New Barak leak: Netanyahu opposed 'terrorists for Gilad' deal
In yet another leak of the supposedly 'secret' tapes of Ehud Barak's autobiography, it was disclosed today that Prime Minister Netanyahu opposed the 'terrorists for Gilad' trade.
Speaking of the Shalit prisoner exchange,
Barak tells his interviewers — who are working on his biography — that
Netanyahu was opposed to the exchange of the captive IDF soldier for
1,027 Palestinian prisoners, but gave in after Barak pressured him.
“Bibi [Netanyahu] is forced into action, and
shows a side [to his personality] that is less elegant, less about
self-control, less pretty, when he’s in a personal crisis over
something,” Barak says in recordings he did not know would become
public.
“As much as he was opposed to [the] Gilad
Shalit [exchange], and I pressured him for months to do two things, to
do Gilad Shalit and immediately afterward to pass in the government [and
in] the Knesset [the recommendations of] the Shamgar Committee” that
recommended changing Israel’s prisoner exchange policy.
“In the end he was convinced he had to free
Shalit but wasn’t convinced to do the obvious next step [of passing
Shamgar], and that’s how he found himself in the [June 2014] kidnapping
of the three kids,” teenagers whose kidnapping by a Hamas-affiliated
cell in the West Bank triggered that summer’s Gaza war.
What he refers to as 'Shamgar' was a law that would prohibit Israel from trading terrorists for Israelis being held hostage. As if that would stop any Israeli government from doing exactly that....
As some of you might recall, I opposed the 'terrorists for Gilad' trade. And I still think it was the wrong thing to do.
Report: IDF implemented Hannibal Protocol right after kidnapping
A report by Israel Radio's military correspondent Carmela Menashe reports that the IDF implemented the Hannibal Protocol after Hadar Goldin was kidnapped this morning. This is from the first link (the second link is a lengthy post of mine from 2011 that explains what the Hannibal Protocol is).
Israel Radio military correspondent Carmella Menashe reported that the
moment it was realized that Second Lieutenant Hadar Goldin may have been
kidnapped that the IDF engaged in massive fire in the area where the
terrorists might be with Goldin.
Such a move would be consistent with what is known as the IDF "Hannibal
Protocol"
The following is a report back from 2011 with a link to the audio:
The IDF Hannibal Protocol - IDF Commander Briefing Troops
For audio:
http://youtu.be/BvlP6yM15ws
"The strategic weapon, the "Judgment Day Weapon" that Hamas wants to
acquire, is to capture a soldier.
But no soldier in Battalion 51 will be kidnapped at any price.
At any price. Under any condition.
Even if it means that he blows himself with his own grenade together with
those trying to capture him.
Also even if it means that now his unit has to fire a barrage at the car
that they are trying to take him away in.
There is no situation. No situation that they will have this weapon."
Golani Battalion 51 commander briefing his troops on the eve of their entry
into Gaza during Operation Cast Lead.
Video report broadcast on Israel Television Channel 2 News 16 October 2011
http://www.mako.co.il/news-military/security/Article-778ae8d014e0331017.htm
OMG: Livni refers to Hamas tunnels (until Thursday) as 'problem that has not yet taken place'
You can't make this stuff up. Justice Minister and perpetual peace processor Tzipi Livni is wondering why the IDF would destroy Hamas' tunnel network when it hasn't been used yet!
This recording helps to provide a very important understanding as to how the
very top of Israel's leadership analyzes situations and makes policy
decisions.
Here is the guiding principle: "there is a difference between a problem
that still hasn't taken place..."
To be clear: The decision makers in the Government of Israel can know that
the enemy has developed a strategic capability (and in the case of the
tunnels there can even be past experience in the use of tunnels against
Israel), but the Government of Israel is only compelled to act against this
strategic capability when the enemy uses it in a high profile operation.
At the time of this writing (Sunday morning) the IDF just discovered a
major tunnel reaching inside Israel to Kibbutz Netiv Haasarah. If Hamas
had accepted the ceasefire last week, that tunnel and the many others now
being discovered would still be intact - waiting for use at a time that most
serves the program of the enemy.
This revelation by Minister Livni should serve as a warning regarding the
policy making process inside Israel.
It appears to be an approach that enables policymakers to make decisions
that can ignore all the facts, all the dangers, all the threats - as long as
they have not yet actually take place.
Oslo, retreat from the Gaza Strip and Philadelphi Corridor, "quiet for
quiet", as well as the many initiatives to trade the Golan for a piece of
paper that only failed because of an uncooperative Assad, are all
illustrations of how policymakers had reasonably accurate technical
information about security ramifications but chose to downgrade or ignore
the information since the technically possible scenarios had yet to play
out.
As has been often said: our enemies tend to save us from our incompetence.
Tzfat (Safed) Chief Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu is blaming the Shalit family for the abduction of Gilad Shaar, Naftali Fraenkel and Eyal Yifrach.
“One of the major factors contributing to the erosion of Israeli society
was the atmosphere of ‘me as the individual’ and the loss of national
identity,” Eliyahu wrote.
“The Schalit family and the group that put in motion the campaign around
it [for the release of their son] enhanced this erosion,” he wrote. “It
adopted an attitude of whining and playing on sentiment. They blamed
everyone [and] perpetuated the culture of ‘I deserve it.’ It was as if
the only important thing to consider is today, not what happens
tomorrow. As long as they get their son back, damn the consequences,
even if it means that innocent civilians will pay the awful price. And
the awful price has come. Three young boys were kidnapped.”
Eliyahu drew a comparison between the Schalit family and its vocal
public relations campaign to bring pressure to bear on the government
for their son’s release after five years in captivity, and the reaction of the families of the kidnapped youngsters who went missing 10 days ago.
