Steven Plaut, on the other hand, is very sure about his position on the prisoner deal, and you know what that means. Listen, complexity is not a vice in this situation – this is the kind of stuff that gets written into ethics textbooks because we’re pretty sure that it’s structurally impossible to find an entirely consistent and satisfactory answer! The article is too filled with omissions, mischaracterizations, and outright factual inaccuracies for me to just identify a single, overriding flaw, and it is too marginal to be worth fisking. Let me just deal with a couple of things (the “blood on the hands” issue and the deterrence issue), because I’ve seen these come up in a couple other places:
My government decided to release nearly 450 murderers with blood on their hands in order to “buy” the release of the carcasses of three of my fellow citizens who were murdered by the Hizbollah after they had been kidnapped by it in a border incursion.
Factually incorrect: see here and here. Nobody released actually had blood on their hands. Any prisoners with blood on their hands are being held back for information about Ron Arad, and if releasing a murderer to get Ron Arad back is what has to be done, then maybe that’s what has to be done.
The agreement announced on Sunday, January 25, between Israel and the Hezbollah terrorist organisation is a further nail in the coffin of Israel’s deterrent power. — David Shalom
I have to admit that if I have any concern about this deal, it is in regards to Israel’s long-term deterrent and to the possibility that this deal may encourage Hezbollah or other terrorist organizations to carry out more kidnappings. On the other hand, Sharon was pretty clear that Israel would physically hunt down the next group of kidnappers. Of course, self-flagellators like Plaut or doomsayers like the Hatzofeh editorial staff will insist that Sharon is weak and that he’ll inevitably cave. I dunno – he’s not like Barak (or, I might hasten to remind Hatzofef and their allies, Bibi), ordering impotent helicopter attacks because he is too nerve-racked to take decisive action. The last few people who tested Sharon’s “one more time” warning are either dead or well into their third year calling foreign diplomats from the crumbling ruins of a certain converted former prison. That’s when they’re not busy worrying about getting expelled – again.
UPDATE: Yediot Aharonot agrees with me:
While the editors aver that “the exchange deal with Hizballah is… bad and flawed,” they add, “Nevertheless, it had to be carried out,”… no Israeli government could and would make a decision other than that which the Sharon government made; yes to the deal, with all the reservations. Not because it is the correct deal, but because rejecting it was out of the question.”
