Popping up one after the other, Facebook status updates around the world began lighting up in staggered succession with Gilad Shalit news. Only to be followed by Facebook accounts substituting pictures of account members with pictures of Gilad Shalit. Logged onto Facebook, everywhere I am looking I am literally seeing pictures of Gilad Shalit.
The building emotion is practically palpable. Reader, you know from previous columns I have written how deeply torn I am on this issue. I feel Gilad should have been brought home by different means than negotiations or capitulation. It certainly is terrifying and disturbing to contemplate the thought of murderers and depraved architects of terror sentenced to life, being released to walk free on the street.
I lived through the Israeli prisoner swap of Elchanan Tannenbaum and the three soldiers returned dead for Jewish burial in their homeland. At the time, the intensely dramatic contrast of seeing three white coffins and the released murderers publicly celebrated as heroes back home which, twistedly enough, is what these murderers are to the Palestinians: heroes was a knife in the heart.
Yet, emotionally, this prisoner swap feels different. Gilad Shalit! Young beautiful innocent Gilad Shalit! The sweet face we have all come to know and feel close to. Gilad ben Aviva, the Gilad we all want home. This is what we have been praying for.
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