I must admit that I was wrong!

Peloni:  Terror is not a crime, it is a war crime.  It is an assault on society as a whole and it warrants the most extreme penalty which society might possibly envision on the terrorists, and such a penalty should not be limited to them being held in a cell until such time that another war crime is committed to earn their early release to continue this pantomime of justice.

Barbara Diamond | Jan 26, 2025

Immediately after the atrocities perpetrated by Hamas on Israeli innocents on October 7th, 2023 the world was stunned. We in Israel were in shock. Speaking for myself, I must share that I had never imagined such barbaric behavior as that which was perpetrated by Hamas on our Innocents on that day. Surely, I wrote and suggested… the abduction of our people to become the hostages of Hamas could have been avoided?

My blog published in the Times of Israel on January 25, 2024 which I titled : “ Hostages…The Ultimate Ethical Conundrum” seemed to me, at the time, the only solution possible for civilized nations facing hostage crises. I posited that if world powers had an agreement between them that under no circumstances would hostages abducted by terrorists ever be used as bargaining chips to benefit the enemy, then most certainly terrorists would realize that there would be no purpose in further abductions.

This is the first time that I have chosen to write about my own mistake. We all make them. We rarely admit to others when we get something wrong. Mea Culpa. It is indeed logical to presume that if terrorists truly understood that there would be no ransom paid for a hostage… there would be no motivation for abducting them. I have come to the realization that my suggestion is purely abstract and theoretical. There is no chance that it can or will be applied in the complex world in which we live.

This is an issue which affects not only every Israeli but every Jew world-wide. After the atrocities of October 7th, we are all vulnerable. Will travelling on an Israeli passport identify us as a potential target? Will wearing religious garb put us in danger? Why must I hide my necklace with the Hebrew letter chai, the star of David or the shape of the map of Israel which hangs on a chain to show my love of my people, my faith, and my country? I am not ashamed of who I am or where I live. Still, authorities are telling Jews around the world to do exactly that. We are being told to cower…to hide. That never worked in the past and we are not about to pretend that it will work in the present.

In truth, no one I know of has taken my original suggestion under advisement. Why would different countries agree on such a stringent attitude toward terrorist abductions when we in Israel who have suffered so greatly, have not done it either? In a perfect world… my theory would indeed stop the abductions of innocents. But we live in an imperfect world and after 67 weeks of war between Israel… Hamas, Hezbollah, Isis, Islamic Jihad, the Houtis and the Mullahs of Iran… it would be fair to say that none of us see the world as simplistically as we once might have. Our innocence has been shattered like the invisible glass shield which we metaphorically created around us, in order to live surrounded by so many enemies.

Here in Jerusalem, it is Saturday night. On this day four female soldiers who were abducted by Hamas …were released. On this very same evening, just minutes from the center of Jerusalem…in East Jerusalem… there were mobs of ecstatic Arabs marching joyfully …proclaiming what they perceive to be Hamas’ victory. I know what they were celebrating… because they not only were waving Hamas flags, but they had wrapped their little children in them as If they were superman costumes. Never have I seen such outlandish behavior inside of Jerusalem proper. I could hear the chanting and it sent shivers down my spine.

When one lives through a war of this length with Islamic Fundamentalists who murder children, burn families alive, cut off body parts while people are still alive , rape, disfigure and murder people with glee…reality is redefined. When their leaders then make pronouncements that they intend to commit October 7th over and over again until all the Jews are dead… philosophy and theories are quite irrelevant. This is very real, and the grotesqueness of their intent requires a different response than those of the past. Whatever we thought we were doing correctly before… was not a deterrent. We gave back more than 1,000 prisoners in exchange for Gilad Shalit’s life… and they returned to murder more of us. We have clearly learned nothing from that experience.

Israel truly cannot wait for other countries to either take the lead or join us in changing the rules of this game…which is no game at all. It is a war for survival… ours. One must rethink absolutely everything previously taken for granted. I speak for myself of course, but know that I am not alone.

In wartime, it is internationally acceptable to take the life of your enemy. If you do not… he will take yours. That is a fundamental principal which must guide Israel from this point forth. If other nations which have experienced terrorism on their innocents, want to stop this spreading evil in its tracks… there is a clear path to be taken by them as well. While these fundamentalists are focused on Israel at the moment, they make no secret of their plans for the rest of Europe and the West. It is just a matter of “when”. They excel in patience.

