tidbits from today's news

1. A few hours ago I heard PM Ehud Olmert's speech from the Sharm Summit. In it, he was very forthcoming to the Palestinians. He compared their suffering to the suffering of the Israelis. He then announced that in an effort to shore up support for Abbas, as a form of goodwill, as a gesture to show the Palestinians that we are really concerned about their suffering, Israel would soon release 250 prisoners in Israeli jails, provided they do not "have blood on their hands" and they promise not to engage in terror activities any more in the future.

This is very hasty of Olmert. It is a reward for terror. Fatah has shown no signs of coming through on any promises ever made, and they hardly ever make promises anyway. I am not sure what Olmert thinks he will gain from this, unless he is looking to get support from Israel's "left wing" so he can survive politically, for just a little bit longer.

Another option I thought of is that this is part of a secret deal with the Palestinians. It could be that they agreed Hamas would release information about Shalit's condition and Olmert would release 250 prisoners. The only thing is neither side can admit to such a deal. That is why Hamas would blindside Israel with a surprise audio recording, and on the same day Olmert would announce his intentions to release 250 prisoners.

Not sure it is true, but is an idea I had. There are things that do not make sense with the theory, like Olmert said he will release Fatah prisoners, so why would Hamas agree to that? But maybe Hamas does not really care about those differences, because either way they still come out looking good (to their people)..

Maybe. Who knows? We probably never will..

2. Yesterday, Omri Sharon's sentence was lessened from 9 months in prison to 7 months in prison.

To remind you, he was convicted of fraud, election fraud and other nefarious activities related to manipulating the political system.

Omri and his attorney are not happy with today's decision to lessen his sentence. They think the jail time aspect of it should have been totally cancelled. They are considering a further appeal to the higher courts.

I find it funny that the judges take into consideration the fact that his political career is over and he was forced to resign as a result of the conviction. That was a major factor in the lessening of his sentence.

If a common criminal is convicted of something, and loses his job because of it, should he not still have to sit out his prison sentence? Why should the fact that he lost his job be a reason to lessen his sentence?

Another dose of hutzpa from Omri Sharon was his claim that when he committed his crimes he was under duress because his mother was very sick. At the time, he entered politics because of "the great love he had for his father". He also used his father medical situation (being in a coma) as a plea for leniency...

3. Olmert, earlier in the day, when discussing the upcoming Sharm Summit, referred to the Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip. he said, "It is difficult to watch what Hamas has done to its own people, but it was expected. We saw it coming."

So, if you saw it coming, why did we give them weapons, money, training, electricity and water? Why do we still offer them goodwill gestures, like releasing 250 prisoners? Releasing hundreds of millions of dollars in tax monies?
Does he not see it coming again?

Does he think that because Abbas escaped Gaza and retained control of the West Bank, that Hamas can't eventually take over there as well?
Does he not realize that everything he gives to the "moderate" Abbas, will soon fall into Hamas control?

4. Elchonon Tannenbaum - yes, him. The guy who went to Lebanon, supposedly to deal in drugs, was kidnapped, and eventually released back to Israel in a prisoner exchange.
Today Elchonon Tannenbaum was stripped of his army ranking of Officer and was demoted to private.
There are no ramifications of this, as supposedly he is not receiving any pensions from the army, but he is going to appeal the decision anyway. he is slighted and says he would give up everything else, and even be willing to stand trial and be punished for any crimes he committed (dealing drugs, etc..) but he insists on retaining his ranking.

This strengthens, in my mind, the original suspicions that the fact that he was a drug dealer was just a cover story. The suspicion was that he was a government rep at some level, possibly a Mossad agent. The whole story never made much sense, and this just adds to it.

5. Back to Omri Sharon: Jameel pointed out to me today another aspect of the court decision.. There was a minority opinion by Justice Caspi that Omri Sharon has suffered enough and should not sit in prison at all for his crimes. Caspi was of the opinion that public service should be enough of a punishment.

2 years ago, during and after the disengagement, Justice Caspi was very strict with anti-disengagement protesters. Caspi sentenced two teenagers who blocked a road during an anti-disengagement protest to two years in rpison, and refused any requests for leniency.

Is Caspi working for the Sharons? Is Caspi part of the Sharon network of officials who were forced to play along or lose their career?

Was Omri Sharon's crimes less serious than that of those two teenagers?