“Today, a new spirit is blowing,” the rabbi wrote admiringly of the
families of Naftali Fraenkel, Gil-Ad Shaer, and Eyal Yifrah. “It is a
spirit of might and heroism, a spirit of responsibility, a spirit of
unity. It’s a more responsible, healthier, more moral spirit. This
spirit is alive and well in the army and the government, the Knesset,
and the entire public. It’s a spirit of remedying the defects of the
past.”
“This spirit is being fostered by the families of the young people,” the
rabbi wrote. “With quiet conduct, they have managed to tug on the
heartstrings of the Israeli society and to rehabilitate it. There are no
accusations of guilt, no whining, no public pressure, no bitterness.
What they do have is belief.”
During the time that Gilad Shalit was being held, I had plenty of criticism for his father. Here's one.
You can't help but feel sorry for the guy but for the past five years,
Noam Shalit has done more than anyone in the world to convince everyone
that his son's release is 'just' a question of paying Hamas' price, and
therefore pressure has been brought on the government of Israel and not
on Hamas. He is also rumored to have vetoed an IDF rescue mission out of
fear that Hamas would kill his son if such a mission were undertaken.
It is questionable whether such a mission is even possible today - how
would you have any element of surprise?
What is Shalit
suggesting? Reinstating a full blockade? It was his friends that forced
the government to stop that. Cut off water and electricity? The only
people who favor doing that are the Right, who are anathema to the
Shalit family because they're not willing to trade thousands of
terrorists for Gilad's release.
And so the stalemate continues and only Hamas benefits.
I have a real problem with this kind of interference in the government's
foreign policy prerogative. It harks back to a previous set of
negotiations in Oslo, in which Beilin (whom Yitzchak Rabin famously
referred to as "Peres' poodle) participated - the illegal negotiations
with the PLO that produced the Oslo 'declaration of principles' in 1993.
In the United States, the Logan Act,
a criminal statute prohibits private citizens from engaging in
"correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any
officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies
with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States."
Israel doesn't have a Logan Act, but it should.
Suppose that
next month Beilin and Noam Shalit (whom I had figured as a leftist
almost from Day One after his son was kidnapped) go to Oslo and come
back with an agreement with Hamas: Israel will release 1400 terrorists
and Hamas will release Gilad Shalit. Despite the fact that such an
'exchange' would endanger every Israeli citizen,
the pressure on the weak Olmert-Barak-Livni government to accept such
an agreement would be enormous. That is why private citizens (and Beilin
- who is not in the government - is a private citizen in this regard)
should not be interfering with the State's conduct of foreign policy by
negotiating with its enemies about anything.
I know that someone
is going to say, "but all Beilin and Noam Shalit did was to ask the
Norwegians to bring back a sign of life." There are three responses to
this. First, the same thing could have been accomplished through the Red
Cross, which is a proper channel. The Israeli government could have
approached the Norwegian government, which would have been a proper
channel. And Beilin comes to this incident with unclean hands because he
has a history of undermining governments in this exact manner.
But perhaps this is the most important part, which came out after the terrorists for Gilad deal.
Yes, of course, the Shalit family had a public relations campaign. Now that the terrorists for Gilad trade has been made, the campaign has been exposed.
About
four years ago, after year and a half of silence in the media and the
sense that Gilad Shalit was beginning to be forgotten, Shalit's father,
Noam, enlisted the help of a public relations firm. Until that moment,
the Shalit family had operated without the close help of media
consulting. Noam was determined to change the public discourse and
offered to pay Tammy Shinkman, of the public relations firm
Rimon-Cohen-Shinkman, as much as it took. "At first, they [the Shalit
family] offered to pay us, and we of course, without second thoughts,
said 'no chance.' We insisted that we would do it voluntarily," says
Benny Cohen, a partner of the firm who ran the operational strategy and
work behind the scenes of the Shalit campaign.
Immediately after
the firm began working for the Shalit family, the media was flooded with
countless messages and news items calling for Shalit's release.
Meetings were held with newspapers and broadcast media in attempts to
convince them to cover the soldier's struggle on their front pages and
in their top headlines; politicians were asked to join the campaign; and
celebrities decided to lock themselves in a makeshift jail cell,
believed to be similar to what Shalit was kept in under Hamas captivity,
in solidarity with the soldier.
The country was filled with
billboards, flags and stickers, and pictures of the kidnapped soldier
printed in the nation's colors - blue and white - became an iconic
symbol. The Shalit family's struggle made headlines and brought crowds
of supporters out into the streets. The change marked an unprecedented
and historic shift.
"It is connected to the empowerment of
emotions. The strategy was to make everyone empathize with the terrible
fear that his or her child could leave and never return," Shinkman once
said in an interview with the Globes newspaper. "The codes of
communication are clear: You get a response when you reveal a personal
side. The Shalit family had a hard time exposing itself to the public.
They were an introverted family, and Noam himself is a bereaved sibling.
And yet it was important to facilitate emotional involvement, to
highlight the fact that every parent would expect this kind of public
solidarity if it happened to them, and this was done by massively
amplifying the dose of the family's exposure to the public."
"You
have to remember that mutual responsibility for one another is part of
the Israeli ethos and this does not exist in other cultures," Cohen
adds. "It means that when we speak of one child, we are talking about
everyone's child, not just some distant soldier fighting in Afghanistan.
As soon as we realized this would be our strategy, we did a lot of work
to keep the Shalit story alive, for example, during Purim, releasing
photos of Gilad dressed as a clown when he was a child.
"There
were many periods of quiet, so every few months we had to find some
other idea that would push the media to give us coverage. There were two
other sources that played a big role - the advertising agency Shalmor
Avnon Amichai voluntarily produced movies, designs and slogans for us,
for example the ad showing the word "help" written in handwriting; and
also Kobi Gamliel who was able to get 800,000 people to change their
profile pictures on Facebook."
