Prisoner exchange becomes political dance

After five-and-a-half years in captivity, Shalit was released by Hamas militants and transferred across the Gaza border into Egypt yesterday in a carefully orchestrated political dance.

The Palestinian prisoners, who included dozens of people who had been serving life sentences for deadly attacks, were returning to heroes’ welcomes, while dozens of people prepared a joyous homecoming in Shalit’s tiny hometown in northern Israel.

“Until we see him, we are following with concern and anticipation,” said Shalit’s father, Noam, at an air base inside Israel where his family was waiting to be reunited with him. Noam Shalit has become a ubiquitous figure in Israel since his son’s capture and led a massive campaign to press the government into bringing the 25-year-old home.

The Egyptian- and German-brokered deal capped a five-and-a-half-year saga that has seen multiple Israeli military offensives in Gaza, an Israeli blockade on the territory and numerous rounds of failed negotiations.

The operation got under way early yesterday as Hamas moved Shalit across Gaza’s border with Egypt, while Israel simultaneously began freeing the Palestinian prisoners. By mid-morning, Mahmoud Zahar, a Hamas leader in Gaza, said his group was no longer holding the soldier who had been captured in June 2006 by militants who tunnelled into Israel and snatched him from his tank.

Hamas’s Al-Aqsa TV reported that a high-level Hamas delegation had arrived on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing with Gaza to hand over Shalit and to greet the returning prisoners.

Before he was flown to an Israel air base to be reunited with his parents, Shalit spoke to Egyptian TV. The gaunt, sallow and uncomfortable looking Shalit appeared to struggle to speak at times, and his breathing was noticeably laboured as he awkwardly answered questions

Wearing a black baseball hat and grey shirt, he was seen for the first time emerging from a pick-up truck and turned over to Egyptian mediators by a gang of top Hamas militants.

Shalit, still escorted by Hamas gunmen, was then taken to a border crossing, where an Egyptian TV crew waited to interview him before he was finally sent into Israel.

Stumbling over his words, he spoke of missing his family and friends, said he had feared he would remain in captivity “many more years” and had worried the deal would fall through after learning of it last week.

“Of course I missed my family. I missed friends, meeting people, to talk to people, and not to sit all day, to do the same things,” he said.

Later, video released by the Israeli military showed the weak Shalit being helped into an army jeep after crossing the border, and walking gingerly down some steps as he exited a military caravan in a fresh army uniform.

Military officials said a physical exam had found him to be in “good” condition, though he showed signs of malnutrition and lack of exposure to the sun.

Shalit was then flown to an air base in central Israel, where he looked shocked by the welcome by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before being reunited with his family.

He was later flown home to the small town of Mitzpe Hila where thousands took to the streets to welcome him back.

Mr Netanyahu issued a warning to the freed militants saying that any who returned to terror would “be held accountable”.

Those concerns were emphasises with comments by Palestinian prisoners and demonstrators for more soldier kidnappings to bring home the thousands of Palestinians still in Israeli prisons.

When the exchange is complete, 477 Palestinians held in Israeli jails, including 27 women, will have been released, several of them after decades behind bars.

More than 200 prisoners, originally from the West Bank, will be sent to the fenced-off Gaza Strip and about 40 will be deported to Syria, Qatar, Turkey and Jordan. Another 550 prisoners should be released in two months’ time.

The exchange involved a delicate series of staged releases, each triggering the next, supervised by the Red Cross and Egyptian officials.