By Yatindra Bhatnagar

Terrorism and worldwide human right abuses and grave violations are gaining ground despite tall claims by Human Rights advocates, Amnesty International, free and democratic countries and the Red Cross organization that pride themselves in safeguarding those rights and coming hard on those who violate them.

This is sadly the situation when it comes to radical Islamic terrorists, Iranian "revolutionaries" and the so-called Palestinian and other "freedom fighters." The world keeps silent.

Of course Somali pirates are other kind of terrorists and they hold scores of ships hijacked and kept waiting till they get hundreds of millions. The well equipped and well armed countries whose ships are hijacked are also well funded and so the Somali pirates are generally not punished but rewarded for their acts of keeping the hostages alive for months and more and exchanging them for tons of money.

In case of Israel nothing good can come out of that small country surrounded by a sea of hostile Arabs and other jihadi Islamists. The Arab-Islamic countries of course are deadly enemies of the Jewish people but the so-called free and democratic countries of the world, the European countries, also Russia and China, and even the United States under the current administration is acting to punish Israel and reward the Jihadi Palestinian Arabs.

Not only the US and the EU send hundreds of millions of dollars to the Palestinians, the United Nations as a world organization funds them in the name of helping the refugees - three generations of them - and subsidizing their terror activities.

The talks of safeguarding human rights is one-sided - applies only to Israel. Nobody speaks about the serious violations and grave abuse of human rights, international conventions and humanitarian institutions by the Palestinians, both Fatah (the Palestinian Authority) and Hamas. No country in the world - or even the UN -could put pressure on Hamas and Fatah to renounce their pledge to wipe Israel out of the map of the world.

No international organization could put pressure on Hamas to at least allow their observers to meet with the abducted Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit who is in captivity for five years. He was just 19 year-old Youngman when he was violently and forcibly abducted on the Israeli border with Gaza.

Shame on those countries, those organizations and on the United Nations that would discuss independent statehood for the Palestinians but could not fulfill its humanitarian obligation to get the soldier free.

It was left to the beleagured Israel to accept a lopsided deal to get their soldier back by freeing thousands of Palestinian bloodthirsty terrorists, many of whom would certainly resume their murderous activities. Over one thousand Palestinian terrorist will be freed in exchange for Gilad Shalit.

While we would welcome the chance to get the abducted Israeli free we resent and are sad that Israel has to make such a huge sacrifice and take a big risk of future attacks by hard core Palestinian terrorists.

The world failed in its duties, its obligations, its principles of a peaceful, democratic order and well established humanitarian norms. They could not force a lawless group of bloodthirsty jihadists to behave before they could demand a separate, independent state and hundreds of millions of dollars in regular funding for their anti-peace, anti-democracy and anti-humanity acts. The only solace was that Israel never lost hope of freeing Shalit and went all out to get their young man back even if it required major sacrifice. It's a story of perseverance, pride, sacrifice and faith.

The news from Jerusalem makes poignant reading. Jason Edelstein of NGO Monitor wrote:

While welcoming the agreement to release kidnapped Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit as an important humanitarian act, Professor Gerald M. Steinberg, President of Human Rights watchdog NGO Monitor, noted that this episode further exposes the moral bankruptcy of international human rights mechanisms.

"Throughout the five years of Shalit's captivity in Gaza, during which every human rights obligation was blatantly violated, organizations such as the UN Human Rights Council, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network (EMHRN), Gisha, and the International Red Cross demonstrated very little interest," Steinberg stated. "Similarly, the report of the UN Fact-Finding Commission on the Gaza War, headed by Judge Richard Goldstone, downplayed Shalit's captivity in blatant violation of international law. This moral stain will never be erased."

In addition, NGO Monitor noted that the agreement to release hundreds of terrorists, responsible for heinous crimes, and tried and convicted according to due process of law, highlights the continued erosion of international legal principles. Instead of serving their time for these convictions, the murderers have been freed under extreme duress and compulsion, adding to the incentives for similar actions in the future. Organizations dedicated to human rights have an obligation to condemn such immoral extortion.

