Majority of Israelis favour freeing militants in return for Shalit

TEL AVIV - An overwhelming majority of Israelis support releasing and deporting hundreds of jailed “heavyweight” Palestinian militants in exchange for an Israeli soldier held in the Gaza Strip for more than three years, a poll published Friday revealed.

The survey also found that a majority think Gilad Shalit, snatched June 25, 2006 during a cross-border raid launched from the Gaza Strip, will be released soon.

Hamas, which is holding Shalit, is demanding Israel release around 1,000 Palestinian militants from its jails, in return for the soldier.

Top Israeli ministers convened this week to discuss the matter, and apparently accepted the Hamas demands, but only if some of the released militants be sent to the Gaza Strip or even exiled abroad, rather than return home to the West Bank, where they could threaten nearby Israeli population centres, or undermine the Palestinian Authority run by Hamas’ bitter rival, President Mahmoud Abbas.

Hamas is currently studying the Israeli counter-demand, which was given to it this week by a German mediator. The Islamist movement is expected to give its reply soon.

According to the poll published Friday in the Israeli Yediot Ahronot daily, 76 percent of Israelis support the release and deportation of the militants in return for Shalit, compared to only 14 percent who oppose such a deal.

A slightly smaller majority - 70 percent - think Shalit will be released soon, compared to 23 percent who think he will not be.

The negotiations to free Shalit, conducted at first with Egyptian mediation, have been held almost ever since the soldier was snatched. But only when Germany joined the mediation efforts in the summer was progress reportedly made.

The poll found Israelis almost evenly split on the question of whether the swap deal could have been better handled, with 45 percent saying it was possible to have conducted the negotiations better, and 43 percent saying it was not. The two percent gap in the respective positions falls within the 4.5 percent margin of error the poll had.

There was no equal divide on the questions of whether it was right to keep the negotiations under tight wrap. Only 10 percent said they thought more information should have been provided, as opposed to 87 percent who thought this would have obstructed the negotiations.

The poll, conducted by the Dahaf polling institute on behalf of Yediot, questioned 425 people.