What they did worked.
But
what if the Shalit family had not been in the position to say "we'll
pay you whatever it takes"? What if the Shalit family (like the leaders
of the tent city this past summer) had not been from a socio-economic
group that Israel's mass media loves? What if, for example, he had been a
religious Hesder
soldier from Judea and Samaria or from a development town? I have my
doubts whether the families of such soldiers would ever have attempted
to do what the Shalits did in the first place, but Israeli society needs
to do some soul-searching and ask itself those questions.
Well, now we have the answer as to who a religious family from Judea and Samaria (okay, two of them don't live in Judea and Samaria, but two of the kids go to school there) would react and it's nothing like the Shalits. Rav Eliyahu's criticism is very much in place. The Shalit family manipulated Israeli society into paying an exorbitant price, and that price has encouraged other kidnappings. There has been no ransom demand: maybe because the terrorists are waiting for the families to start making the kinds of demands the Shalits made, or maybe because the 'Palestinians' have decided that kidnapping random Israelis and making them 'disappear' has a chance of being a more effective tactic to spring terrorists. It's time to tell the truth.
How many terrorists does Gilad Shalit think Jonathan Pollard is worth?
Gilad Shalit spent five years in captivity with Hamas in Gaza before being released in exchange for more than 1,000 'Palestinian' terrorists. As you can see from the pictures above, Shalit was malnourished in the Hamas prison.
Jonathan Pollard has been in American prisons for more than 28 years for turning US intelligence information over to Israel. He is in far worse health than Shalit was in. The United States has refused to release Pollard.
Gilad Shalit has now - more than two years after his own release - called for Pollard's release. But would he favor releasing 'Palestinian' terrorists in exchange for Pollard as was done for his own release (a question that is largely academic since Pollard will not allow Israel to trade terrorists for his release)? Apparently not.
"I heard the request tonight, like everyone else, from Prime Minister
Binyamin Netanyahu to release Jonathan Pollard, who has sat for 29
years in prison," Shalit wrote to Yediot Aharonot. "After
Israel has released terrorist prisoners back to the Palestinian
Authority as a gesture [for negotiations], we ask for a mutual gesture."
"I am sure that like me, the entire nation of Israel agrees that to
demand such a simple gesture as Pollard's release is well-deserved,"
Shalit continued.
"Please - all of you - join me in a clear call to our friends the
Americans: We released dozens of terrorists with blood on their hands at
your request - so extend to us this one gesture that can likely save
[Pollard's] life," he urged.
...
Shalit's point addresses the fact that Israel has been generous about
releasing convicted terrorists back to the PA to appease the US, who is
brokering peace talks between the PA and Israel. Pollard, by contrast,
presents little security risk to the US.
In other words, while Israel paid more than 1,000 new terrorist releases for Shalit's freedom, Pollard's should be based on past services rendered. Whether Shalit would favor releasing new terrorists in exchange for Pollard is unanswered.
I guess Shalit doesn't think Pollard did as much for Israel as he did.
I was trying to pump as much information as I could out of a well
connected source I had built an excellent working relationship with,
we’ll call him Pierre, who often provided me with information other
reporters covering French diplomatic activity in the Middle East didn’t
get. I had called him up with for some clarifications on the rumors
about Regev and Goldwasser, left a message, and decided that since it
was my first ever Tisha B’Av in Jerusalem, that I would go down to the
Kotel for services.
The scene was overwhelming. There was a sea of people, Haredim,
Hassidim, Hilonim, tourists, photographers and security, all crammed
into the the Western Wall plaza. Bachurim were sitting on the floor in
mourning, grown men were crying, it was a very emotional and inspiring
sight, and I was completely caught up in it. As I wandered around taking
it all in, my phone began buzzing in my back pocket and brought me back
into a world I thought had been left behind at the office for the day.
“Hello?!?! Hello?!?!” I shouted over the noise of the crowd. It was Pierre returning my call.
“Hi Pierre,” I began somewhat hurriedly. “Listen, I can’t really talk
now, I’m down at the Kotel for Tisha B’Av, can I call you back in the
morning?”
It didn’t occur to me that he probably had no idea what the Kotel
was, or what Tisha B’Av signified. Pierre was an inquisitive type, and
sometimes over the course of our conversations, he ended up asking more
questions than I did. This was one of those times. “Sure, pas de problem, we speak in the morning,” he said. Before I could hit the end button, I heard it.
“Mais attend,” – wait he said – “You are where?”
I was certainly not in this conversation. My head was elsewhere. I
was antsy, and I wanted to get off the phone. I didn’t want to start
sermonizing on the meaning behind this day of mourning, that it was the
day that God had decided that future generations would weep in order to
commemorate past transgressions. That Israel as a whole on this day
would relive the lost hope felt in the desert as they began to angrily
follow Moses and question their faith. That because tears were directed
inwards instead of toward the Heavens, that for one day a year the
Almighty would not mend His children’s broken hearts. So I went with the
thirty second ESPN highlight version.
“I’m at the ruins of the temple in Jerusalem. It was destroyed today,
so people are coming from all over the country to mourn and to pay
their respects.”
Pierre was a government official, not a ten year old attending Jewish
day school and already well acquainted with the likes of Vespasian,
Titus, and Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakai. There was dead silence on the other
end of the line, and you could almost feel the panic sinking in on the
other side.
“But the president was briefed on the Middle East this morning,” he
began shakily. “Nobody mentioned this catastrophe.” and then it came.
“France strongly condemns the destruction of your Temple!”
For the shocking ending of what is apparently a true story, read the whole thing.
