Prisoner Swap Approved, Olmert: We know soldiers are not alive
In a 22-3 vote, the Israeli cabinet approved a measure that would allow for Samir Kuntar, terrorist serving 4 life sentences for 1979 murders, to be exchanged for Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser who were kidnapped by Hezbollah in June 2006.
Justice Minister Daniel Friedmann, Housing Minister Ze’ev Boim and Finance Minister Ronny Bar-On opposed the measure while the remaining 22 ministers voted in favor.
The exchange will likely occur on German soil in the coming days.
The cabinet meeting was held after pressure from the Israeli public and the families of the captive soldiers rejected an IDF proposal to declare the soldiers “killed in action,” thereby scurrying any prisoner exchange deal.
Many have voiced that the deal should be withdrawn if the soldiers are dead, so as not to create a precedent. According to a Ha’aretz report, this line of thinking is erroneous as that precedent was already set in the past. According to that article, Israel has released 45 live prisoners for the bodies of IDF soldiers Yossi Fink and Rahamim Alshayach in 1996 and also released another 60 Lebanese prisoners in exchange for the body of naval commando Itamar Ilya.
Many have made the comparison to the situation of missing airman Ron Arad. According to Ehud Olmert:
“For more than 20 years after Arad’s disappearance, we have not had confirmed information on what happened to him,” he said.
“The assumption all this time was that theses people were alive. Today we know for certain that there is no chance of that, and that knowledge must be the basis for today’s decision,” Olmert said during the debate.
While the cabinet approved the deal, now we must wait to see if the exchange actually happens and we will, too, see the state of the soldiers upon their return (if they are actually dead, or alive and we all hope and pray).
Shalom Hartman Institute Co-Director Rabbi Dr. Donniel Hartman comments on the value of the swap and the Jewish traditions that back it up – Hartman website – http://hartman.org.il
I hate these kind of sources. They’re exactly the empty, polemic like type of argument that plauges Jewish discussion. The real answer – there is no Jewish tradition. There is much confusion of values and much dissent. As to how this all figures into our current political predicament – God knows.
Let me tell you all one classic story. I don’t know the source, but it is told throughout the yeshivas. During the middle ages, non Jews would often kidnap Jews for ransom, this act of ransoming them is what is generally referred to by the rabbinic phrase (pidyon shvuyim). Anyways, there were rulings tha at the same time described pidyon shvuyim as the most important mitzvah, and at the other times ruling that severely limited the amount of money you were able to give for this goal. Well, once the Maharam MiRutenberg, the gadol hador, was captured, and his captors demanded a tremendous ransom. His principle student, the Rosh, organized a massive fundraising drive and redeemed him. After returning home, the Maharam promptly excommunicated the Rosh for having spent too much money on him, and thus endangering hte community. So, the Rosh ran away from Ashkenaz and ended up in Spain. That’s how he was able to span both traditions, paving his way for his son, the Tur, to write his incredibly important halakhic work
Sorry for the yeshivish history lesson, but it’s one we should all know
http://www.jpost.com/NationalNews/Article.aspx?id=241489
For anybody interested, this is what the scene was like at the Schalit tent last night.