighters. Almost 4,000 Hezbollah rockets landed in northern Israel, injuring thousands of civilians, destroying millions of dollars worth of property and wrecking the economy of the area.

Because of the lack of preparation of the IDF and incompetence on the part of Israel’s leadership, the war’s initial goals (although the official goals changed from day to day) of returning the kidnapped soldiers, breaking Hezbollah’s grip on southern Lebanon and eliminating its military capability were not met.

34 days later, the war ended in a cease-fire and UN resolution 1701, which was supposed to prevent Hezbollah from rearming and keep it from reoccupying South Lebanon. The UN, as expected, was unable to enforce it, and Hezbollah has been fully rearmed — by Iran via Syria — and its troops are firmly ensconced in the south, even where UN ‘peacekeepers’ are deployed.

In addition to the military and diplomatic failures, Israel allowed Hezbollah to manage the content of news reporting during the war, resulting in huge propaganda victories. World-wide reporting of ‘atrocities’ was used as a justification for terrorism, such as the murder of a Jewish woman in Seattle.

Hezbollah has also taken de facto control of the Lebanese government and army.  The new Lebanese president, Gen. Michel Suleiman, although a Christian, is considered to be aligned with Syria and is supportive of Hezbollah’s militant stance against Israel.

One of Suleiman’s first acts as president was to support Hezbollah’s demand for the strategic Har Dov (Shabaa Farms) area to be transferred to Lebanese — i.e., Hezbollah — control. Although the UN certified the border between Israel and Lebanon in 2000 and placed Har Dov in the Golan Heights, the resurrection of this issue is a clear indication that the balance of power in the region has changed.

But this is not all. The outcome of the war reawakened Syria’s ambitions to recover the Golan Heights without having to give anything in return. It prompted Washington to press its program to force Israel to give up the West Bank to the Palestinians, which it formalized at the Annapolis conference, and which it has been actualizing by arming the terrorist Fatah organization. And it emboldened Hamas to follow a Hezbollah-like strategy.

Finally, to close the circle, Israel has agreed to a practically and psychologically disastrous swap with Hezbollah, which not only includes the release of unrepentant mass murderer Samir Kuntar, but also several Palestinian prisoners and the bodies of several Palestinian terrorist heros including ‘Bus of Blood’ perpetrator Dalal Mughrabi. In return, Israel will get the bodies of the kidnapped soldiers, thus ensuring further kidnappings, and guaranteeing that hostages need not be kept alive to be good bargaining chips.

Israel’s Winograd commission apportioned blame for the massive failures of the war in various places. Dan Halutz, the IDF Chief of Staff and Amir Peretz, the Minister of Defense, were forced to resign as a result. But Ehud Olmert, the Prime Minister, has managed to hang onto power despite his failure in the war, despite a continuous series of bad and worse decisions, despite being universally despised by Israelis and despite being accused of all manner of deceit, corruption and malfeasance.

Now that Hezbollah has been fully rearmed, now that the situation in the South can only get worse as Hamas takes advantage of the truce to prepare for even more violent conflict, and now that the Iranian nuclear program is about to reach the point of no return, now is the time for Olmert to be replaced.

Please, do it now, before he has the opportunity to make any more critical decisions for the State of Israel.

Ehud Olmert, courtesy of Israel Matzav

Technorati Tags: Israel, Second Lebanon War, Hezbollah, Olmert

A few days ago I wrote about how the great heros of the Palestinian people were terrorists like Dalal Mughrabi and Samir Kuntar, who ‘courageously’ murdered defenseless Israelis — especially children.

The Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority [PA] is no better in this regard than Hamas. And they don’t seem to understand — or care — how they appear to civilized people:

Azzam al-Ahmed, a senior Fatah official closely associated with PA President Mahmoud Abbas, described Mughrabi, whose family originally came from Jaffa, as a “the first Palestinian woman to carry out one of the most courageous operations in Israel.” He claimed that in her will, Mughrabi, who belonged to Fatah, had asked her family to see to it that she was buried in “Palestine.”

“We want to turn Dalal’s funeral into a national wedding, a major celebration,” the Fatah official said. “The operation she carried out off the shores of her hometown of Jaffa was heroic and exemplary. She will always be remembered as a symbol for the Palestinian women’s struggle” …

An article published in Thursday’s edition of the PA-funded Al-Hayat Al-Jadedda newspaper hailed Mughrabi as a “living legend and a wonderful example for all women.” — Jerusalem Post

You would think that Mughrabi was the Palestinian Joan of Arc instead of the cold-blooded murderer of 35 people that she encountered at random, including 13 children. But what she did was exemplary, she is a “wonderful example” to be followed by Palestinian women!

Ahmed also praised Lebanese prisoner Samir Kuntar for carrying out another terror attack in Israel one year after the 1978 carnage. He described Kuntar as a “stubborn and firm fighter in the ranks of the Lebanese resistance who led a very courageous operation.”

It must have taken great firmness and courage to smash the head of 4-year old Einat after shooting her father in front of her eyes. A stubborn fighter indeed.

This from a people that is always talking about human rights, insisting for example that the security barrier  built by Israel to stop those like Mughrabi and Kuntar violates their human rights.

But at some point one is forced to wonder: what do you have to do, how far do you have to go, before you lose the right to be considered human?

Technorati Tags: Israel, Palestinians, terrorism, human rights