The video, that is a total of 38 seconds long, shows Schalit buttoning
the infamous shirt he was released in, tying his shoelaces and being
escorted by armed and masked Hamas Kassam brigades men.
The video
also features the images and year of capture of other Israeli soldiers,
such as Yaron Hen, Nachshon Vaksman and Shahar Simani.
The video
ends with a darkened image of a hunched down soldier and the text "we
started our goal [mission]... and we'll reach the end" in Hebrew and
Arabic.
An upcoming visit to Canada by Gilad Shalit, an IDF soldier who spent five years in Hamas captivity, has led some people to question whether he should be treated as a hero.
The Jewish Tribune’s Israel correspondent, Atara Beck, noted that an IDF investigation into the kidnapping revealed that Shalit had not paid much attention
to the briefing before the patrol, did not open fire at the terrorists,
and was unaware of the fact that there were other soldiers in the area
because he had not listened carefully to the briefing.
Two IDF soldiers, Hanan Barak and Pavel Slutzker, died in the same attack.
Beck said that many in the Canadian Jewish
community are questioning JNF Canada’s decision to bring Shalit to
Canada as a guest speaker, fearing that this may broadcast a message of
weakness rather than heroism.
The same issue of the Jewish Tribune
featured a letter to the editor signed by Harry Smith from Montreal, who
said that bringing Shalit to Canada as a guest speaker is “a foolish
idea”.
“Perhaps it is the Palestinians residing in Canada
who should be given front row seats. They surely would bask in the glory
of our shame,” wrote Smith, adding, “This young man is, by his own
admission, a stumblebum. He could not be bothered to even bring his
weapon out of his vehicle. In fact, he never bothered listening to
instructions. He anticipated stumbling his way through army service.…
What were his superiors thinking? Why didn’t they just put him on
kitchen duty? A few more like this hero and Israel will cease to exist.”
That's what happens with a universal draft: You get a lot of soldiers who don't really want to be there. Gilad Shalit was obviously one of them.
Flashback: Noam Shalit meets with Jimmy Carter in 2009
The ostensible reason that former President Jimmy Carter is receiving an award at Yeshiva University's Cardozo law school is because Carter is a 'human rights activist.' But is that claim true?
Here's a video of a 'meeting' Carter had with Noam Shalit during the time when Noam's son Gilad was being held hostage by Carter's friends in Hamas. The meeting lasted all of three minutes, and it tells you all you need to know about Carter's 'human rights activism': It doesn't benefit Jews.
The second part of Gilad Shalit's story is as incredible as the first. In essence, he invited himself to be kidnapped.
The use of the hand grenades that were thrown into Gilad Schalit's tank
casts doubt on the view that the main goal of the attack was to kidnap a
soldier. If the militants had wanted to kidnap a soldier, it is
unlikely that they would have thrown a grenade into the tank. They
wanted to kill, to cause as much damage as possible and then get away
quickly.
Somehow, Schalit survived the grenade blasts and exited the tank. As he
left the tank, he saw the terrorist climbing the front of the tank which
on the Merkava is referred to as "the knife."
In order to climb,
the terrorist needed to use both hands, which meant that his personal
weapon - a Kalashnikov - was strapped across his back. At this point, he
was in close range, making him an easy target. Schalit, who was sitting
on the dome of the tank, where the tank commander has a view of the
surrounding area, saw the militant climbing toward him but could not see
the second militant on the other side of the tank.
The militant
had still not seen Schalit, and Schalit could have easily moved his
hand 10 cm to take control of the .50 caliber tank machine gun and shoot
him, cutting him to pieces in seconds. The .50 cal is not a weapon that
you would want to have fired at you - its firing speed is lethal, and
squeezing the trigger is quick and easy. But that is not what Schalit
did; in fact, he did nothing. It is plausible to assume that if the
machine gun had been fired, it would have killed the militant climbing
the tank and caused the second man to flee. Even if it had not occurred
that way, taking control of the machine gun would still have given
Schalit, who was inside the tank with three guns and the main tank
cannon at his disposal, a marked advantage over his adversaries.
“You never thought to shoot the terrorist?” Schalit was asked during the investigation.
“No,” he answered, “I was completely confused. I did not think about anything. I was in shock.”
Seconds
later the terrorist noticed Schalit at the top of the tank and Schalit
shouted to him in Hebrew, “Don’t shoot, don’t shoot.”
The
militant realized that Schalit was handing himself over, and leveled his
weapon at him. He then shouted at Schalit in Hebrew, “Come with me.”
Schalit climbed down from the tank, shaking wildly. The second militant
joined them, the two immediately understanding what a prize had fallen
in their laps: a live Israeli soldier who was not fighting back. This
was the prize that Hamas had dreamed of for years, and now here it was
in front of them.
The three of them, Schalit and his two captors,
moved quickly to the Gaza fence. At 5:21 a.m., they blew a hole in the
fence and entered a small tunnel underneath. Schalit went with them
quickly the entire way, without attempting to slow them down to save
time until the second tank or other back up could arrive. He simply went
along with them and ran toward the fence.
One of the militants
crawled underneath and told Schalit to do the same, the latter complying
immediately. The militants told him to move more quickly and he rushed
to obey. Afterward, his bullet proof vest was found next to the fence;
it appears he took it off in order to move more freely.
After
passing under the fence, the three headed deep into the Gaza Strip, with
all possible haste. An IDF tank arrived at the scene and at an
observation post locked a fix on the three, but permission to fire was
not issued. It was still not known that a soldier was being kidnapped.
They were already more than a kilometer in Palestinian territory.
Finally the tank opened fire, but only with its machine guns.
