Saturday, July 27, 2013

Israel's Painful Sacrifices for Peace: The release of Convicted Criminals


Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has agreed to release 104 convicted Palestinian criminals to meet the Palestinians' pre-conditions for resuming peace talks, stating "This is an incredibly difficult decision. It hurts the bereaved families, it hurts all of the Israeli people and it hurts me very much. It clashes with the most important principle, the principle of justice."  He added that "sometimes prime ministers are forced to make decisions that go against public opinion - when the issue is important for the country."


The talks are expected to begin Tuesday.


The vast majority of Israeli Jews are against the release of Palestinian terrorists "with blood on their hands" as a means of restarting peace talks with the Palestinians, a poll commissioned by Israel Hayom has found.


 Almost 85 percent of Israeli Jews are against the release of terrorists who have committed deadly attacks as a means of facilitating the upcoming peace talks, the poll shows (9.4% said they would support such a move and 5.7% had no opinion). A smaller proportion (78.1%) said such Palestinian terrorists should not be released even after the talks resumed and even if such a move was contingent on progress in the peace process (13.7% support this, with 8.2% having no opinion).  

Frimet Roth, who young daughter Malka was killed in a terror attack,  writing in Times of Israel , expressed her frustration that convicted murderers, terrorisst- convicts with blood on their hands, are being released, against the will of the people

 The pain that Netanyahu has inflicted on our family and on other victim families by freeing our children’s cold-blooded, convicted killers is but one of the repercussions of his actions and hubris.

By returning unrepentant terrorists to their homes, Mr. Netanyahu has also endangered every Israeli and weakened the very foundations of our society.

 This unprincipled man – a crass politician down to his every last cell – has usurped the role of judge and court. “The majority of the prisoners [about to walk free] have been sitting in prison for more than 20 years.” he explained to his constituents today.

Do we need to remind Mr. Netanyahu that far wiser and more thoughtful people than he sentenced those prisoners to much longer than 20 years, sometimes life?

The pre-Oslo prisoners that are being released are not "political prisoners".  They include:


Ramdan Yacoub - murdered Sarah Sharon with axe; serving life
Musa Kra'an - accomplice to murder of Tzvi Klein; serving 28 years
Asrar Samarin - murdered Tzvi Klein; serving life term
Ataf Sha'at - accomplice to murder of Simcha Levi; serving 29 years
Muhamad Said - murdered Hagai Shalhevet and Naset Sarim; serving 45 years
Mahmad Ahmad - murdered Hagai Shalhevet; serving 30 years
Mahmed Sabbag - tortured and murdered 'collaborators'; serving life
Mahmed Sualha - stabbed to death Baruch Heizler; attempted murder of others; serving life
Dia'a Faluji - beat Amatzia Ben Chaim to death with a hoe; serving life term
Yusef Adel Aai Sayid - attempted murder; tortured 'collaborator'; serving 22 year
Rajib Amer - murdered Ian Feinberg; murdered 'collaborators'; serving 3 life terms
Ahmed Shahada - sodomized and murdered 13 yr old Oren Baharami; serving 47 yrs
 Mahmad Asor- murdered Jewish taxi driver David Kaspi; serving 30 years
Gidan Usama - murdered Yosef Ben Gal to steal his car; serving 30 years
Yusef Arsheed - murdered 5 Arab "collaborators"; serving 5 life term
Mustafa Al Haaj - murdered hiker Frederic Rosenfeld; serving life term
Hamida Abed Geni - strangled to death Ben Tsion Nafusi in robbery; serving 30 year
Mazlum Nasser - strangled to death Ben Tsion Nafusi in robbery; serving 30 year
Usama Silawi - tortured and murdered 'collaborators'; serving 4 life terms
Ahmed Abdel Aziz - planned and carried out murder of Moshe and Maili Biton; serving life

 (Thanks to our friends at CIF Watch for the inspiration )


UPDATE: via the Jerusalem Post

After nearly 6 hour meeting, cabinet votes to renew talks with Palestinians including release of 104 Palestinian terrorists in 4 stages over 9 months; cabinet also approves bill to bring peace deal to national referendum...

The ministers voting against included Likud ministers Gilad Erdan and Yisrael Katz, Yisrael Beytenu ministers Yair Shamir and Uzi Landau, and Bayit Yehudi ministers Naftali Bennett, Uri Ariel and Uri Orbach. Likud ministers Silvan Shalom and Limor Livnat abstained.

Those who voted for the proposal were Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Yuval Steinitz, Moshe Ya'alon and Gideon Sa'ar from the Likud, Sofa Landver and Yitzhak Aharonovitch from Yisrael Beytenu, Yesh Atid's Yair Lapid, Yael German, Yaakov Peri, Shai Piron, Meir Cohen, and Hatnua's Tzipi Livni, and Amir Peretz. 

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is shameful!

reenspace said...

Well, let's think about all of the innocent Palestinian male children who are dragged out of their homes, in the middle of the night, while they are sleeping, blindfolded and taken off to Israeli prisons, then sexually abused and tortured!!! Let's think about the children who are shot by Israeli settlers, who are now living on Palestinian land. Let's think about the Palestinian, who attempts to stand up and save his family home and old olive groves, and then gets arrested, and his home is destroyed, and his 100 year old olive grove destroyed. Israel needs to STOP their stealing of Palestinian land and leave the area. The Palestinian people own the land and are only standing up[ for their rights!!!

Dusty said...

"Well, let's think about all of the innocent Palestinian male children who are dragged out of their homes, in the middle of the night, while they are sleeping, blindfolded and taken off to Israeli prisons, then sexually abused and tortured!!!"

Objection. Assumes facts not in evidence.
Are you referring to 17 year old Hakim Mazen Awad , who broke into a Jewish home, decapitated an infant, murdered her parents and her sleeping brothers simply because they were Jewish? What do you suggest doing with such "children", if not prison? What do you propose to do about the adults that encourage such behavior?


"Let's think about the children who are shot by Israeli settlers, who are now living on Palestinian land."

What "Palestinian land"? What are its borders? There was never an independent nation of Palestine. There was a continuous Jewish presence here for over 3500 years. Long before Christianity. Long before Islam. What makes it "Palestinian land"? Do you also think about Israeli children, shot by Palestinian extremists? Do you ever shed a tear for 10 month old Shalhevet Pass, shot by a Palestinian sniper while in her stroller?


"Let's think about the Palestinian, who attempts to stand up and save his family home and old olive groves, and then gets arrested, and his home is destroyed, and his 100 year old olive grove destroyed. Israel needs to STOP their stealing of Palestinian land and leave the area."

Once again, assumes facts not in evidence. The vast majority of Palestinians in the land are recent immigrants. They are not indigeneous.

"The Palestinian people own the land and are only standing up for their rights!!!"

You are confusing concepts of sovereignty, residence and ownership. You might want to brush up a bit on your reading.

Anonymous said...

To Reenspace:

Did you even look at the list of convicts?

A Palestinian man who sodomized and murdered a 13 year old boy was not "defending his land"

A Palestinian man who murdered an old lady with a axe was not "defending his olive groves"

Stop thinking of the Palestinians as righteous victims who can do no wrong. You sound like you are rationalizing and excusing cold bloded murderers.