RAMALLAH, West Bank: Israel yesterday released the speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council (Parliament), Aziz Dwaik, a senior Hamas member who has been jailed for three years.
The 60-year-old Hamas official was one of the key bargaining chips Israel hoped to use as leverage in efforts to secure the release of captive soldier Gilad Shalit.
Last week, Israeli prosecutors tried to persuade a military court to extend Dwaik’s prison term by six more months but failed.
Dwaik was escorted by a unit of the Israel Prison Service to the Irtah checkpoint, from where he returned to the West Bank.
Dwaik was received by supporters from both Fatah and Hamas, including Palestinian lawmakers, Minister of Prisoners Affairs Issa Qaraqi and Tulkarm Gov. Talal Dweikat. “My body is free, but my soul is still in jail with the other prisoners,” said Dwaik. Hamas says 35 more of its parliamentarians are still in Israeli prisons.
Dwaik was arrested in August 2006 by Israeli troops in Ramallah. His arrest came after a series of failed attempts to apprehend him as part of a wave of arrests against senior Hamas officials in the West Bank following the seizure of Shalit in a June 2006 cross-border raid. A website operated by Islamic Jihad reported yesterday that an Egyptian delegation headed by a senior officer was in Israel to discuss efforts to free Shalit. Cairo has been acting as mediator in indirect negotiations with Hamas.
Hamas, however, said the release of Dwaik would not change the organization’s stance or lead to more flexibility on its part in the negotiations. “There is no connection to (Dwaik’s) release and Shalit,” said Fawzi Barhoum, spokesman for Hamas.
