Feb 10 2025
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Q. Your title reads like a bizarre stream of consciousness . . .
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A. It was quite a week. Every event (Gaza), bombastic statement (Trump), or low-key yet momentous mass prisoner release by Israel called up a troublesome association from the past. Even the comparisons of freed Israeli hostages to Nazi camp survivors, while historically problematic, were understandable to anyone who knows the US Army photos of Buchenwald and Bergen Belsen survivors from 1945.
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Q. Perhaps you can start with the Israeli release of Palestinian prisoners. That got the least media attention.
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A. Every time we see three or four Israeli hostages released by Hamas after being paraded before a ludicrous terrorist pseudo-tribunal, with Red Cross participation and a mass Gazan audience, Israel responds by releasing over 100 (183 on Saturday) convicted or recently captured Palestinian terrorists from its jails--with minimal ceremony and fanfare.
There are several reasons for Israel to downplay its weekly release of Palestinian prisoners. First, it is extremely unpopular among Israelis, who are well aware that they are likely setting free the next Yahya Sinwar, the next Hamas or Islamic Jihad suicide bomber.
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Shin Bet statistics show that around 12 percent of Palestinian terrorists who are convicted and later released by Israel are terrorism recidivists. Recall that Sinwar, the Hamas leader who orchestrated the October 7 attack on Israel, was released in 2011 as part of the deal for captured IDF soldier Gilad Shalit.
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Second, Hamas quite understandably trumpets the release by Israel of its incarcerated Palestinian terrorists and fighters--some, frankly, also looking emaciated and abused--as a victory. The price Hamas extracts from Israel for a single Israeli--dozens of terrorists--is indeed mind-boggling in the annals of prisoner exchanges. Compare for example to Russians and Ukrainians, whose POW exchanges are roughly one-on-one.
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Is one Israeli really the equivalent of dozens or even scores of Palestinians, some of them mass murderers? At a certain philosophical level there is something insulting here to both sides. Israel, for its part, has no need to help Palestinians celebrate. Indeed, the ceremonies Hamas choreographs in the Strip on Saturdays, with emaciated Israelis thanking their tormentors, are designed to play up Hamas’s ‘victory’ and obvious ongoing control of the Strip and, correspondingly, humiliate Israel.
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Releasing terrorists in exchange for emaciated Israelis is one primary price that Israel is paying for the sins of October 7, 2023 that are widely attributed to the leadership under Netanyahu and the security establishment. The Netanyahu government is not comfortable reminding Israelis of that, either.
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Yossi Alpher's Death Tango: Ariel Sharon, Yasser Arafat and Three Fateful Days in March
"Anyone seeking to understand how Israelis and Palestinians traded the hopes of Oslo for something approaching hopelessness is well-advised to read this book. With penetrating analysis and elegant prose, Yossi Alpher has told the gripping story of three days nearly two decades ago that continue to haunt would-be peacemakers. Yossi’s faithful readers will not be disappointed with his latest effort."
Ambassador Frederic C. Hof, Bard College
"A riveting account of the crucial days in March 2002 when the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was profoundly changed for the worse. The peace camp has never recovered from those wrenching days, and we live now without any hope of a just settlement. Alpher is a highly respected expert who has spent decades studying this conflict from both sides."
Bruce Riedel, Director of the Brookings Intelligence Project
"A critical assessment of a key period in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict never before presented in such detail. The best and most capable players at the executive and political levels proved unable to forge any resolution, final or partial, because both parties continued to maintain an insurmountable gulf between themselves. This is a MUST read for anyone daring to tackle the future of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and of Israel-Arab relations in general."
Efraim Halevy, former Head of the Mossad (1998-2002)
Oraib Khader and Avi Bar-On are youngish Palestinian and Israeli bachelors with security experience, readiness to do business with one another, a shared fondness for women and money, and total cynicism about the lack of peace between their two peoples.
Oraib and Avi can never become true friends: the cultural and political gaps are too wide. But as they confront a failed peace process and a bleak peace future, they readily become business partners: shady business that exploits a lot of naïve international peace aspirations.
As Oraib sums up on a visit to Sarpsborg, Norway, where the ultimately-failed Oslo peace talks were held, “There is a lesson here for those who still doggedly and hopelessly pursue a two-state solution in the Middle East. Get smart. Get out of the Israeli-Palestinian peace business. Step back and let the Jews and Arabs screw one another while making money.”