They
did not receive permission to fire heavy weapons, and the machine guns
missed their target. Schalit and his captors reached the first line of
houses where a tractor was waiting for them. They boarded the tractor,
which took them to a car, which in turn took them to another car. On the
way, the terrorists stripped Schalit of his army uniform and dressed
him in civilian clothing. Schalit was firmly in their hands, and five
and a half years of captivity had begun.
I don't know how the IDF does psychological profiling to assign soldiers to units, but this one was clearly a major mistake. I thought these comments were on point.
Schalit is an introverted young man who is both emotional and fragile.
It is likely that he should not have been placed in a tank unit in the
first place. Perhaps he simply was not fit for it. When his tank was
hit, he went into shock and lost the ability to act. The term "hero",
which was given him by IDF Chief Benny Gantz when Schalit returned to
Israel, is misplaced. Brigadier General Avigdor Kahalani, a tank
commander in 1967 and 1973, was a hero. Major Roi Klein, who died in the
2006 Lebanon War by jumping on a grenade to save his comrades, was a
hero. Lieutenant Colonel Avi Lanir, tortured to death by Syrian soldiers
during the Yom Kippur War, was a hero. The history of Israel and the
IDF is checkered with many stories of bravery, and Gilad Schalit is far
from being among them. He is in a way a type of anti-hero. He was a
soldier who was placed in a difficult situation and chose a path of
submission. There is no heroism in this story. This story is one of
humanity that is both sad and touching.
It
is possible that Schalit was never fit to serve as a combat soldier.
Still maybe it is the very fact that he served in the tank unit and
fulfilled his duty to his country even so that is his badge of honor.
Yet after all of this, we cannot forget that there is a state to
protect, one that is surrounded by enemies. Israel cannot afford to
allow herself too many stories of "bravery" like this.
The story's author then goes on to say that there is no lesson from Shalit's story. I disagree. The lesson is that we have to make the IDF into a professional army that does what is humanly possible to protect the country, and stop trying to make it into the country's melting pot. The IDF spends too much time making sure that people pass their matriculation exams and trying to assimilate misfits into Israeli society. That ought not to be their job. It's time for the IDF to turn professional, at least in the combat units.
Surprise: Gilad Shalit's tank did not fire a single bullet
Gilad Shalit, for whom we gave up over 1,000 terrorist murderers, has admitted to military investigators (who went easy on him, since after all, this is the child of all Israelis) that he and his tank crew were incompetent, and did not fire a single bullet during his kidnapping. Two of the three other members of the tank crew died in the attack.
This story is the story of
Gilad Schalit. This is his version, as told to the IDF investigators who
questioned him. As stated, he feared his encounters with them; he was ashamed of
what he had to tell them, yet he did so with an honesty that truly inspires
respect. He didn’t try to conceal the truth; he told them he’d failed and
acknowledged that he had not done his duty. He said this willingly, without any
coercion or pressure.
Schalit has a phenomenal memory, he knows exactly
what happened on each day of his captivity, when he was moved from place to
place, what he ate, what was done and what happened.
And thus, for his
interrogators, Gilad Schalit went over the details of the attack that led to his
capture. Here is Schalit’s version, almost in its entirety (which the exception
of the details that were redacted by the censor).
The attack took place
in the pre-dawn darkness. Schalit’s tank crew was on guard duty outside the Gaza
Strip. During the night, the crew took it in turns to rest – two keeping watch
and two sleeping.
With the dawn, everyone was supposed to be awake, in
his place and battle ready. At this stage, there is a communications check with
the rest of the troops in the field, as well as with the operations room, and
everyone reports that they are ready. This is what Schalit’s tank team should
have been doing.
In reality, just one of the four-man team was awake –
the rest were sleeping the sleep of the just. The driver was in the driver’s
seat, the gunner (Schalit) was in his place, the comms guy in his and the
commander in the commander’s turret.
Schalit was what is known in the
army as “rosh katan” (literally, small head, and meaning someone with little or
no initiative).
He was assigned for operational duty without knowing what
was going on around him, the makeup of the area, or where the enemy lay. He had
attended meetings and briefings before setting out on the mission, but had not
immersed himself in the details. He was, after all, a member of a team, and
trusted in his commander.
If he had listened to the company commander of
the sector, who had issued detailed briefings, he would have known that there
had been an explicit warning from the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) about a
possible Hamas infiltration from Gaza, perhaps via a tunnel, and an attempt to
kidnap a soldier. If he had been aware that in his vicinity – and just a few
minutes away – there were reinforcements, perhaps it could have changed the face
of the battle and even prevented the abduction.
In the briefing before
the operation, it was clearly stated where everyone was located in the field,
the deployment layout and more. A unit from the Engineering Corps had been
situated 200 meters from Schalit’s tank, next to the border fence, throughout
the night. Col. Avi Peled, the senior commander in the sector, who was suffering
from a manpower shortage, had wanted to give back-up to the tanks in the field,
and had brought in the team from the Engineering Corps, assigned as a personal
favor.
It would have been possible for Schalit to call on this backup,
had he known that they were there, but he had not been paying attention when the
information was imparted.
“I didn’t listen,” he admitted to the
investigators. “The commander was listening, and that was enough. I trusted
him.”
When the attack began, he was sleeping in his gunner’s seat, deep
inside the tank. His personal weapon was on the floor underneath him; he wasn’t
wearing his helmet, his bullet- proof vest was hanging on the back of the chair,
and maybe his flak jacket was on.
Maybe not.
As it turns out, the
vest and the flak jacket saved his life.
Schalit went to sleep at 4:35
a.m. Until then, he had been on guard in the commander’s post, and had been
relieved by a team member. Twenty-five minutes later, he was awoken by the
impact of a rocket-propelled grenade striking the tank. He looked up to see the
tank commander, Lt. Hanan Barak, and the driver, St.-Sgt. Pavel Slutzker,
climbing out of the tank at speed.
