One step closer to Samir Kuntar’s freedom

I’ve been reluctant to write about this, because it simply enrages me. The murderer who comitted one of the most heinous crimes in Israel’s history is about to be set free.

Israel needs the death penalty to prevent more trades like this in the future. If Samir Kuntar had been executed 29 years ago, Israel would not be exchanging him for Israeli prisoners (who may not even be alive) Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, who were kidnapped specifically for this cause. Once again, the Arab world learns that terrorism pays. And Kuntar is going to be released to commit more murder, which he has already promised he will do. The process has begun, and is probably winding to its inevitable end.

Hizbullah terrorists have returned Israeli body parts that they’ve held since 2006 for this very purpose.

Hizbullah on Sunday handed over to Israel remains of an unidentified number of Israeli soldiers killed in the Second Lebanon War, al-Manar television reported.

The body parts’ transfer was completed shortly after 3 pm, and the remains were taken for identification to the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute in a Magen David Adom ambulance along with representatives of the Army Chaplaincy.

[…] A Hizbullah official, Wafik Safa, reported of the remains’ transfer at the Lebanese coastal border town of Naqoura minutes after Lebanese-Israeli citizen Nissim Nasser was released by Israel after serving a six-year jail term for spying for Hizbullah.

It’s step two in the future transfer. This was step one:

Nasser is believed to have been released as part of a future prisoner swap deal with Hizbullah, which would include the return of kidnapped Israeli soldiers Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser and the release of six Lebanese prisoners, including murdered Samir Kuntar.

If Samir Kuntar’s name is familiar to you, it’s because he and his fellow terrorists murdered two police officers and the Haran family.

On the night of April 22, 1979, a terrorist cell of four operatives landed on Nahariya’s shore from Lebanon. They surrounded Amnon Sela’s villa on the water front and pressed the interphone buzzer.

Sela and his wife noticed the suspicious figures carrying backpacks and assumed they were burglars. Police forces quickly arrived at the scene.

Eliyahu Shachar, a 25-year-old officer who was also the shift commander arrived at the scene first. He was hoping to red-handedly catch the burglars, but a bullet shot through his neck when he exited his vehicle. The terrorist cell headed by Kuntar moved on to the Haran residence, where they murdered the father Danny Haran and his daughters Einat, 4, and Yael, 2.

What the article does not tell you is that Samir Kuntar killed Danny Haran in front of his daughter Einat, and then he smashed Einat’s skull on a rock. Smadar Haran’s first-person account was published in the Washington Post.

Outside, we could hear the men storming about. Desperately, we sought to hide. Danny helped our neighbor climb into a crawl space above our bedroom; I went in behind her with Yael in my arms. Then Danny grabbed Einat and was dashing out the front door to take refuge in an underground shelter when the terrorists came crashing into our flat. They held Danny and Einat while they searched for me and Yael, knowing there were more people in the apartment. I will never forget the joy and the hatred in their voices as they swaggered about hunting for us, firing their guns and throwing grenades. I knew that if Yael cried out, the terrorists would toss a grenade into the crawl space and we would be killed. So I kept my hand over her mouth, hoping she could breathe. As I lay there, I remembered my mother telling me how she had hidden from the Nazis during the Holocaust. “This is just like what happened to my mother,” I thought.

Yael died. She was inadvertently smothered by her mother to keep her from giving away their hiding place.

More than one family was ripped apart by Kuntar. The brother of one of the police officers they shot was interviewed by Ynet last week.

“After my brother’s murder, my mother would visit the cemetery every single day and sleep near his grave,” said Haim. “She died of grief eight months later at the age of 44. My father became an alcoholic who would sit at home drinking constantly. Four years later, the alcohol beat him and he passed away at 51.”

[…] A year after his brother’s murder, Kuntar was transferred to Beersheba Prison and placed on kitchen duty. Their meeting was inevitable.

“The first time a saw him I could hardly believe my eyes. I wanted to kill him and it was simply unbearable,” said Haim. “I repeatedly asked to have him transferred from there because I couldn’t deal with seeing him around, but he stayed on. He knew exactly who I was and remembered me from his trial. Every time he saw me in the kitchen he would stare at me and smile.”

This is the subhuman scum that will be released soon. I can only pray that the Mossad sends an assassination squad after him to do what should have been done in 1979. If Kuntar is freed, may his life be short, and his death quick. And as painful as possible.