Though Gilad Shalit and the negotiations for trading up to 1,000 terrorists for his release are not currently headline news, efforts continue to be made to ensure that as few as possible terrorists, if any, are actually freed.
Lt.-Col. (ret.) Meir Indor, who was himself wounded in battle to capture terrorists, is heading a group whose goal is “to thwart the efforts of Hamas to secure the release of over 1,000 terrorists from Israeli prisons.”
He says that his organization can justly be called “The Committee on Behalf of the IDF’s Elite Commando Units,” in that it does similar work in preventing terrorists from attacking innocent Israelis.
“We currently have an opportunity,” Indor says, “to make substantial progress in the public eye, in the Knesset, and other government circles, which all add pressure on the Prime Minister not to cave in to the Hamas demands. Each of our activities in this campaign serves to minimize the number of terrorists that may be released.”
“What immense and life-threatening efforts went into capturing these terrorists! How can we simply allow them to walk free out of prison?”
Indor is confident that his work has been productive: “So far, our campaign has helped to forestall pending swaps, and keep terrorists in jail – and in this way, it is just like the work of our most elite commando units.”
Of late, several IDF commanders and officers have joined the campaign, notably, Col. Moshe Hager, ,a former combat officer who now heads the Council of Pre-Military Yeshiva Academies; Col. Geva Rapp, who served as Deputy Commander of the IDF ground forces during Operation Cast Lead; Lt.-Col. Dan Sion, a former air formation commander; Lt.-Gen. Amaztia Chen, former commander in the legendary Shaked Commando Unit; and Col. Shmuel Paz.
Sion recently said that the release of terrorists is a “national catastrophe, a genuine danger, and a tremendously grave ethical wrong.”
“As a former commander in an anti-terror squad, and as the founder of Volunteers For Israel with Rabbi Yehuda Hazani,” Indor says, “I know first-hand that the efforts of our victimized families is a great aid to the IDF, as well as an honor to the memory of their beloved. Their work actually saves soldiers from having to risk their lives recapturing released terrorists, and insures that the self-sacrifice of the scores of soldiers who risked themselves night after night to imprison these murderers will not be in vain simply because of some unjust and dangerous mass release.”
“In a very real sense,” Indor concludes, “you could call our work, ‘The Committee on Behalf of Tzahal’s Elite Commando Units.’”