“Gilad, get out of the tank!” Barak
yelled at him. From beneath him, he could hear the voice of Cpl. Roi Amitai,
calling “Hanan, Hanan,” but Barak and Slutzker were already out.
The
command to leave the tank contravened operational orders. An RPG cannot do
significant damage to a Merkava 3 tank, and this was a light strike on the side.
Yes, it caused shock and agitation, but even so, this was no reason to abandon
the tank – it wasn’t on fire, the grenade had caused minimal damage, the
electronic systems were working, and no one on the team had been
wounded.
Following the attack, after it was all over, an army technician
went to the tank, turned on the engine and drove it away. The tank that Schalit
had been in was capable of continuing to fight. A tank like this is a powerful
war machine, with an effective, precise and swift cannon; it has three machine
guns, primed and ready at the touch of the trigger, not to mention all the other
advanced weaponry on board.
And yet the crew fled.
...
The officers questioning the post-captivity Schalit asked him
if he had left the tank.
“No, I didn’t leave,” he replied.
“Why?”
“Because the tank seemed safer than there, outside,” he said. “Outside is
dangerous.
Inside was protected.”
With the departure of Barak and
Slutzker, Schalit heard the rattle of light weapons being fired. It was this
gunfire that killed the two crew members, and they fell from the tank onto the
ground. Schalit heard them fall, then quiet, and realized that the two, one of
whom was his commander, were either dead or seriously wounded.
Cpl. Roi
Amitai, who had been fast asleep at the time of the attack, was trapped in his
spot in the tank. Schalit understood that he was alone.
He decided to
stay in the tank, and not get out and fight.
He had options, however,
from inside. There was the machine gun, set up to be operated by the gunner
without any need to stick his head out of the vehicle; he could have let off a
few rounds and let the world know that the Merkava was still operational and in
the fight. Yet he stayed put, in his seat, and hoped for the
best.
Outside, at the same time, there were a total of two
militants.
...
At this point Schalit was sitting in the gunner’s seat,
praying for it to just be over. Then one of militants approached and threw two
or three grenades into the turret. Schalit doesn’t recall the explosion of the
grenades, but he does remember the smoke very well.
His bullet-proof vest
and his flak jacket, hanging on the back of the chair, absorbed most of the
impact. The chair was completely shredded.
Schalit, miraculously, was
lightly wounded with shrapnel in his elbow and rear. He was scared, shocked. He
stayed in the tank for a minute or two until the smoke spread throughout the
turret and he found it hard to breathe. Then he decided, finally, to leave. He
left unarmed. His gun, a deadly M-16, he left on the floor of the turret. In
military terms, this is called abandoning your weapon.
If only Schalit
had taken his gun with him when he left the tank; if only he had seen the
militant approach the tank and start to climb up it. He could have taken him out
easily, but he was not in battle mode. This is what Schalit himself told the
investigators.
This is clearly a soldier who didn't want to be in a combat unit. Maybe it's time to stop throwing soldiers like this at the front lines and go to a volunteer army?
More Shalit fallout: PFLP cell that planned to kidnap and ransom Israeli busted
The Israeli security forces have broken up a terror cell that planned to kidnap an Israeli to ransom in exchange for Popular Front for the Liberation of 'Palestine' leader Ahmed Saadat (pictured, center). Saadat was the leader of the terror cell that assassinated Tourism Minister Rechavam Zeevi in the Hyatt Hotel here in Jerusalem.
"Some of the members admitted to planning a kidnapping," the Shin Bet [Israel Security Agency]" added.
The
Agency named Ashraf Abu Aram, 26, and Muhammad Zeitoun, 26 - both from
Ramallah - as the two main suspects. Abu Aram allegedly founded the
cell.
"Abu Aram got in touch with a weapons dealer to try and obtain two handguns and an automatic rifle," the Shin Bet said.
The
suspects weighed carrying out a combined shooting and kidnapping attack
on IDF forces, with the shooting designed to create a distraction. A
second plan involved kidnapping an Israeli hitchhiker from the Jit
Junction in Samaria, the northern West Bank.
The kidnap victim would have been taken in a van to a hideout apartment in Kafr Akab, on the outskirts of Ramallah.
Both men have been charged with conspiracy to kidnap a soldier and host of other security charges.
Two additional suspects affiliated with the PFLP have been arrested for plotting disturbances against security forces.
After the 'success; of the Gilad Shalit kidnapping and ransom, no one should be surprised that the terror organizations would like to try it again.
The height of chutzpa: Noam Shalit criticizes Netanyahu for releasing terrorists!
If you need more proof that Noam Shalit is a scumbag, you now have it. Kalman Liebskind, an investigative reporter for Maariv, reports that Noam Shalit, who spent five years pressuring both the Olmert and Netanyahu governments to release more than 1,000 'Palestinian' terrorists in exchange for his kidnapped son, is now criticizing the Netanyahu government for releasing terrorists in a bid to gain a slot on the Labor party's Knesset list.
I will give you the original Hebrew for those who can read Hebrew, and then I will post an English translation (it's pretty short).
אם
תערך פעם באיזה שהוא מקום על הגלובוס תחרות האיש החצוף ביותר עלי אדמות,
נעם שליט יעמוד על הפודיום לבדו. רק לפני שנה שוחררו אל החופשי למעלה מאלף
מחבלים, בהם רבי מרצחים שטבחו בהמוני ישראלים, כדי לשחרר את בנו משבי
החמאס. הדיון בשאלה האם ללכת על העיסקה הזו היה קשה וכואב. גם מי שתמך בה,
נשך שפתיים אל מול תג המחיר הגבוה שנקבע. גם מי שהתנגד לה, התקשה לעמוד אל
מול כאבו של האב. בסופו של יום הכריע ראש הממשלה, בנימין נתניהו, מה
שהכריע.
