Israel is paying a terrible price in this ‘deal' with Hamas
This simple fact tells you everything you need to know about the values of the two societies.
Thousands of Israelis have been forced to watch as criminals are released to secure the freedom of their innocent compatriots who were snatched from their homes for no greater crime than simply being Jewish.
On the list of those released last night was 67-year-old Nael Barghouti, Israel's longest-serving Palestinian inmate. That sinewy killer, affiliated to Hamas, was first jailed in 1978 for the murder of Israeli bus driver Mordechai Yekuel near Ramallah. He was about the same age as my father was at the time. After serving 33 years of a life sentence, Barghouti was released in 2011 in exchange for Israeli hostage Gilad Shalit; but three years later he was once again arrested and convicted on terrorism charges. By the time of his latest release, he had spent 44 years in prison.
Another Palestinian icon to have walked free last night was Abdel Nasser Issa, a founding member of the West Bank wing of Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas. A protege of Yahya 'the Engineer' Ayyash, the mastermind behind the group's suicide bomb strategy in the 1990s, Issa was serving two life sentences plus an additional seven years for his role in multiple atrocities. Hamza al-Kaluti, a Hamas operative involved in planning suicide bombings in the same period, had his life sentence commuted and returned home to East Jerusalem after 24 years in prison.
These are not small concessions. More than 500 men were released last night in return for a handful of innocent Israeli hostages, some living but many dead. And to see the frenzied carnival as they walked free, in which many were immediately draped in the colours of their jihadi groups and armed with automatic weapons, was a sobering reminder of the blood-price paid by the Jewish state.
Hillel Fuld, a high-tech consultant who watched the release of the man who stabbed his brother to death in 2018, described the experience as 'like a punch in the gut'. He said: 'On the one hand, we're releasing hundreds of monsters for every single Israeli hostage. It's just tragic, it's horrible. On the other hand, we see these hostages being reunited with their families. How could we not pay that price? Who could look a mother in the face and say we're not going to bring your daughter back from the dungeons of hell?'
Some of the convicts have been deported to other Arab countries but Israelis are under no pretence that giving freedom to such numbers will produce anything other than blood and tears. Israel is a practical country and it is quite obvious that the very dynamic of the deal provides a powerful incentive for further hostage taking. There have been reported cases of released convicts slipping immediately back to lives of jihad, to be arrested or killed later in the pursuit of further murders.
Yet this is the nature of the Israeli social contract. The Jewish state is a remarkable outlier when set alongside other liberal democracies. Its birth rate is high, not low; its population young and growing; its social bonds are powerful, with the nation relating to itself as an extended family, not atomised, unpatriotic and demoralised; its innovation, economy and GDP are vibrant; its health system and quality of life are excellent; and its people are among the happiest in the world (after October 7 it fell in the international league tables from fourth happiest in the world to fifth, behind only the Scandinavian countries).
At the heart of this miraculous paradox lies the ancient Talmudic motto, 'Kol Yisrael Arevim Zeh Bazeh,' meaning 'all of Israel hold a responsibility for each other'. It is this that motivates hundreds of thousands of men, both young and not-so-young, to leave their families, their children and their businesses and place their necks on the line for the sake of defending the family of the nation.
It is time to face the truth of both cultures. By comparison to Israel, which is not without stain but is nonetheless a beacon of liberalism and hope in the region, Palestinian society is in the grip of a monstrous cult of death. There is nothing inherent in Palestinians that condemns them to live in this way. Rather, it has been engineered by the international community.
The history and anguish comes together with each exchange of innocent hostages for hundreds of murderers, such as we saw last night. The conclusion, however, is unavoidable. Look at the relative achievements of both societies.
Look at Israel's place in the Middle East; its wealth, its social cohesion, its military might, its quality of life, its levels of happiness. And look at the existence the Palestinians must endure. In truth, as the deputy director of the FBI pointed out this week, 'Arabs in Israel have more freedoms than Arabs in Arab countries'.
For all the pain that fills the heart of every Israeli right now, they know that ultimately life will triumph over death. That the other side has failed to learn this lesson, or has been forbidden from doing so by those harbouring cruel political interests, is the most unspeakable tragedy of all.
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37 minutes ago
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