Video: First Pictures of Shalit Freed
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Shalit: I Was Told a Week Ago I Will Be Free-Gilad Shalit told Egyptian media he was told a week ago he would be freed. I was happy to hear it, but I was suspicious, he said.By Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu First Publish: 10/18/2011, 11:25 AM
Gilad Shalit told Egyptian media he was told a week ago he would be freed. I was happy to hear it, but I was suspicious, he said. I waited years, but I believed I would find myself free.He said the first thing he wants to do when he gets home is to be with my family and meet my friends and speak with them. I want to tell people about my experience.Despite his having been in captivity without communication with the outside world for more than five years, Egyptian media asked him difficult and loaded questions.Asked if the captivity and release gave him a stronger will, Shalit answered, A deal could have been arranged sooner.Questioned whether he will help campaign for the release of 4,000 more Palestinian prisoners languishing in Israeli jails, Shalit reŚ€lied:I will be happy if they will be freed and return to their homes if they do not return to terror.He expressed the hope that Israel’s freeing of 1,027 terrorists and security prisoners will help it make peace with the Palestinian Authority.IDF doctors examined Shalit before his return home, and he was confirmed to be in good and stable health.
Netanyahu is at Tel Nof Air Base-Gilad Shalit will be driven through the Kerem Shalom Crossing and taken to Tel Nof where he will meet his family.By Gil Ronen First Publish: 10/18/2011, 11:58 AM
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu arrived Tuesday morning at the Tel Nof Air Base near Rehovot.Netanyahu entered the room in which the Shalit family is waiting for its son and told the family: I am glad that we made it to this day. In a short time, Gilad will return to you.The prime minister told the family members that the process of returning Shalit was going forward without a hitch so far. At about 10:00 a.m. Netanyahu was reportedly in the situation room, along with Defense Minister Ehud Barak and the IDF Chief of Staff.Gilad Shalit will be driven through the Kerem Shalom Crossing, close to where he was abducted 5.5 years ago, and taken to Tel Nof, where he will meet his family.
EU to celebrate Shalit swap despite concerns
Today OCT 18,11 @ 08:04 By Andrew Rettman
The EU is set to cheer the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, expected on Tuesday (19 October), despite concerns it could pave the way for military strikes on Hamas and Iran.Hamas poster. The 25-year-old is to be reunited with his family after five years and four months of complete isolation (Photo: Tom Spender)According to plans negotiated by Egyptian, German and Israeli intelligence, Shalit, who was captured by Palestinian militant group Hamas five years ago, will be handed over to the Red Cross in Gaza before noon local time.The NGO will take him via the Rafah crossing point to a secure area in Egypt's Sinai peninsula for 15 to 20 minutes and then to Israel via the Kerem Shalom point. Israel will at each stage of the process release tranches of 477 Palestinian prisoners. A second set of 550 prisoners is to be freed in December.The deal was finalised by Egyptian security chief Murad Muwafi and the new head of Israeli military intelligence Yoram Cohen. But the blueprint for the handover was drawn up by Gerhard Conrad, currently the chief of staff in the German intelligence service, the BND.BND spokesman Dieter Arndt told EUobserver Conrad worked on the plan for the past two and a half years. Almost the whole draft of the contract was done by Conrad. It was a long term involvement, but the final glory belongs to Egypt alone, he said.Arndt noted that Conrad took off his BND hat for the work before returning to the service: It was a personal thing. He was not acting on behalf of the federal government of Germany or the BND, but on behalf of all sides, Israel and Hamas, for the whole time the negotiations were going on. EU governments are banned from negotiating with Hamas because it is on the union's blacklist of terrorist entities.
The EU last week endorsed the deal on humanitarian grounds. I warmly welcome the news that Gilad Shalit will soon be able to return home after five years of captivity, putting an end to the long ordeal that he and his family have endured, foreign relations chief Catherine Ashton said.An EU diplomat earlier told this website Shalit's release could help with EU endorsement of Palestine's bid to upgrade its UN status and reopen the question of delisiting Hamas from the terrorist register.But despite the atmosphere of good will, some commentators believe the Shalit swap spells trouble for the region.Speaking as someone who has been involved in these things [Israel-Hamas prisoner swaps] in the past, I don't think we are moving toward any kind of reconciliation between Israel and Hamas. What usually happens afterwards is that the Israeli government gives Hamas a whack to show that it's still strong. If I was Hamas, I wouldn't leave any of my top leaders out in the open after this, one former EU diplomat said.For his part, Israeli journalist Alex Fishman, reputed to have close ties to Israeli security chiefs, in an op-ed last week said the Shalit deal is designed to clear the desk of the Israeli government for a strike against Iran's alleged nuclear bomb facilities. The Europeans will be applauding us, and no less importantly it will boost the national consensus and the prime minister's image ahead of the next challenge [Iran],he wrote.Some recent developments on the international stage support Fishman's line.US President Barack Obama at the UN general assembly in September gave Israel carte blanche for action against security threats. The US and the EU have upped anti-Iran rhetoric by accusing it of helping Syria to kill protesters and by exposing an alleged plot to assassinate a Saudi diplomat in Washington. They have also backed the rebellion against Syrian leader Bashar Assad, Iran's main ally.Alon Ben-David, a senior Israeli defence journalist, cast doubt on the Shalit-Iran link, however.He said the US and the EU are planning to impose a new round of sanctions on Iran. If these do not stop Tehran's nuclear programme, the next opportunity for military action will come only when the weather improves in spring next year. Iran is an extremely serious issue. Whether Israel launches an operation against Iran has nothing to do with Shalit,he told EUobserver.Ben-David agreed that Israel is likely to strike Hamas after the Shalit swap to show who is boss. But he noted the new Egypt-Hamas-Israel mechanism bodes well: I don't think this will be used for anything political. But all parties have developed more trust. We have a new mechanism for negotiating humanitarian issues if there is a military clash.
Arabs Riot as Terrorists Are Freed-Hundreds of Palestinian Authority Arabs throw rocks at Israeli soldiers as terrorists are freed at a checkpoint. The IDF fired smoke bombs.By Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu First Publish: 10/18/2011, 11:59 AM
Hundreds of Palestinian Authority Arabs threw rocks at Israeli soldiers as terrorists were freed at the Betunia checkpoint. The IDF fired stun grenades, tear gas and smoke bombs to disperse the rioters.Most of the rioters carried Hamas and Islamic Jihad banners and arrived at the checkpoint to welcome approximately 100 terrorists and security prisoners who were among those being allowed to return to their homes in Judea and Samaria.The IDF did not anticipate a riot, and soldiers fired a heavy barrage of riot-dispersing weapons. At least one person was wounded.
Israel pardoned and freed 477 terrorists and prisoners early Tuesday in the first phase of the deal in which a total of 1,027 will be released as Gilad Shalit returned home after more than five years in captivity.Of the 477 terrorists released Tuesday, 132 are being allowed to return to Gaza, but one of them, Amna Muna, decided to remain in Egypt after her release rather than face likely revenge in Gaza for her brutal treatment of fellow inmates.Forty terrorists will be deported outside of Israel.
