Among the hundreds of people kidnapped by Hamas terrorists from Israel are at least a couple dozen European and American citizens. Italy announced that “Hamas has kidnapped 10 Italian citizens, including a one-year-old baby.” Hamas also kidnapped citizens of other European countries like Germany.
Will Hamas benefit from this, by being able to extract a ransom from these countries? Or will it turn those countries against Hamas, making them more willing to cut off European aid to Gaza’s government, which is ruled by Hamas?
In the past, European countries have paid ransoms for their citizens. As Chatham House notes, “In 2014, countries including France and Spain were reported to have paid millions of euros in ransom to bring home journalists and aid workers captured by Islamic State (ISIS) in Syria.” Similarly, the Biden administration recently made a $6 billion ransom payment to Iran in exchange for the release of five hostages, freeing up other Iranian resources to subsidize terrorism and Hamas.
To obtain the release of Bulgarian nurses falsely accused by Libyan authorities of infecting Libyan children with HIV in 2007, “the European Commission committed $461 million to the Benghazi International Fund. Also, Bulgaria cancelled a probably non-collectible $57 million debt owed by Libya.”
European countries also apparently offered concessions to Hamas to free a kidnapped Israeli soldier over a decade ago, in hopes of avoiding a war between Israel and Gaza. To obtain that soldier’s release, Israel released over 1,000 Hamas criminals, who had killed 569 Israelis, in exchange for a single Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit. If Israel were to do this again — release 1,000 Hamas criminals for every hostage released by Hamas — it would get back only four of the hostages, or fewer, because Israel only holds about 4,000 Palestinian inmates (some of them Hamas militants, and some of them Palestinians from the West Bank).
Wikipedia describes the Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange. It
followed a 2011 agreement between Israel and Hamas to release Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in exchange for 1,027 prisoners — almost all Palestinians and Arab-Israelis, although there were also a Ukrainian, a Jordanian and a Syrian. Two hundred and eighty of these had been sentenced to life in prison for planning and perpetrating various attacks against Israeli targets.
Hamas military leader Ahmed Jabari was quoted in the Saudi Arabian newspaper Al-Hayat as confirming that the prisoners released under the deal were collectively responsible for the killing of 569 Israelis. The agreement came five years and four months after Palestinian militants captured Shalit in southern Israel along the Gaza Strip border.
The deal, brokered by Mossad official David Meidan through a secret back channel run by Gershon Baskin and Hamas Deputy Foreign Minister Dr. Ghazi Hamad authorized by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on one side and Ahmed Jabari, head of Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades on the other side. The list of prisoners to be released…was signed in Egypt on 11 October 2011. Its first phase was executed on 18 October 2011, with Israel releasing 477 Palestinian prisoners and Hamas transferring Shalit to Cairo. In the second phase, which took place during December 2011, another 550 prisoners were released…
Israeli analyst Dan Schueftan has called the possible swap deal “the greatest significant victory for terrorism that Israel has made possible since its establishment.”
Among the hostages seized this month by Hamas were at least four Americans. Hamas also killed at least 11 Americans in southern Israel.
This seizure of American and Israeli hostages was a victory for Iran, which recently received a $6 billion ransom from the Biden administration for releasing a mere five American hostages. Hamas confirmed that Iran provided the weapons it used in its attack on Israel. “We thank the Islamic Republic of Iran who provided us with weapons, money and other equipment! He gave us missiles to destroy Zionist fortresses, and helped us with standard anti-tank missiles!”
Iran was able to budget money for such weapons because Biden freed up billions of dollars worth of sanctioned oil for Iran. That greatly improved Iran’s financial position and made it more affordable for Iran to use its other reserves to pay for terrorism and aggression.
The a $6 billion ransom payment to Iran from the Biden administration works out to $1.2 billion for each hostage released. As former State Department official Gabriel Noronha points out, “Three years ago,” an Iranian Revolutionary Guard “Commander said they could balance their budget by getting a billion each for American hostages. Well, Biden just gave Iran $1.2 billion each for five.”
Hamas militants also killed Thai and Filipino people in southern Israel. As Professor Monica Marks notes, “Hamas killed 12 Thai workers on Saturday….One was beheaded with a garden hoe in an absolutely gruesome video that many people—especially in Israel—have watched.”
The Biden administration has released millions of dollars to Hamas that the Trump administration had withheld.
In its invasion of southern Israel, Hamas killed foreign visitors, such as Europeans attending a peace festival in Israel near the border with Gaza: “Hamas flew terrorists into a music festival with 1000s of young people. They killed hundreds: encircled them, sprayed gunfire, and hunted down those who ran. They seized dozens of women, raped and tortured them, then executed many and took others to Gaza.”
