Mrs. Shachor of Jerusalem, speaking with Arutz-7's Hebrew newsmagazine, says her plight is much easier to bear than that of mothers of captive soldiers. "My son was taken from me, and I know he will never return," she said. "But to sit at home and to worry and think, day after day, what is happening to my son, and what types of tortures is he going through, and if he is able to withstand them, and what type of person will they return to me, if at all - to judge such parents is very difficult, and I would not want to be in their place for one second."



"But on the other hand, if we release terrorists, they simply return and commit more attacks, for there is nothing to deter them. They sit in prison, get fatter and bigger, graduate high school, and then an Israeli soldier is kidnapped and the government has pity on his parents and the terrorists are released. This is what happens time and again."



A possible solution, Mrs. Shachor says, is for Israel to hand down death sentences for terrorist murderers. "This would leave Israel without negotiating cards, and then maybe they'll have no reason to kidnap soldiers."



Uri Shachor and his friend Ohad Bachrach of Beit El were murdered in the summer of 1995 while hiking in the Wadi Kelt area near Jericho.



"This is such a difficult issue," Mrs. Shachor said, "that the parents are not the ones who should be consulted. The government has to make the decisions. Prime Minister Olmert said, at the beginning of the war, that there would be no negotiations for the release of terrorists, and he must therefore be good to his word - because in the end, one of the sides will give in. Unfortunately, the other side usually has more patience than we do... We need leaders who are courageous and who think ahead, [but] I don't see such leaders today."