בשבועות האחרונים מגלות זרועות הביטחון שלנו שרבים מהמשוחררים
כבר חזרו לטרור. עכשיו החליט נעם שליט להתמודד לכנסת. היום הוא הופיע
בוועידת מפלגת העבודה וחילק פלאיירים עם הטקסט הבא: "ממשלת נתניהו היא
ממשלה רעה למדינת ישראל, שפגעה בכל ההיבטים של החיים במדינה...היא פוגעת
בסיכוי שלנו לחיות בביטחון ושלום במדינה שלנו". אתם הבנתם? שליט מודאג מכך
שהממשלה ששחררה אלף מחבלים פוגעת בביטחון שלנו. אין מילים
And the English translation:
If one day, anywhere in the world, a competition is held for the most galling man on the face of the earth, Noam Shalit will stand on the stage alone. Just one year ago, more than 1,000 terrorists, including mass murderers who slaughtered many Israelis, were freed in exchange for his son from Hamas' prison. The debate over whether to make the exchange was difficult and painful. Even those who supported it bit their lips at the high price that was set. Even those who opposed it found it difficult to stand up to the father's pain. At the end of the day, Prime Minister Netanyahu decided as he did.
In recent weeks, our security forces have disclosed that many of those freed have already returned to terror. Now, Noam Shalit has decided to run for the Knesset. Today, he appeared at the Labor party central committee and distributed flyers with the following text: "The Netanyahu government is a bad government for the State of Israel, which has damaged all aspects of life in the country... it damages our chance to live in security and peace in our state." Do you understand? Shalit is concerned that the government that freed more than 1,000 terrorists is damaging our security. There are no words.
Channel 10 played excerpts from the interview, undertaken near the first
anniversary of Schalit's release by Hamas in a prisoner exchange from
his more than five-year captivity in the Gaza Strip. The full interview
will be broadcast in coming days, according to Channel 10.
Schalit,
who was an Israeli soldier when he was taken captive, said he played
board games with himself. "I used to play a lot of games on my own as
well. I used to make a ball out of a sock and throw it around all sorts
of places, like into a garbage can." He added that he also drew maps -
of the country, of his community and of his favorite places - so he
would not forget them. "I used to write, I used to make lists, I used to
follow sport events," he said.
Speaking of his release, Schalit
said he felt a sense of great "relief" when he crossed into Egypt and
that he was disconcerted by the "flurry" of people around him after only
seeing a few people for nearly six years. Schalit said he felt a lot of
"pressure" during the trip from where he was hidden to the Rafah border
before being set free.
"I was really tired and slept well," Schalit said of his return home. "Then I wandered around my house."
He
added wryly that when he was forced to be interviewed on Egyptian
television, the interviewer was the first woman he had seen since being
taken captive.
I don't think any of us envies what he went through, but unfortunately the manner of his release makes it much more likely that someone else will God forbid be kidnapped down the road.
For approximately the last three years of Gilad Shalit's captivity, his family lived in a protest tent outside the Prime Minister's residence in Jerusalem. No one ever suggested forcing them out.
Shortly after the terrorists for Gilad trade, a group of Ethiopians took over the site to protest against racism. Now, the City of Jerusalem wants to expel them. The Jerusalem district court has ordered the protesters to leave, and the Supreme Court is due to rule on an appeal within a few days. The protesters have rejected a 'compromise' that would require them to be out by Sunday - before next week's Independence Day.
Aspiring Knesset member Noam Shalit realizes it would be political poison (not to mention hypocritical) for him not to oppose the evacuation, so he showed up at last week's court hearing and said that the Ethiopians should be allowed to stay.
But it should be clear to everyone why the Shalits were allowed to stay and make a public scene for three years while the Ethiopians are being forced to leave. It's not that Gilad Shalit was an IDF soldier - the Ethiopians serve in the army too. It's that in Orwellian Israel, some Jewish citizens are more equal than others. The Shalits are part of the branja. The Ethiopians, who just started to arrive here in the mid-'80's , are not.
I'm not arguing substantively that the Ethiopians are right or wrong. Only that the way that they are being treated is certainly validating their claims.
Iran's FARS News reports that 'Palestinian' Minister for Captive Affairs Ataollah Abu Sabah complains that Israel's prisons are 'worse than the Nazis.'
Speaking told FNA, Sabah said that almost 4,400 Palestinian prisoners are incarcerated in Israeli jails, and added that those prisoners who are sentenced to long terms of imprisonment are kept in central prisons whose conditions are gravely inhume and terrible.
"These prisons lack sanitation and are overcrowded," he said, and added that Israel is using the harshest methods of suppression against Palestinian prisoners in these jails.
He added that conditions in Ketziot Prison, where many Palestinian political prisoners are held, are even harsher than the conditions tolerated by prisoners in the Nazi Germany.
Sabah added that prisoners in Ketziot are not safe from night torture.
Look at the pictures above and decide for yourselves whose prisons can best be described as 'worse than the Nazis.'
YNet reports that Gilad Shalit went on a hunger strike shortly before his release from Hamas captivity, and the fear that Shalit would not be worth anything to them dead led Hamas to compromise on the terrorists for Gilad trade.
An intelligence source said that "there were those in Hamas who feared that the extreme conditions under which Shalit was being held would mean they could not offer him the help he needed and he would die on them," and so they compromised over the details of the prisoner exchange deal.
The report also reveals that Shalit was injured from shrapnel during the kidnapping which just barely missed his vital organs. The wounds eventually healed.
Newly released details also reveal that for the most part Shalit's captors did not physically abuse him, other than beatings that did not leave any long lasting or permanent damage.
