When you negotiate with terrorists, be they Palestinian or Iranian, the results always come back to bite.
“One-time exception.”
Yeah, right. Famous last words of an Obama spokesperson, commenting on the country’s prisoner exchange with Iran — the innocent traded for the guilty.
Yeah, right. One time only.
Check it out with Israel, which has made one-time exceptions, how many times now? Ten times? Fifty times? One-hundred times? It depends only on how far back you start counting.
More Americans will be taken hostage by Iran and other “friends.” It is as inevitable as night following day. Once you trade the innocent for the guilty, you don’t go back. When the negotiations over the next kidnapped American come up, the question will be obvious: Why is one particular American citizen, swapped now, worth more than the next American citizen, held hostage in the future? The future hostage isn’t worth more; therefore, the next morally lopsided exchange will proceed apace.
Israel has let everyone from convicted murderers to dead bodies go back to the enemy in exchange for an Israeli citizen held hostage.
It happens periodically.
It is outrageous each time it happens.
It never stops.
It depends only on the skill of the enemy in capturing another Israeli.
There is absolutely nothing in the recent exchange of convicted Iranian criminals for innocent American citizens that differs from the Israeli dynamic — with the sole exception of the American delusion that the current US-Iran swap is a “one-time exception.”
Oh yes, and this, too: The same American spokesman who touted the exchange as “one-time” also saluted Obama’s “courage” for making the decision. Yeah, right. A knife is held to his neck — fork over our criminals, or you don’t get your innocents — and this qualifies as “courage.”
Oh, and by the way, it was not just imprisoned criminals whom the US released to Iran. Iran also demanded and got the removal of 14 Iranians from an international criminal watch list.
Face it. The whole matter is distasteful; there is no courage here. And this is the least of it. These exchanges, whether done by Israel, the US or any other country, undermine the values of the rule of law, of equality and of peace.
The history in Israel is that convicted prisoners released in a prisoner exchange come back to commit the same crimes. In Israel’s case, this often means murder. In the current Iranian case, this would mean rebuilding Iran’s nuclear program — you know, the one that’s supposedly shut down for now. Even if these particular releasees do not return to Iran, they inspire other Iranians to commit the same crimes.
There is another aspect to the dynamic: the enemy gets bolder. Crime pays, the enemy learns. Palestinian murderers get released and Iranian nuclear agents get released. So try something bigger next time. Why not? There is no inevitable penalty.
Item: When these asymmetrical negotiations between Iran and the US were underway — with the asymmetrical results guaranteed for Iran — Iran kidnapped a couple of American sailors. The US fell all over itself complimenting itself on its “new” relationship with Iran, allowing it to get its sailors back in short order. The more nuanced, intelligent and helpful self-reflection would be: Why were the sailors taken to begin with? That’s just the type of dynamic built into these negotiation in which the innocent party — the US or Israel, for example — caves in.
Item: Iran did not release one of its American hostages, detained last October, who, like the others, was accused of crimes, but either no charges were filed or no evidence was offered. Extortion for the next prisoner exchange is already underway.
Item: You don’t even need to look to the future. In fact, the current deal was not the first time the US caved in to Iranian demands in a prisoner exchange. It happened after Iran imprisoned three American hikers in 2009. For these innocents Iran got four of its own citizens held on arm-smuggling charges. In other words, the current swap was neither a “one-time” nor even a “first-time” event.
It is impossible to negotiate with terrorists and win anything significant over the long-term. The evidence is at hand. The nuclear deal with Iran already means: Walk softly with Iran, lest it back away from the deal. Don’t expect hostages to be freed until you fork over $1 billion in sanctions relief. This is exactly the opposite of what the nuclear deal was supposed to deliver: a more diplomatically pliant Iran, not an even more obdurate Iran.
Copyright © 2016 by the Intermountain Jewish News
