The Israeli government today released a video of captured IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, captured more than three years ago by Hamas, holding a Palestinian newspaper dated September 14 and looking healthy and calm, if thin. This proof of his wellbeing was released in an Egyptian- and German-mediated deal between Israel and Hamas that also saw the release of 19 female Palestinians held in Israeli jails, plus one more to be released later today. After senior government officials viewed the tape, it was flown by helicopter to the Shalit family, in Northern Israel, who then authorized its public release. “I have been hoping and waiting for the day of my release for a long time,” he says in the video. “I hope the current government under Binyamin Netanyahu will not waste the chance to finalize a deal, and I will therefore be able to finally have my dream come true and be released.”
Video Shows Captive Israeli Soldier in Good Health [NYT]
Watch New Schalit Video: ‘I Yearn to See My Family Again’ [JPost]
Gilad Shalit in Video: I Feel Healthy, Being Treated Well [Haaretz]
Jesse Oxfeld, a former executive editor and publisher of Tablet Magazine, is a freelance theater critic. He was The New York Observer’s theater critic from 2009 to 2014.