The news of Shalit's abduction led to a flurry of activity in Israel in a bid to find out which organizations were behind the attack and a great deal of effort was invested in trying to locate the place where Shalit was being held.
At a certain point Israel believed the intelligence efforts would bear fruit. Information that reached Israel claimed that the captive soldier was being kept in a northern Gaza house surrounded by a wall. Israel exerted many efforts in trying to find out exactly what was going on in the house and was even considering the possibility of a rescue mission.
Luckily, they found out that Iran and Hamas were "feeding" the information to Israeli intelligence: The house was in fact empty and booby trapped. The scheme set up by Iran and Hamas was to lure the Israeli rescue forces into the house and then blow it up with the forces inside.
...
The terrible disaster was averted but from that moment on, Israel had no idea of Shalit's whereabouts. The reason Israeli military and intelligence sources found it so difficult to find Shalit's location was because of the compartmentalizing on Hamas' part.
Shalit was guarded by four Hamas members who were brought in from abroad especially for the secret mission. The foreign operatives were not replaced at any time during Gilad's captivity. "The four guards basically sentenced themselves to the same conditions in which Gilad was being incarcerated," the Israeli intelligence source noted.
It's probably just as well that I don't write for the Washington Post. Looking at how they have publicly attacked fellow blogger Jennifer Rubin, who writes for them, for retweeting a blog post written by 'Bad Rachel' Abrams (whom I have had the privilege of meeting), you have to wonder what the thought process is over at WaPo. This is their ombudsman commenting on Jennifer's retweet.
But in this case Rubin told me that she did agree with Abrams. Rubin said that she admires Abrams, has quoted her a lot, thinks she’s an excellent writer and endorsed the sentiment behind the Abrams blog post. Rubin said, however, that she did not see it as a call to genocide against all Palestinians: “The post expressed an understandable desire for righteous vengeance against the kidnappers and human rights abusers of Gilad Shalit. It is a sentiment I share. If I were writing on The Washington Post Web site, I would not have used that language. . . but the sentiment underlying it — that the captors deserve the final penalty -- is one that I share.”
Abrams’s post is so full of dashes it’s hard to follow, but the subject of her run-on sentence does appear to be “captors” not Palestinians in general. The language is so over the top, though —“child-sacrificing savages,” “devil’s spawn,” “pimped out by their mothers,” “unmanned animals” — it’s easy to how some people might see it as an endorsement of genocide. Furthermore, other posts on Abrams’s blog also refer to Palestinians with a broad brush.
Rubin suggested that the letters I received denouncing her retweet were part of an “orchestrated campaign to get The Washington Post to fire a pro-Israel blogger.”
It is true that a lot of the letters did call for Rubin’s firing. I’ve received lots of letters objecting to her conservative views since I came here in March. Many of them call for her firing. Regular readers of the ombudsman will know that I defended Rubin back in July. I think The Post needs conservative voices to balance its many liberal ones.
It is also true that two groups did seem to be driving some of the reader reaction to the retweet. One was a Al-Akhbar English, a Middle East-focused Web site, where Max Blumenthal (son of journalist and Clinton White House aide Sidney Blumenthal) denounced the Abrams blog post and Rubin’s retweet and encouraged people to contact me. The other was J Street, a liberal American Jewish group frequently at odds with the conservative Emergency Committee for Israel. J Street denounced Abrams’s blog post as an “unhinged rant filled with incitement and hate speech.”
Sorry, but I hope that the IDF and the Mossad will hunt down and kill everyone who was involved with Shalit's kidnapping. Just like they did after the Munich Olympic massacre. And I see nothing wrong with saying so. (And yes, that's how I understood Rachel's post). Is the Post suggesting that we ought to forgive terrorists? South African minister Desmond Tutu - a notorious Israel hater - suggested this week that we ought to forgive the Nazis (may their name be obliterated). Does the Post agree with that sentiment too?
To most people, wishing for the death of terrorists is pretty non-controversial stuff. But then again, those people don't live in the bizarro world of the Washington Post's ombudsman.
Well, maybe. But what worries me about this is that the Post ombudsman admitted that he caved in to an orchestrated letter writing campaign by Leftist extremists Max Blumenthal and J Street - and he identified this as an orchestrated letter writing campaign. It's not a big step from publicly condemning Rubin to firing her, leaving the largest circulation newspaper in America's capital without a conservative voice.
Abu Mazen says he'll never recognize a Jewish state, kidnapping Shalit a good thing
Last week, our 'peace partner,' 'moderate' 'Palestinian' President Mahmoud AbbasAbu Mazen told Dream2 TV that he will never recognize a Jewish state, that negotiations have to be accompanied by force, and that it was a good thing that Hamas kidnapped Gilad Shalit.
Here's a transcript.
Mahmoud Abbas: "First of all, let me make something clear about the story of the 'Jewish state.'
"They started talking to me about the 'Jewish state' only two years ago, discussing it with me at every opportunity, every forum I went to – Jewish or non-Jewish – asking: 'What do you think about the "Jewish state"?' I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I will never recognize the Jewishness of the state, or a 'Jewish state.'" [...]
Interviewer: "Don't you think that it was the resistance that managed to liberate a thousand prisoners?
"Negotiations must always be accompanied by a measure of force. There can be no negotiations without resistance. This has been shown by the experience of people – in Ireland and all countries."
Mahmoud Abbas: "That's true, but our circumstances are different. We are not able to wage military resistance.
"Hamas kidnapped – or rather, captured – a soldier, and managed to keep him for five years, and that is a good thing.
"We don't deny it. On the contrary, it’s a good thing that on a small strip of land, 40 × 7 kilometers, they were able to keep him and hide him." [...]
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
