15-Oct-14: Things we learned (or should have) during the last 3 years about dealing with terrorists

October 19, 2011: The convicted mass murderer who engineered the bombing
of the Sbarro pizza shop in Jerusalem arrives in Amman, Jordan, fresh from
her Israeli prison cell and about to embark on the high-profile life (continuing
until this very day) of a 'celebrity' murderer/terrorist [Image Source] 

In the next few days, three years will have passed since the consummation of the Shalit Deal. 

It's a theme to which we have returned often, here on our blog and other websites, on television and radio, in newspapers, via face-to-face meetings in far-away countries and here. We make no bones about it: that transaction, and the price Israel paid then and since, makes it a watershed, a learning moment. Tragically, the learning has been scant, and involves far too few public figures in this country. 

We do feel the Israeli public, which has gone through significant travails in these past three years, has undergone a significant change of heart away from supporting such trades. But clearly there is still much learning to be done.

Frimet Roth has a brief essay on the Times of Israel website, that went up in the last few minutes. Here's the first part of it.

Ten lessons the Shalit deal taught us   

FRIMET ROTH | Times of Israel | October 15, 2014

This week we mark the third anniversary of the Shalit Deal. On that day, October 18, 2011, my husband and I felt as though our child, Malki, murdered in the notorious Sbarro massacre of August 2001, was killed a second time. The anguish and torment we felt as we watched her released murderer, Ahlam Tamimi, triumphant and joyous, hug family and admirers celebrating her arrival at Amman airport were unbearable.  

How can that be compared to Malki’s actual murder? There are no expert psychological delineations of a normal reaction to such an experience. That’s because no other leader in the world has ever overturned 16 life sentences in one fell swoop to free a mass murderer, as prime minister Netanyahu did. No other leader freed scores of murderers and handed them back to their terror groups. No other leader trampled the rights of victims of terror the way he did. There are, therefore, no other instances of this torture to compare to ours. So please just take our word for it. Malki was indeed murdered twice.  

1. A stint in an Israeli prison rarely rehabilitates a terrorist. It punishes them and isolates them from bombs and missiles. But prison is where they belong for as long as our court deemed, just for our own and our children’s good. 

2. Terrorists who are freed from Israeli prison prematurely and return to terrorism are more dangerous than novices. This refutes the Shalit-camp contention that it’s immaterial whether terrorists remain in prison; there will always be a terrorist threat regardless, they say. But the fact is a released terrorist is the most lethal sort. 

3. Sending freed terrorists into exile does not render them harmless. They are equally capable of murdering while residing there as they would be in the West Bank or Gaza. Exile simply places them out of the reach of the IDF or other arms of Israeli security. Tamimi, the woman who engineered the massacre that killed my daughter, was “exiled” (in the government of Israel’s language) to the land in which she was born and raised, Jordan. Jordan is the very comfortable base from which she now travels and broadcasts freely throughout the Arab world, exhorting her audiences to respect and emulate the murderous actions of terrorists like herself...

The rest is at the Times of Israel. It makes some points worth sharing. If you have comments, please write them there. Also, please Tweet and Facebook it. We greatly appreciate the help of all who contribute to getting this message out as widely as possible.