This is the first time that I have chosen to write about my own mistake. We all make them. We rarely admit to others when we get something wrong. What I now understand to be true, is very different one year after I wrote and published that article.

We in Israel, understand that when Islamic Fundamentalist warriors kill the “other” whom they find so repugnant, they are comfortable with the idea of their own death in the name of Allah. Many in fact, are immediately neutralized by police or whomever has the ability to stop their violence. In essence that terrorist is committing a war crime before our eyes and thus it is moral and just to stop them any way necessary.

Fast forward please, to the captured terrorists who have had as many as five life sentences pronounced upon them after killing and murdering Israelis in premeditated planned attacks. Consider please that some of those very same vile individuals are now walking free as a part of the negotiations for our innocents which were abducted for this very purpose more than one year ago. Those of us who had friends, loved ones, and family members murdered in those terror attacks…are appalled and sickened to see the perpetrators celebrating their ultimate victory and their plans to repeat their horrors. This is the degradation of all that we respect and value. It must end.

After the Holocaust, Israel decided not to have the death penalty. We as Jews, needed to respect life… and not be like the Nazis who murdered six million of our own family members. We needed to be the moral light that shone brightly for the world to admire. The concept was beautiful, but in today’s reality….we must accept that it is a luxury which has now resulted in the deaths of many hundreds of our people, murdered by reoffending released terrorists…in addition to what had befallen us already. If we truly want to be a “light unto the nations” we will not accomplish it by cowering to the lowest and most cruel elements of humanity, but by stopping them in their tracks. Evil exists. We are at war with that Evil. The warriors for evil must not be allowed to re-offend.

We in Israel are well aware that the now deceased Yahya AL-Sinwar was in our prisons after committing heinous crimes against us. We saved his life in our hospitals when it was discovered he had a brain tumor. He was venomous against us even though an Israeli surgeon had saved his life. He was later returned to Gaza in a prisoner swap… and went on to lead Hamas to murder, mutilate, rape and defile more than 1,200 of our fellow Jews and country’s men and women. This is not an isolated incident. It happens over and over again that once released, the terrorists return to murder us. The negotiations which have taken place for the return of the hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7th… once again reward the murderers who, upon capture, have lived decently in our jails while their families received payments from the Palestinian Authority in thanks for the atrocities they perpetrated against us. They are now, once again, released to murder even more of us . Are we quite insane? How have we allowed this to happen once again?

It is quite simply because we did not learn from our own mistakes.

There is only one solution. It is not what I suggested in my previous article. Israel must impose the death penalty on every terrorist who kills or abducts even one Jew or Israeli citizen. It is not unreasonable. When they perpetrate these acts…they are acts of war. In a war, every human being and society has a right to defend itself. The only defense against murderous terrorists Is to end their lives. It is not that the terrorists will stop trying to kill us if we implement such a law. If they do not fear death… they will still be vengeful and violent. But having imposed the death penalty on them, we end the risk of hostages being taken in order to once again…. free the terrorist murderers. If there is no one to return…the negotiations would serve no purpose. When we now release the approximately two thousand terrorists in our jails… we resupply the upper echelons of Hamas with their own heroes. They know no other life. They have no other purpose.

We must treat them as they deserve… as our enemies. Once we do… terrorists of every description will have no reason to wave their flags in celebration of our perceived weakness and their imagined victory.

Born in the Washington DC area, Barbara has been a pro Israel activist for over four decades, having had a radio show in Jerusalem called “Barbara Diamond One on One” , doing in depth interviews which aired in Israel and in the UK. She participated in missions to the USSR to meet with Refuseniks, to Ethiopia with a medical team to help the Jewish villages and to China to open up relations prior to China recognizing the State of Israel, She has been pro-active lobbying congress and helping to start a Pro Israel PAC in Los Angeles. She stays involved through the Jerusalem Press Club attending up to the moment briefings which she would like to share with the readers. During the current war between Israel, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houtis and Iran…she is publishing a weekly “Israel War Diary” in the Jewish Press and on 100 Pro-Israel Facebook groups. Ms. Diamond is the author of the new website – thedementiadiary.com and is the 2018 recipient of the “StandWithUs”-Israel leadership award.