What is in it for Israel:
The current peace plan, known as the road map, does not require Israel to free prisoners. But Mr. Abbas has made releasing Palestinians jailed by the Israelis a top priority, and Israel says it wants to strengthen Mr. Abbas’s position.
Instead of nudging the negotiations forward, though, the prisoner issue has become a leading point of contention. Palestinians say the Israelis are giving far too little, and some rightist Israelis accuse their government of giving too much.
Palestinian factions are threatening to call off a month-old truce if Israel does not make concessions.
Other than making Abbas more legit, why should they free more than the 350 they have offered?
Barney Gumble
“Other than making Abbas more legit, why should they free more than the 350 they have offered?”
The palestinians consider them prisoners of war.
Eric SIvula
So if I blow up a bus full of women and schoolchildren, will I be a Palestinian Prisoner of War too? Or do the women and children have to be Jewish?
Barney Gumble
You still owe me a book report on the massive allied bombing of Hiroshima, Error-ic.
Pauly
Wow – did you just equate the Hiroshima atomic bomb to religious terrorism?
Andrew Lazarus
Well, this is a pretty delicate dance.
That really is it. One of the problems of the Oslo “process” is that average Palestinians actually saw a WORSENING of their situation. Settlement construction proceeded at an increased pace, and most although not quite all of the economic possibilities were swallowed by Arafat graft. Needless to say, the Palestinian political situation was far from democratic, and indeed this was one of the points in bringing the PLO in, that they could use undemocratic means to squelch Hamas and Islamic Jihad. (And indeed, when it suited their purposes, they did.)
Against this historical background, Abu Mazen doesn’t have the firepower to repeat the force-based squelching of terror that occurred in the early 1990s. He’s going to have to present more carrot, in the form of Israeli concessions, and hope this gives him wnough stick to outnumber the radicals. I’m not at all sure this will work, but it’s better than nothing. And since Sharon is very slow on making territorial concessions over the settlements, prisoner release and some economic liberalizations that have already taken place, is the only way of creating any sort of positive facts on the ground. Frankly, if Sharon dismantled more of the open-air lunatic asylums masquerading as settlements, he wouldn’t have to release as many prisoners.