Israeli leadership must be capable of setting boundaries
Analysis: While Israel is known for its efforts to rescue citizens in life-threatening situations around the world, it's completely different when people are voluntarily taken captive and a terror organization wants murderers freed in return for their release.
We have created a distorted social ethos which is incapable of setting boundaries and clearly determining where the state's commitment to one of its citizens, who is in a state of distress and whose life is in danger, begins and ends.
The only serious attempt to create a logical mechanism for curbing this conditioned reflex – in the form of the Shamgar Committee – is crashing in its very first test, in light of the disappearance of Abera Mengistu and a member of the Bedouin community – two people who reached the Gaza Strip out of their own free will, while breaking the law and jeopardizing the State of Israel's interests.
Justice Meir Shamgar's committee, which submitted its recommendations on the future handling of prisoner release negotiations to the government in 2012, tried to create a "roadmap" on the issue and indicated four degrees of the state's commitment to its citizens.
The highest degree is of a soldier who has been taken captive during an operation activity. Here the state has an absolute commitment to release him. The committee does not use the term "at all costs," but it is clear that the state is willing to pay heavy prices. This is the highest degree as it involves people who were sent by the state and who were hurt during their mission.
The second degree describes an Israeli who is taken captive following a terror attack. Here too, the State of Israel should be very committed to releasing him. In both cases, the committee discusses reasonable prices to be paid as part of negotiations. It is implying that in the Jibril and Shalit deals, the Israeli society paid unreasonable prices.
The third degree describes an Israeli citizen who accidentally crossed the border and was captured by the enemy. Here too, the state isn't shaking off its responsibility – but its commitment is not at the same level as in the first two degrees.
The fourth degree is relevant to the current case: Israelis who crossed the border and turned themselves over to the enemy out of their own free will. Here the suggested governmental handling is humanitarian-based: The Foreign Ministry, international organizations, etc. It does not involve negotiations or a price which will harm Israeli interests.
In all four degrees, the committee rules, secrecy is a necessary condition for successfully handling the case. The committee also recommends a number of "obstacles" which will neutralize, as much as possible, any political pressure on the prime minister. The person who will actively handle the negotiations and the family, for example, will be the defense minister rather than the prime minister; and any move will only be carried out after a unanimous cabinet decision.
In the current case, Colonel (res.) Lior Lotan is in charge of the negotiations and of the families on behalf of the prime minister, not on behalf of the defense minister, and the cabinet is excluded. This stands as further proof that the Shamgar recommendations have not been accepted, and that the decisions are not driven by logic or a national interest – but by politics, an ethos and uncalculated responses.
The closest case to the current affair is the Tannenbaum affair. Former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon treated Elhanan Tannenbaum as a Sayeret Matkal commander who had been taken captive by Hezbollah, and that raised questions and personal, despicable, accusations against him. The argument that there was a fear that Tannenbaum would reveal secrets, and therefore he had to be rescued as soon as possible, did not hold water either in light of findings obtained by information security officials who were involved in the negotiations. Sharon simply sanctified the ethos that any Jew should be released from captivity, even if he is a criminal.
The efforts made by the State of Israel to rescue Israelis in life-threatening situations around the world – landslides, jungles and earthquakes – are a glorious chapter. The Foreign Ministry even takes care, secretly, of Israelis who have been jailed for serious offenses. But in these cases the state is not required to pay with interests which are crucial to its existence and put its citizens' lives in risk.
This is not similar to a situation in which people are voluntarily taken captive and a terror organization demands that the State of Israel free murderers in return for their release. Here we need a leadership to set the boundaries.
But the moment the Mengistu story was revealed, the affair turned from a humanitarian incident into a strategic incident, fueled with ethnic feelings of discrimination, no matter how justified they may be.
At first, the Prime Minister's Office made a pathetic attempt to convey that it is just a tactical event, and the announcement about Mengistu's absence came out of the working ranks: The coordinator of the government's activities in the territories. But Benjamin Netanyahu's political senses quickly led him to the Mengistu family's home.
In the next stage, we'll witness pressures from organizations, the Ethiopian community's representatives, lobbyists and PR agents, which will cause the prime minister to sit down – if he fails to stop the drift – and hold prisoner release negotiations with Hamas.
