As Hamas continues to toy with us all, and US envoy Steve Witkoff declares their response "unacceptable," the remarks made by Maj. Gen. David Zini opposing hostage deals have been sidelined. That is regrettable. While the leak of Zini's words was intended to sabotage his candidacy to head the Shin Bet security agency, it also presents an opportunity to examine the shallow and biased media discourse surrounding the hostages. In this discourse, only one position is regarded as legitimate and moral. The opposing view, Zini's, as a case in point, is depicted as cold, immoral, and unfeeling.
Let's start with the most obvious point of denial: The hostages and their families are paying a horrific price for previous deals, deals nearly identical to the one now being demanded. These deals, over the past few decades, have brought upon us waves of terrorism and rivers of blood: two intifadas and one horrific massacre, planned and carried out by terrorists released in the most reckless of them all, the Gilad Shalit deal. Recent deals, and the one currently being negotiated, send Hamas and its ilk a clear and consistent message: Murder, and especially the kidnapping of Jews, is profitable and should be pursued. This is how they chip away at us and eventually defeat us.
Moreover: Unlike past blood-soaked deals that involved the wholesale release of terrorists who returned to kill us, tragically, a scenario we've come to expect, the current deal demands something more. Israel is being asked to halt a strategic military operation just before delivering a decisive blow to the enemy and to forfeit two crucial game-changers: cutting Hamas off from controlling humanitarian aid and from governing the population. a separation that is already crippling the group, and surrendering "holy ground." For Hamas, this is an unbearable loss. Yet these areas are vital to the security of Israeli citizens, especially those in the Gaza border region.
They, too, weep and tremble
If Israel folds now, the next time civilians are kidnapped, Hamas and others will insist on receiving - in return for their release - evacuation of settlements, parts of Jerusalem, the Temple Mount, and the Western Wall. Even the so-called "right of return" is back on the table, and beyond. This is not fantasy; they say it outright.
The charge that critics of such deals, like Zini, do not care about the hostages is absurd. They care deeply. They suffer. Their hearts are broken. They, too, lie awake at night and weep with joy when hostages return. But they are also convinced that releasing hundreds or thousands of murderers poses a grave danger to tens of thousands of Israelis. When forced to choose between individual lives and the collective, they've made a cruel but no less moral choice than the supporters of the deal.
Zini's supporters acknowledge that Israel has indeed violated its contract with the residents of the Gaza border region - elderly men and women, children abducted in pajamas from their homes. But they argue that this broken contract cannot be repaired by violating the one with the broader public, one that endangers countless more lives. The social contract between a state and its citizens is never absolute. It is never a contract of "at any cost." The state, for instance, omits certain life-saving drugs from its subsidized healthcare basket, even knowing that people will die without them, in order to prioritize treatments that can save more lives.
Without disdain for others
Zini and his colleagues believe two more things. First, had more military pressure been applied, Hamas would have dragged out the hostage crisis indefinitely. That serves its interests. The hostages are golden eggs. Second, and this may sound paradoxical, though it isn't, the path to a deal goes through opposition to a deal. The less eager Israel seems, the more Hamas lowers its price and chases after us, instead of the other way around. Yes, this is a brutal approach, especially toward the hostages' families, and no one can presume to fully grasp their pain. And yes, it may now be too late for such a strategy. But had the leadership coordinated this line early on with the families, today's terms might have been very different.
The media silencing of anyone unwilling to chant the "deal at any price" mantra exposes a form of tunnel vision. There is a concerted effort in the public space to place blinders on all of us, like those worn by horses, so that we see nothing but the hostages. It's entirely possible that, after an honest debate, some opponents of the deal would come around and some of its supporters might change their minds. After all, these deals are not a matter of black and white. One can rejoice wholeheartedly for every hostage who returns, and simultaneously understand the terrible price we've paid, and will continue to pay, for it. And one can also protest, like Rabbi Benny Kalmanzon, a father, brother-in-law, and uncle in mourning whose relatives were murdered in the aftermath of such deals, against this ideological dictatorship and the legitimization of disdain toward those who think differently.
