Word: shalit
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...taking part in attacks on Israeli troops - she is by turns furious and woeful. She doesn't deny her son's actions; what almost all Israelis see as terrorism, she sees as justified resistance. But when asked about the parents of Corporal Gilad Shalit, the Israeli soldier held [an error occurred while processing this directive] captive by Palestinian militants since June 25, she is instantly empathetic. "We know Israelis love their children just as we do," she says softly. The Shalit family's love for Gilad is indeed palpable in the northern Israeli town of Hila, where his parents, Noam...
...elected Hamas as their government - and polls show its support has actually grown during the current showdown. But the financial chokehold and the rising chaos it provoked has clearly weakened the authority of both President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh. Haniyeh condemned the capture of Corporal Shalit, which surprised him as much as it surprised the Israelis, and demanded his safe return to Israel. Palestinian observers believe more radical elements in Hamas launched the operation that captured Shalit in part to undermine moves by Haniyeh and other pragmatists toward agreement with Abbas on pursuing a two-state...
...Still, when Secretary Rice talks of getting "back on track" once Hamas hands over Corporal Shalit, it's difficult to know what she means. There is currently no "track" involving Hamas, and no obvious incentive for movement to respond positively to her appeal. And the gunmen of Hamas appear to be out to show that even though Israel ignores the elected government, they can force it to bargain...
...outcome of the Shalit crisis may even further empower the radicals: Israel's Internal Security Minister Avi Dichter indicated Friday that Israel may be moving toward a prisoner swap - as demanded by Shalit's captors - in order to get its soldier home. That would be a massive victory for the hard-liners in Hamas - in the same way that Israel's withdrawal from Gaza without negotiating any agreements with the Palestinian leadership was taken on the street as vindication of the violent strategy of Hamas, which had not yet entered politics...
...Abbas and Haniyeh won't be the only losers if the crisis ends with a prisoner exchange. Israel, for all the violence it unleashed on Gaza in the wake of Shalit's capture, will have been seen in Palestinian eyes to have been humbled. And U.S. influence in the region is unlikely to be boosted...