the assurances given by the (very same) "defence expers"

Probably hamas's? I Would'nt put much Creadence in that?

look everyone wants Gilad home and no one wants more kidnappings or terrorism. I think it was an opportunity that we needed to grab while open, when indeed Hamas needed some credibility after Abbas UN adoration. Terrorists will try their things if so inclined regardless of who is in or out of prison. We can be stronger on the offense and now bomb Gaza with impunity if needed as Gilad will hopefully not be there.

B"H - With the erosion of the life sentence in Israel for odious and vicious crimes against innocent citizens doing their daily activity by a clear abuse of the presidential pardon, the fight for mandatory death penalty becomes an urgent action-item now.

Israel should start to treat every individual in Gaza with the same "hospitality" that Hamas treated Gilad Shalit with for over 5 years.

There are at least two or three major points which are wrong for Israel in the way the decision to free Palestinians prisoners was made. The most controversial is the decision itself. One can understand the position of the family & I would not be immune to their feeling if Shalit was my brother or my son. But the responsability of the government is not only the security & life of one man but the security & life of all citizens unless for political reasons it gives it up to please popular opinion & frees a large number of hardened extremists. The second very sticky point is negociating with Hamas. The Netanyahu administration claims it is the fault of Olmert who started it. But why did the current government continue on the same path? The third point ,once the decision to negociate has been made, is why accept such a large number of liberations in exchange for one man? This is only going to entice more kidnappings since with this kind of deal Hamas can hope to empty the jails with only 2 or 3 more hostages. Then what? Release the remaing top murderers & their political masterminds?

If this is what Israel defense officials really believe then Israel is in trouble....from within.

It is obvious that one soldier who never fired a shot at the enemy is more important than the hundreds of Israeli's that have been and in the future will be killed and maimed by many of the terrorists being released. Something is wrong with this picture.

To all those Shabak, Mossad, Zahal people responsible to find and retreive Gilaf Shalit from his uderground prison: You should ......resign. You had 5 years to find a soltion . Where were you all that time? What we got now is a pitiful 1000 for 1 prisoner exchange made possible by politicians just because you could`t find an alternative solution. Next time, and it surely it will come, next time, you Shabakniks, Mosadniks you should know that a second failure of yours will irreversibly degrade Israel`s international standing as a Mediterranean power. Never again.

Enormous gamble you've made. Good luck to ya.

line of self delusion not always red

red lines were crossed regardless os what some so called expert tells us. However, shalit had to be brought home alive after what olmert brought home 3 bodies from lebanon.And some of the hamas terror boys will try to kill again. What else is new. Israel should look for oportunities to eliminate the released individuals if they so much as sneeze the wrong way. no one should say a world about the shalits as they pressed to the ends of the world so bibi had to do it. But in future, if a soldier is taken hostage, israel has to immediately detain the key leaders of the state that took him like haniyeh zahar and musrr and their relatives or kaim and nasrollah and their relatives and hold them in a trade limbo.

When does incarcerated mean incarcerated???? Let em all out to kill some more. Just look the other way when they repeat the procedure against a Jew again. Just think if we released all the German Prisoners in WWII. They most surely would never repeat the offenses committed when they were put back into their units.

These are the same morons that stated that once we left Lebanon there would never be another attack. Of course they ignored the hundreds of thousands of attacks before we ever went into Lebanon to save the stupid Christians. There were the same idiots that stated that once we signed a peace treaty with Egypt that we would never be attacked from the Sinai again, and that we would be best of friends. Exactly when did later occur again, me memory isn't what it used to be. These were the exact same 'experts' that assured us that Arafat would use the weapons supplied by us to fight terrorists. Ignoring the fact that Arafat was support to fight himself. These were also the same 'experts' that told us how paranoid that we were about ethnically cleansing Gaza of the rightful owners for the Arabs. They said that not one rocket would ever fight Israel. Well I guess they were right 15,000 is not one. They are also attempting to get us to give the Golan to Assad, eastern Jerusalem to more terrorists, etc.

time. Secondly, forget going to the courts or the ministry of "justice". You lost before you start with them. No one in the government cares about the victims or their families. They only know how to offer a few cheap words of consolation at the victims funerals and spout the same lies about going after terrorists to avenge an attack. They refuse to hit the terrorist bases and their civilians. Only Israeli civilians are fair targets! We need the death penalty for all arab terrorism. And we need the death penalty for aiding terrorism. Those that approved the deal will be guilty of aiding terrorism.

The Shalit deal was a stupid deal which will cost Israeli lives. Ehud barak the Darling of the Clinton family supported this deal which would let hundreds of prisoners with blood on their hands out. Does anyone remember the founder of Hamas who ordered some of the suicide bombings Ahmed Yassin who was released as part of a prisoner deal in the 90's? I am beginning to have less and less confidence in the Israeli goverment defending not only Israel and Jews in Israel but Jews around the world. This goverment is beginning to be a laughing stock of the world. One Man is not worth the potential of hundreds of additional lives that will be lost because of this decision.

Who does Peri think he is fooling? Does he believe we were all born yesterday? Israel's firm policy for many years was not releasing prisoners with 'blood on their hands'. This is a violation of that principle in a very major way. The despicable murderers being released here, some of who may , God forbid, kill more Israelis should not have ever again seen the light of a free day. Red lines were crossed in a substantial and severe way.

Really, I wasn't aware that Israel had any 'red lines' anymore.

forgotten or forsaken with no hope of reunion with their families if captured. That is another significance of the Gilad Shalit trade for worthless vile Palestinian prisoners.

When Gaza was given to Hamas, the same arguments were heard. And where did that get us? When Lebanon was being given back, the same arguments were heard, and where did that get us? Truth is the truth is out and the deterrent built in 67 gone.