Aviva Shalit, whose son Gilad was abducted by the Hamas terror organization, said Wednesday that her family is “very wary” of the right-wing government being formed, and that “it will take them time to learn the subject matter and establish their stand. It could be a matter of days and months, but from Gilad’s point of view that is an eternity,” she told Army Radio.
Gilad’s father Noam spoke with the family of Ron Arad, an IAF copilot who was taken captive by in Lebanon 1986 and is now presumed dead. The Arads visited the Shalits’ tent and according to Noam Shalit, told him that changes in governments made things more difficult for them when they were struggling on behalf of Ron, and that “the new governments never brought Ron back.”
Gilad Shalit has been held by Hamas for almost 1,000 days, without receiving Red Cross visits. His family and supporters set up a protest tent outside the Prime Minister’s residence on Sunday, in the hope of pressuring Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to carry out a swap with Hamas that would bring their son home, in the weeks that remain before Olmert leaves office.
Noam Shalit and Gilad’s grandfather, Tzvi, met with the Prime Minister’s wife, Aliza Olmert, Tuesday. She told them, "I identify with you and with your struggle, and if I hadn’t witnessed first-hand the intensive efforts that are made to bring Gilad back, I would have probably joined you in the protest tent.”
The chairwoman of Na'amat, Talia Livni, joined the campaign for Shalit said Wednesday. She said in a message to Ehud Olmert: "I beseech you on behalf of the mothers in Israel: save Gilad Shalit now. No price is too high for the lives of our sons, we all feel the pain of Aviva Shalit's silent tears." Na'amat is Israel's largest organization for women.
In 2000, a campaign by the "Four Mothers" group used similar matriarchal discourse to pressure then-PM Ehud Barak to dismantle Israel's security zone in southern Lebanon. The area vacated by the IDF was then seized by Hizbullah.
Maj.-Gen. (res.) Aharon Ze’evi-Farkash commented Wednesday on the Shalits’ protest tent and the counter-protest tent that had been set up opposite it by parents of terror victims who oppose the release of terrorists.
Speaking at a conference in Haifa’s Technion, Ze’evi-Farkash said: “The Shalit family’s tent, and the counter-protests by families of terror victims, are a painful and inhuman sight – one which results from weakness of leadership.”
“The citizens understand [that the government is weak] and that is why they act on their own,” Ze’evi explained.