Four Years of Captivity for Gilad Shalit

[Palestinian]

Put there by courts

Hence the reason I said "and hundreds of them as administrative detainees". And some years there have been even over a thousand administrative detainees being held in Israeli prisons.

Also, there are nearly 1,500 military regulations that govern the West Bank and about 1,400 that govern the Gaza Strip. This leaves a very BROAD definition of "security". For example, according to one of the military orders, holding a flag or singing a nationalistic song is a hostile action. So basically a Palestinian can be imprisoned for any form of a political or public activity...

And as I said on average only about 2 to 4 Palestinians monthly are convicted of actually violating some kind of combat laws (since 2009 to present).

including free education, family visits, money and regular updates to the Red Cresent

Actually, the access to education in Israeli prisons is getting worse. In fact recently many prisoners were not permitted to do their exams, or even do their university studies. Even since 2009 prisoners were excluded from taking their exams. Thats including nearly 1,800 people.

And for the past 5 years, over 750 Palestinian prisoners have been denied any family visits. Then there are probably even more since Israel transfers the detainees into it's territory, (when under international law the detainee should be within the occupied territory) making it nearly impossible for prisoners to have family visits. In fact all visits from Gaza have been denied since 2007. And the majority of residents from West Bank have a very hard time even getting a short visit within Israel.

Medical care isn't very well provided either. There are 1,500 prisoners (at least a fourth of the prisoners), including 36 female prisoners and 350 children in need of health care which is denied them. Also, about 85% of the prisoners are subjects of torture... The torture there is even better delievered than the health care!

The Fourth Geneva Convention protects the Treatment of Prisoners. In fact, many international human rights organizations have found that Israel has violated nearly every article of the conventions, including treatment of the prisoners, process of detention and location of prisoners. So its not like Israel should be giving education, family visits, medical care etc to be kind. There are laws in which say the treatment of prisoners should be...

None of which has ever been granted to Gilad Shalit.

I haven't read too much on Gilad Shalit. All I know is your correct when you say that, and also the total abscence of information on him is just unacceptable.

[Mediocrates]

Personally and this only my own opinion, Gilad will never be released alive and there will never be allowed any access to him by any international body. I believe he should be declared KIA and all discussions should crease forever. This takes the silly notion of freeing convicted murderers by the dozens in exchange. Moreover this should be Israel's permanent policy no exceptions for anyone, forever. Hamas and Hezbollah wants to play hardball, ok then.

[Kachah]

Personally and this only my own opinion, Gilad will never be released alive and there will never be allowed any access to him by any international body. I believe he should be declared KIA .

Is there any recent proof of life? I've missed any info (if there has been any). And declaring him KIA can pave the way for an action of Thuderbolt style when at least a very clear message is sent to the Hamas creeps. In fact, taking senior Hamas hostages for prevention of kidnappings in the future might work well.
The way Israel handles it is simply unacceptable.

[farmboy]

A Jewish friend of mine from TA once suggested on another forum that PA prisoners should be taken out and shot, 10 each day untill Gilad was returned. I thought that was very harsh. Effective but harsh.

[vigilante]

Seems like discussion has virtually stopped since he was actually released. Speaking as someone who grew up in America and has just now read about the saga on wikipedia, the 1000:1 prisoner exchange including *intentional* child killers is just so... it's baffling, foreign, alien even. Personally I'm not quite sure if I agree or disagree with it, but that's not even the point. It's merely the widespread support for it is something one would never, ever see in America, amongst the liberals or conservatives. It's simple pragmatism... I think we would ask ourselves, would the release of so many prisoners likely result in more American deaths? Even just one or two? If the answer is yes, the math doesn't add up and we would not have negotiated.

Sounds like most people around here were against the deal, but I'm interested in the other 4 (out of 5) Israelis that were for it. What is this crucial aspect of the Israeli (Jewish?) soul I am missing? Some kind of unshakable focus on the present instead of the nebulous future? (We're all guilty of this, but it's hard for me to think of an American example anywhere quite so extreme.) An attempt to set a contrasting example showing their respect for life? Faith in the IDF/Mossad to prevent the former prisoners from mounting new attacks? Religious arguments? (I'm not up on the details but given what I know I would *assume* that burial does not affect status in the world to come, and I would also assume that Rabbinical jurisprudence provides for something if a body is never recovered.) Respect for the Palestinian cause (or at least respect for much of the rest of the world's respect for it) to the point where someone like Fuad Muhammad Abdulhadi Amrin is considered a freedom fighter?

Speaking as a curious American, I think this merits its own thread, but I'm new so will refrain from starting one.