RAMALLAH, West Bank: The Israeli Cabinet yesterday approved the release of 250 Palestinian prisoners as a goodwill gesture to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas ahead of Eid Al-Adha.
The Cabinet decision followed Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s promise to Abbas in their meeting two weeks ago to free more Palestinian prisoners. Israeli sources said the actual release is expected to take place Dec. 8.
According to Olmert’s office, prisoners belonging to the Islamic Hamas and Jihad groups will not be released.
However, the proposal did not pass without the objection of some ministers. The ministers opposed to the move were Shaul Mofaz and Yaakov Edri of the ruling Kadima party, and Eli Yishai, Ariel Attias, Yitzhak Cohen and Meshulam Nehari of the Ultra-Orthodox Shas party.
“This wholesale marketing of prisoners just delays the release of (abducted Israeli soldier) Gilad Shalit, and damages the social fabric,” said Minster of Industry Trade and Labor Eli Yishai.
Minister Jacob Edri also slammed the move prior to the Cabinet meeting, saying Israel “has made enough gestures to the Palestinians without having received anything in return. You don’t have to free terrorists so long as there is no progress in the effort to free Gilad Shalit or the peace talks.”
Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz, like Yishai and Edri, also voted against releasing the prisoners.
The prime minister’s office said this was a routine gesture, made every year during Eid Al-Adha.
Israel made a similar gesture two months ago with the release of 198 Palestinians, two of whom were involved in the death of Israeli citizens.
The main opposition Likud party also opposes the move with one of its lawmakers arguing that the release of prisoners will not promote the diplomatic process but harm the security of Israeli citizens.
Israeli security officials, meanwhile, said that the Jewish state would soon free all those it arrested in 2006 for use as bargaining chips in an effort to free Shalit. Dozens of Hamas parliamentarians, along with several Hamas ministers, will have to be released within the next year, even if no deal for Shalit is reached, because they will have finished serving their two- to three-year sentences.
