Word: shalit
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Somewhere in that inhospitable landscape, Corporal Gilad Shalit, 19, a soldier in the Israeli army, awaited his fate last week. Abducted by Palestinian militants at an army post in Israel and smuggled into Gaza on June 25, he might not have known that his captivity had set off a furious Israeli campaign to try to save him--and in the process, propelled both sides to the brink of full-scale warfare. While surveillance drones buzzed overhead, some 7,000 troops, 80 Israeli tanks and 180 armored personnel carriers massed at the border with Gaza, territory Israel evacuated less than...
...sound barrier, producing thunderous sonic booms on the ground. Most shocking was Israel's destruction of all six transformers at Gaza's central power plant, cutting off electricity to 45% of the territory's inhabitants. Israeli officials insisted they took such measures to aid in the hunt for Shalit, but few Palestinians believed it. In their eyes, the Israeli assault on Gaza's basic infrastructure had less to do with finding the missing soldier than inflicting collective punishment. "We have learned from past experience that Israel uses the opportunity to implement scenarios and schemes it has," says Rafiq Husseini, chief...
...Shalit is released, Israeli officials have said repeatedly, the army will pull back. Still, it doesn't look good. Attempts to negotiate Shalit's release, assisted by Egyptian mediators, have been paralyzed by the absence of a clear hierarchy on the other side. Numerous Palestinian leaders, led by President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas' political leader, have been working to secure the soldier's release, but the militants holding Shalit apparently do not answer to them. Israeli officials are saying directions are coming from Damascus, from Hamas' leader in exile Khaled Meshal, who is pushing a much...
...Talks could still be ongoing, as many undoubtedly are praying for. But Israel is clearly preparing for action if they fail and trying to prevent the militants holding Shalit from moving him to another part of Gaza or outside the territory. On Wednesday, while the sonic booms continued, the Israeli Defense Forces began shelling Northern Gaza - a measure taken, officials said, to halt Qassam rocket fire from the area into Israel - and seemed poised to cross into the territory. The Israeli Air Force also buzzed the summer home of Syria's president, a brazen, none-too-subtle message conveying Israel...
...Israel has already made clear that if Corporal Gilad Shalit is killed, it will exact a terrible revenge on the Palestinian political leadership. It may even target Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, who has reportedly reached agreement with President Mahmoud Abbas to seek some form of a two-state solution, in response to international demands that Hamas recognize Israel. But it isn't Haniyeh and the Hamas leaders in government that are behind the kidnapping; Israel believes the perpetrators are hard-liners taking orders from exiled Hamas leaders in Syria, who oppose the reported shift towards moderation and compromise...