He won't really release Pollard, will he?
The United States has offered to release longtime captive Jonathan Pollard from jail if Israel agrees to release the fourth tranche of terrorist murderers that it is supposed to free as a “gesture” to the Palestinian Authority (PA), reports IDF Radio's Ilil Shahar. In addition, Israel has to agree to continue "peace talks" with the PA.
The decision was reportedly made after Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told the US that many of his his government's ministers executing the fourth tranche of releases, and that he will not be able to carry out the release.
Shahar reported Wednesday morning that the offer was made to members of both the Israeli and PA negotiating teams over the past week, after an impasse left the US scrambling to move the process along. She added that while there had been rumors of such an offer in the past, the concrete US offer has turned rumors into reality.
The proposal is conditional on Israel going through with the fourth batch of terrorist releases - which has been embroiled in controversy since the PA declared that it was only staying in talks in order to see the terrorists freed - and agreeing to allow negotiations with the PA to continue.
...The fourth terrorist release is meant to include 'Israeli Arabs,' who are, of course, Israeli citizens. As a result, there is a lot more resistance to that release than to the previous releases.
Pollard has said in the past that he would not agree to be released in exchange for terrorists.
This morning, Jewish Home party leader and Economics Minister Naftali Bennett expressed skepticism about the reports and said that Israel should not be begging the 'Palestinians' to continue the talks. No kidding.
"It's not certain to happen, and in any case, we need to stop begging [Abbas] to agree to conduct negotiations with us," Bennett said.
"I'm very skeptical. I didn't see the United States reach its hand into its pocket on the Pollard issue and I haven't heard [about this] from the prime minister. I don't assume that it will really happen," he added.
...
According to the report, Israel would release another 26 Palestinian prisoners, including some 14 Arab-Israelis, in exchange of the US gesture.
The deal would also obligate Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to keep his negotiators engaged in the current round of talks and an extended period through the end of 2014.On Wednesday, the State Department denied the report... but in their conviction to have the deal happen Israeli officials are reading that denial as confirmation that the deal could happen. In other words, we want it to happen so badly that they must want it to happen too.
"There are no plans to release Jonathan Pollard at the moment,” said State Department Spokeswoman Jen Psaki. “Jonathan Pollard was convicted of espionage against the United States – a very serious crime. He was sentenced to life and is currently serving his sentence.”
Psaki stopped short of clearly denying the reports that it had offered Israel a deal in which Pollard will be freed.That last sentence is the same kind of thinking that has had Israelis saying for the last twenty years that we want peace so badly that the 'Palestinians' must want it too, because there is no other logical choice.
I would bet that Jonathan Pollard will continue to be held as a hostage for something much bigger than another few months of talks.
What could go wrong?
Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Binyamin Netanyahu, John Kerry, Jonathan Pollard, Middle East peace process, Naftali Bennett, Palestinian terrorists
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 2:36 PM
3 Comments:
Why not have a "gesture" from Obama, first.
Then, Israelis can decide what is best for them.
Israel has been making these "gestures" for peace for years, and received only war in exchange.
I don't want to say what's going through my mind since it is really too horrible to express. But I would not be so skeptical of this alleged offer.
Releasing any terrorist in exchange for Pollard would be an avlah.
Releasing Israel Arab prisoners - of any type, even car thieves - because the PA says so, is essentially a declaration that Israel has no sovereignty over its Arab population.
Such a demand cannot be accepted by any state that takes itself seriously, of course.
On the other hand, if the PA claims authority over Arabs living in Israel, it should take it all the way and make a "law of return" for them, encourage them to make "aliyah" to their territory and be granted automatic citizenship.
Abbas will never agree to that because it would be implicitly recognizing Israel as a Jewish State. Or maybe by making this demand, he is in fact recognizing the Jewish State?
Someone should send him an email pointing out the ideological danger of negating Israel's sovereignty over its Arab citizens.
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