'Lebanon got a plump prisoner, we got bones in plastic bags'

[notfullofit]

Published: 07.27.08, 12:45 / Israel News

A week has gone by since the implementation of the prisoner swap deal between Israel and Hizbullah, but the winds have not yet died down in Lebanon and the Middle East. Most of the Lebanese reactions commend Hassan Nasrallah and his organization, but a select few have uttered criticisms without reprieve.

One of those critical voices comes from Kuwait, a country that has despised Hizbullah ever since one of the organization's leaders, Imad Mugniyah, was involved in the abduction of a Kuwaiti plane in 1986, which killed two passengers.

Fouad al-Hashem, a columnist for the Kuwaiti daily Al-Watan, wrote that Lebanon should consider itself lucky to be blessed with a neighbor such as Israel, rather than Iraq, for example. "Samir Kuntar lived in Israeli prisons for 29 years," al-Hashem wrote.


"No one cut off his ears, tore out his fingernails, or raped him. He ate three meals a day, watched television, and read newspapers. He was even allowed to study at one of Israel's open universities, where he received an academic degree."

The columnist continued, "Pictures published following his release testify to his health. Now he can begin his new life by going to a restaurant, eating humus with pine nuts and meat, and smoking a hookah. He can even sip a glass of arrack and say, 'thank you, Israel' for being more humane than Saddam Hussein and his party of terror.

"Hizbullah and Kuntar's family should thank their maker for making Israel their neighbors rather than Hussein's Iraq. Otherwise, Kuntar would not have come back to his homeland on his feet, at a healthy weight of 90 kg, but rather in a little plastic bag containing a few bones, as our Kuwaiti prisoners returned to us."

Al-Hashem went on to say that despite the fact that the Kuwaiti prisoners were innocent, they were fed "pieces of bread as hard as rock" and "polluted water", and finally "led into the desert together, where they were murdered Nazi-style, and buried in mass graves without trial, law, attorneys, or involvement of the media."

Al-Hashem was not the only one critical of Nasrallah's accomplishment. Voices from within Lebanon also rose to the occasion. Al-Mustaqbal, a paper known for rivaling Hizbullah, challenged the organization's leader to answer for the 200 Lebanese prisoners that remained lost to Syria.

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http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3573628,00.html

[sellitman]

1. He was lucky not to be a prisoner of the bush junta.

Our glorious leader would have had him tortured.

[BioDan]

8. Are you serious?

Regardless of your opinions of American interrogation techniques, they are nothing compared to what Iraq did. Get back to me when the US has institutional rape rooms.

[Vegasaurus]

9. Whether he was in an Iraqi or an American prison

he wouldn't have come out as fat and unremorseful as he did from Israel.

Looks like he didn't suffer, unfortunately.

I would have liked him to pay for his crimes of humanity with huge, painful suffering.

Instead of pain and remorse, he plans to terrorize Israelis again.

[bemildred]

10. "We're better than Saddam Hussein" seems like a weak argument to me.

And torture is torture.

(PS: you ought to get a better look at some of those pictures from Abu Ghraib.)

[sellitman]

16. I am not kidding one bit.

Guantamino prisoners were raped, water tortured and more. Sadam may have been doing it longer but the bushies are just as evil.

[iamjoy]

2. It's A Real Double Standard

That's what makes this article so amazing.

I won't say Israel hasn't committed atrocities to Lebanese and Palestinian prisoners (and to Palestinians in Israel, West Bank, Gaza, etc)

It is, however, interesting that many Muslims around the world (particularly in the Arab countries/Middle East/Near East) scream bloody murder about the horrible things Israel does but are usually noticeably less vocal about the atrocities Muslims commit on other Muslims. Maybe it's too much to expect them to care about how Israel's neighbors and Palestinian sympathizers treat a captured Israeli soldier, but one could expect a little more vocal outrage about some of the things they do to each other.

[azurnoir]

5. There are some things that yiur "forgetting"

first off it was Israel's choice to do this and there has been alot of what i it were your son, type stuff, but I think there may have been other reasons also in part religious rules which in this case could not and were not strictly adhered to by any means an autopsy was preformed and time period following death, along with a few others including possible embalming of the bodies

http://www.uscj.org/guide_to_jewish_fune6211.html

More over did the Israeli government truly not know the soldiers were dead? Publicly it was always kept an open question, but hind sight being 20/20 I wonder.

Then there is the fact that yes while Israel handed over 5 living people and got 2 bodies in return Israel also handed over somewhere in the area of 180-200 bodies.

Also on this forum there has been a well "now that people know the Lebanese celebrate the relese of a child killer maybe there will not be an out cry the next time Israel decides to invade or bomb", note this is not a direct quote but if you have read this forum you have gotten the idea

there is also that in the western press it has been touted that the Lebanese were solely celebrating the release of Kuntar and only because he killed an Israeli in this case read Jewish child with his bare hands and for no other reason, but could it be that this was a symbolic victory against Israel, people tend to forget that 1191 Lebanese died in the 2006 conflict.

[notfullofit]

7. Actually the article is about Kuwaiti prisoners not Israelis. nt

[azurnoir]

12. Notice you don't have a problem

with "others" going on about Kuntar, and yes I did read the article your description over simplifies.

[notfullofit]

17. I don't

catch your drift? Oversimplify?

[danielet]

3. Did you forget?

Israel bombed Lebanon brutally in 2006, as usual aiming for civilians. But Arabs have learned to take the slaughter and hit back. This latest chapter in the Lebanon saga proves that. Israel in June 2006 used illegally American cluster bombs by the thousands and bunker busters, but Hezbollah still hit back at Israeli forces and hit back so hard that Israel had to pull back. Israel doesn't regret the bag of bones it got, that's what it wanted, but that it can no longer slaughter Arabs at will thanks to US power. Olmert was mensch enough to stop the dying when he saw that his troops were not making any headway. Nevertheless, by the time Israel's assault on Lebanon ended, the Lebanese, AS USUAL, suffered a lot more bones in a bag than Israel. That the air power killers from the air got the short end of a little stick for once is understandable reason for hollow celebration on the part of their victims. But the real issue is what does all that solve for either side? Israel must make peace because it can't go on like this, it will not absorb the kind of losses it inflicted or the number of pilots it would cost to hit Iran. Its people are accustomed to a higher living standard than any of the Arabs it fights against and many "Israelis" are abandoning Israel in a reverses aliyah to LA. A lot of Israel's officers walk around with a gun clip in one pocket and an American passport in the other. Who is thinking about the next generation of Israeli sabras that know no other homeland?

[Vegasaurus]

4. Why did you put Israelis in quotation marks? nt

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[Name removed]

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[azurnoir]

13. Unlike misquoting the post n/t

[notfullofit]

14. 'Israel doesn't regret the bag of bones it got'

This is NOT about Israeli bones but Kuwaiti bones, the article is taken from a Kuwait newspaper.

[ProgressiveMuslim]

11. Hardly typical of Palestinians who languish in Israeli jails.