Israel to Free Prisoners to Obtain Video of Soldier - NYTimes.com

Israel to Free Prisoners to Obtain Video of Soldier - NYTimes.com: "Israel to Free Prisoners to Obtain Video of Soldier
By ISABEL KERSHNER

JERUSALEM — Israel said Wednesday it would release 20 Palestinian women from its jails in exchange for a videotape of a captured Israeli soldier that would prove that he is alive.

Cpl. Gilad Shalit was seized by the Islamic group Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups in 2006 in a cross-border raid and taken into Gaza.

The prisoner release offer, announced on Wednesday by the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was the first significant sign of progress in negotiations on Corporal Shalit since Mr. Netanyahu took office in March.

Israeli and Palestinian officials said the exchange would take place on Friday.

“Israel will receive updated and unequivocal proof of Gilad Shalit’s well-being and status,” Mr. Netanyahu’s office said in a statement, describing the deal as the result of an Egyptian initiative meant to build confidence ahead of the “decisive stages of negotiation” for Corporal Shalit’s release. The prime minister’s office added that the negotiations were “still expected to be long and arduous.”

In Gaza, Mahmoud Zahar, a senior Hamas official, said the deal was “small and symbolic.”

“We are offering a report explaining the situation of the soldier in return for the release of 20 women prisoners,” he said as he entered a Red Cross office in Gaza City on Wednesday.

According to a list issued by Israeli prison officials Wednesday, the women to be released were all due to finish their terms within two years, meaning that they were not convicted of serious offenses or would be close to release.

Mr. Zahar said the women were not long-term prisoners. He said they included four from Hamas; five from Fatah, the rival mainstream Palestinian group; three from the more extremist Islamic Jihad; and one from the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. He said the others were not affiliated with any group.

Hamas has demanded the release of a thousand f Palestinian security prisoners from Israeli jails in return for Corporal Shalit’s release. Many prisoners on the Hamas list have been convicted of deadly terrorist attacks.

Ehud Olmert, the prime minister when Corporal Shalit was seized, was under intense public pressure to resolve the issue before the end of his term, but intensive negotiations via Egyptian mediators failed to produce a conclusion.

Israeli officials said at the time that Israel had agreed to release some 325 prisoners from a list of 450 demanded by Hamas in the first stage of a deal. Israel also insisted that some of the would go into exile.

Mr. Netanyahu appointed a new Israeli chief negotiator, and the Egyptian mediation efforts were supplemented by German mediation.

Corporal Shalit, now 23, was last seen publicly being dragged alive into Gaza in 2006. A year later, Hamas released an audiotape of the soldier believed to be authentic; his family has also received at least two letters written in what family members said was his handwriting.

A videotape would be the first sign of life from him since Israel’s three-week invasion of Gaza which ended in mind-January.

Taghreed El-Khodary contributed reporting from Gaza."