Conflict Blotter

Israeli PM Ehud Olmert’s decision to release 250 prisoners is no service to Abbas. The number is paltry compared with the 12,000 Palestinian prisoners currently languishing in Israeli jails. And why were only Fatah prisoners included in the release? It’s one thing to ignore Hamas for the time being, but what about the PFLP or the DFLP? This is hardly going to strengthen Abbas’ hand as a leader of all Palestinians at a time when the last thing he needs to do is alienate yet additional factions. I spoke with one Palestinian who said releasing 250 prisoners is like giving someone a falafel dinner when you owe him one million dollars.

Mustapha Barghouti and the former director of the Palestinian Prisoners lobby in Ramallah Khalida Jarar are both reportedly fuming over what they see as Olmert’s meager gesture.

Even though Hamas released the Gilad Shalit audio tape before Olmert’s announcement in Sharm, the two are related to some extent. Haaretz’s Yossi Melman wrote today that the decision to release the tape is a sign of weakness on Hamas’ part. Hezbollah, for example, known for their tough negotiating tactics with Israel, would never have provided proof of life without something in return.

Hamas is eager for a concrete victory now that it controls Gaza. Negotiations with the Israelis were effectively frozen after Egypt, which had been mediating the talks, pulled its envoys angrily out of Gaza after Hamas’ takeover, but the tape has given new momentum to popular sentiment in Israel that the government secure Shalit’s release whatever the cost.

Scoring a prisoner release of its own in exchange for Shalit would be a PR coup for Hamas, especially if they get significantly more prisoners released than Abbas, as seems likely. See, Hamas will say, we were right. The only way to deal with the Israelis is through force, because our Palestinian leadership (read Abbas) is totally impotent and a US/Israeli stooge.

Israeli media has reported that Olmert is willing to release 450 prisoners in exchange for Shalit, but that Hamas wants more. Yediot Aharanot reported today that Hamas offered weeks ago to free Shalit in return for the release of Hamas’s entire military infrastructure in the West Bank. “That was an unbearably high price,” the paper’s Nahum Barnea wrote. “It could bring the situation in the West Bank closer to the situation in Gaza.”