A Deal Any Terrorist Could Love

Lebanon is throwing a huge party today, and the hero of the hour is a man who killed a 4-year-old girl, her father and an Israeli policeman.

Samir Kuntar, a onetime Palestine Liberation Front operative who led the nighttime attack on the Israeli family in Nahariya back in 1979, was to be released by Israel today. The Lebanese are also receiving four Hezbollah fighters, as well as bragging rights and the makings of a fiesta to feature a rousing address by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. In the following days, Israel will release an unannounced number of Palestinian prisoners.

In return, Israel will most likely get two bodies.

Last month, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said that intelligence indicated soldiers Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser were dead.

And yet, the exchange was ratified by Israel’s Cabinet on Tuesday.

Hezbollah officials are lauding the characteristically lopsided exchange – a tad more fair than 1985′s swap of 1,150 Lebanese and Palestinian prisoners for three captured Israelis – as an “official admission of defeat” and a “humiliating failure” for Israel.

This is a deal Israel should have never accepted. Not only does this put the country’s own people in danger – like Gilad Shalit, still held hostage by Hamas – but empowers those who would exploit the high value placed on life by Western nations to further their jihad. It’s admirable that Israel wants to bring its dead home, but the price paid by the living may be too high.

Originally published by Rocky Mountain News.

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