Another news story from Jerusalem gave details of the deal:

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu reported to the hastily convened full government session Monday night, Oct. 11, that the deal with Hamas for bringing Gilad Shalit home within days was initialed Thursday and signed Monday. It was the best possible, he said, although the agreed price for the swap is heavy: one thousand jailed Palestinian terrorists, including 60 convicted on multiple murders, who will be exiled to the Gaza Strip and Arab countries.

Debkafile discloses that secret clauses of the transaction for recovering the Israel soldier, whom Hamas kept hidden for five years, were finalized between the United States, Egypt, Israel and Hamas during US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's visits to Israel and Egypt on Sept. 3-4.

Those clauses, negotiated directly between Panetta and Hamas' political chief Khaled Meshaal, entailed the shutting down of Hamas headquarters in Damascus in order to undercut Syrian President Bashar Assad, Iran and Hizballah and loosen their hold on the Palestinians. Meshaal who visited Tehran a week ago agreed to gradually downgrade his ties with Iran in return for American patronage of Hamas.

Netanyahu told the Israeli Ministers that he had faced a tough dilemma between rescuing the Israeli soldier and national security and a balance was hard to strike. But his commitment to saving Gilad Shalit was absolute. The "window of opportunity" presented now may never recur, he warned, given the turbulence besetting the Middle East. He therefore asked the Ministers for their unanimous endorsement of the swap.

During the cabinet meeting, three Ministers, Silvan Shalom, Moshe Yaalon and Avigdor Lieberman, voiced reservations in view of the high risk of setting so many terrorists loose.

That window, debkafile reports, was the deal the Obama Administration had reached with Hamas leaders and their parent, the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood's rift with Tehran.

The Prime Minister thanked the Egyptian government and intelligence agencies for their great contribution toward brokering the deal. He also voiced appreciation for the efforts of the German mediator and Chancellor Angela Merkel who gave the process her wholehearted support.

Gilad Shalit, who was kidnapped in a cross-border raid from Gaza five years ago, and held without any visitors including the Red Cross every since, will first be transferred from Gaza to Cairo to await Israel's release of the first batch of 450 Palestinian prisoners.
The remaining 550 prisoners will be freed after the soldier arrives home. This is the heaviest price Israel has ever paid for any soldiers in Arab captivity.

As to the backdoor diplomacy leading to Gilad Shalit's release, debkafile further discloses that recognizing the rising electoral strength of the Muslim Brotherhood and its Salafi allies in Egypt's forthcoming parliamentary elections next month, the Obama Administration entered into active dialogue with its leaders to draw them away from Tehran and bring them close to the ruling military junta and Washington.

Shortly before Panetta arrived in the Middle East, a US diplomat revealed that US officials had arrived in Cairo on Oct. 2 for talks with Brotherhood representatives. The American side was headed by Prem. G. Kumar, the National Security Council Director for Israeli and Palestinian Affairs at the White House.

This was the first clue that the White House was after a deal not only with the Brotherhood but also its Palestinian offshoot Hamas, part of which was to be the release of the Israeli soldier.

Two days later, on Oct. 4, the US Defense Secretary arrived to seal the accord while in another part of Cairo, the Israeli Prime Minister's personal representative David Meidan and the commander of Hamas' military wing, Ezz a-din al Qassam, Mohammed Jabry, hammered out the minutiae of the prisoner exchange for Shalit's release.

Netanyahu referred to the heavy price Israel was paying in terms of security by letting a thousand terrorists walk free - scores much Israeli blood on their hands. But he also paid a heavy political price: Israel's acceptance of the United States' rapprochement with the Egyptian Muslim brothers - henceforth dubbed in Obama administration parlance a "moderate Muslim force."

Israel can only hope that this gamble pays off.

By procuring the release of 1,000 Palestinians from Israeli jails, Hamas has outperformed is rival, the Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas as the lead champion of the Palestinian cause. After defying the Obama Administration by applying for UN recognition for Palestinian statehood, Abbas is now getting his punishment.