Middle East Peace Notes

Gilad Shalit’s release shows Israelis as the big family they are, with so many regarding Shalit as if he were their own son. It also shows how achingly they want Jonathan Pollard to go free, and the agony of so many who lost their loved ones to the swapped prisoners. But Haaretz always brings out the complexities of the conflict in both of the sides’ narratives.

And so on the other side, even after the exchange, Israel will hold thousands of Palestinian prisoners (some for as long as 30 years ) in jail.

And yet in order to help bring both sides – with their so profoundly divergent narratives – closer to peace, how calamitous it is to leave in jail Marwan Barghouti, perhaps the one Palestinian leader able to unite the divided Palestinians behind an effective peace agreement.

If only Franz Kafka could still be here he would surely put this in one of his stories.

James Adler