Posted on 01/04/2007 7:25:03 AM PST by Alouette
Ahead of the much-publicized summit between Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Thursday afternoon that was due to focus, among other issues, on captured IDF solider Cpl. Gilad Shalit's release, a senior Hamas official said his group was ready to give Israel a videotape of the soldier if it agreed to release Palestinian women prisoners and other detainees.
Moussa Abu Marzouk, deputy head of Hamas' political bureau in Damascus, said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press that Shalit was alive.
He said his group would be willing to trade the videotape for the freedom of "Palestinian women and a considerable number of detainees." He did not give a specific figure.
Abu Marzuk said the demand was "modest in light of the high price Palestinian people have paid and the collective punishment they have faced by Israel following the capture of the solider."
A main sticking point in the prisoner exchange negotiations were Hamas's reported insistence on choosing the prisoners to be freed among about 8,000. With few exceptions, Israel has refused to free Palestinians who played active parts in attacks that killed Israelis.
Shalit was captured in a cross-border raid on an Israeli army post in June. Two other soldiers were killed. The raid set off five months of violence in Gaza, and with the soldier in captivity.
Bringing Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf countries more firmly into the region's "moderate camp" to act as a bulwark against Syria and Iran is expected to be one of the focuses of Olmert's talks with Mubarak Thursday in Sharm e-Sheikh, Israeli diplomatic sources said Wednesday night.
Olmert is scheduled to fly to Sharm Thursday afternoon to meet with Mubarak, where the issue of Shalit's release will also be a focus of the discussions. The two leaders last met in June in Egypt.
But despite persistent reports in the Arab press, Israeli officials warned against expectations that Mubarak and Olmert would make any dramatic announcements regarding Shalit or a Palestinian prisoner release. Hamas leaders continued to insist Wednesday that a deal was close at hand, claiming that Israel had agreed to release hundreds of prisoners, while Israeli officials denied any deal was close.
On Wednesday night, Ahmed Youssef, political advisor to Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, said that Egyptian Intelligence Chief Omar Suleiman had transmitted a new proposed deal to Haniyeh in Saudi Arabia to secure the release of Shalit and that Hamas was discussing the proposal.
Israel Radio reported that Youssef told the Palestinian news agency, Ma'an, that the contentious issue between the two sides was the number of Palestinian prisoners to be released by Israel. Yossef said that Israel was now prepared to release about one third of the number being demanded by Palestinians.
Youssef expressed hope that Israel would relent and raise the number of prisoners to be freed with Egyptian mediation.
He claimed that Israel had agreed to release 200 prisoners who had been sentenced to long prison terms, including senior officials from Hamas and other Palestinian factions.
PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas was also discussing the issue of Shalit's release with an Egyptian delegation in Gaza on Wednesday night.
Wednesday's renewed clashes between Hamas and Fatah were also expected to arise in the Sharm meetings between Olmert and Mubarak, with the prime minister - according to diplomatic officials - interested in hearing the Egyptians' take on the situation inside Gaza, especially since Cairo has representatives inside the Gaza Strip who talk to both sides.
Regarding the co-opting of Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf countries into a regional moderate camp, which now includes Egypt and Jordan, Israeli officials said there was likely to be a discussion of ways to cooperate to reduce the danger to the region of the type of Shiite extremism coming out of Iran and currently threatening Lebanon.
Mubarak is expected to brief Olmert on what he thinks Israel needed to do to bring Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf countries on board to push the diplomatic process with the Palestinians forward.
Mubarak is also expected to urge Olmert to look favorably on the recent overtures from Syria. According to Israeli assessments, the Egyptians believe that such a move could help pull the Syrians out of Iran's orbit.
Olmert is also expected to brief Mubarak on his meeting last month with Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas, and discuss a number of issues that were brought up there, including the release of PA tax revenue and the lifting of West Bank roadblocks. Olmert will also likely raise the issue of arms smuggling from Egypt into Gaza, and likely repeat Israel's frequent calls to the Egyptians to take more effective action to stop the smuggling.
Warning! This is a high-volume ping list.
Hey Olmert try to bargain him down, tell him you'll accept a crayon drawing so you don't have to release as many terrorists.
Hamas had nothing to do with the kidnapping, of course, but they just happen to have this video. . . .
Now that we've seen Olmert in action for a while, I bet he'll accept. It's just his kind of deal.
a deal only Jimmuh C could love.
This is Scrappleface, right? Right?
It ought to be. Israel is out-Chamberlaining Chamberlain.
I'll given Israel tapes of the entire first season of Gilligan's Island if they keep the terrorists in jail. Can Hamas top that?
ROFL! Oh wait, this is not supposed to be a joke. /sarc
We get a video of shalit and we send them a video of Saddam
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