Even as ceasefire proposals aimed at ensuring a long-term cessation of Israel’s brutal war on Gaza go through the motions of indirect exchange, a major sticking point remains the issue of high-profile Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.

Indeed, the fraught history of prisoner exchanges with Palestinians have always been perceived by the nuclear-capable entity as one of its cruellest dilemmas. 

The moral weight of needing to release its citizens from captivity has long collided with the hard calculus of its national security and deterrence. In 2011, Israel freed 1027 prisoners–including Yahya Sinwar–for the return of one captured soldier, Gilad Shalit. 

Yet even if many Israelis cheered that exchange deal at the time, just as many also feared it would embolden Hamas. Both were correct.

Now, amid negotiations over the Israelis held in Gaza since October 7th, 2023, Israel again faces calls to release the most sophisticated Palestinian prisoners in its jails. 

However, this time the stakes are immeasurably higher.

Hamas and its allies are not merely asking for the release of young stone-throwers or even the thousands of civilians detained randomly since Israel’s onslaught on Gaza began and for which is sitting Prime-Minister has been indicted for war crimes. 

They are instead asking for the release of men whose names are vividly etched in living Israeli memory as architects of some of the deadliest attacks against them since 1948.

Israel’s fears that releasing them would not........

© Middle East Monitor