Knesset bill seeks to limit release of terrorists for hostages

Tal’s proposed legislation aims to cap the number of terrorists exchanged per hostage to deter future abductions.

By Amelie Botbol, Akiva Van Koningsveld, JNS

Legislation about to be submitted to the Knesset by Religious Zionism Party lawmaker Ohad Tal seeks to curtail the Israeli government’s ability to free jailed terrorists as part of hostage negotiations with terrorist groups.

The legislation, which received approval from Knesset legal advisers on Monday and is scheduled to be discussed by government ministers in May, seeks to prevent Israel from paying excessive prices to redeem captives.

“We are seeing the heavy price that Israel is now paying in this horrible deal,” Tal told JNS on Wednesday, referring to the recent agreement with Hamas. “We are releasing thousands of terrorists, killers. It endangers the lives of people, and it sends the message that terrorism has no cost.

“You can kill Jews and kidnap one Israeli later, and you will be released. It only incentivizes terrorists to kill and kidnap more Israelis, and we should put an end to this,” the lawmaker explained.

Tal’s draft legislation seeks to limit the number of terrorists who can be traded for each hostage. The restrictions would not apply to current negotiations with the Hamas terrorist organization in the Gaza Strip.

In peacetime, Jerusalem would only be able to exchange one terrorist for one captive. However, if the hostage-taking happened during a time of war, the state could release up to five terrorists for each Israeli captive.

In addition, jailed terrorists would only be able to be freed if they had served at least two-thirds of their sentence, while convicted terrorist murderers would be barred from being released under hostage deals altogether.

“It includes all kinds of limitations that will take away the incentive of terrorists to kidnap more Israelis,” Tal, who heads the Religious Zionism Knesset faction, said of the legislation, which is co-sponsored by five of his colleagues.

He pointed out that similar bills were put on the Knesset agenda in the past by both coalition and opposition lawmakers, including Yesh Atid Party leader Yair Lapid and Yisrael Beiteinu Chairman Avigdor Liberman.

Tal explained, “The purpose was to legislate the conclusions of the Shamgar Committee, a professional committee appointed by former Prime Minister Ehud Barak [in 2008]—not anything you can suspect of serving a right-wing agenda.

“Top professional specialists conveyed—under instruction of Barak—and discussed the whole concept of how Israel can prevent itself from repeating the same horrible deals that threaten national security, and they came up with all kinds of conclusions,” continued the lawmaker.

The committee, headed by former Supreme Court President Meir Shamgar, recommended in 2011 that the Israeli government toughen its positions in future hostage talks with terrorist organizations.

However, the panel’s conclusions were never fully embraced by the government, which was reluctant to put restrictions on its ability to conduct negotiations.

“Basically, what I am trying to do now is legislate these conclusions. It will not apply to negotiations for this deal but only for the future ones, and it has all kinds of limitations,” Tal said in conversation with JNS.

As part of the first phase of the hostages and ceasefire deal with the Hamas terrorist organization in the Gaza Strip, which lasted between Jan. 19 and March 1, Jerusalem agreed to commute the sentences of some 2,000 terrorists, including many convicted of deadly attacks, in return for the release of 33 hostages, including eight bodies of slain captives.