The Hostage Deal: Halachic Analysis By Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz

today's Shear is dedicated by Gail and Marty El as an alal Sig Epstein on the occasion of his 55th yite the 21st of tavat uh may all of the learning today be be Nish um obviously uh yesterday was an important Day in the United States perhaps for Israel as well uh the inauguration of President Trump uh but I want to digress a little today from our regular topic although I'm not sure what our regular topic is yet uh we're kind of in transition and I want to speak a little bit about the hostage deal uh the idea of releasing terrorists in exchange for theim at a ratio of you know like 1 to a thousand you know what whatever it's going to be and I I do want to discuss it Hally in terms of what are these sources now again obviously Nano probably does consult with rabbis if for no reason than his need to have a coalition but obviously he does not consider any binding uh but in terms of Haka it's interesting to understand what would halaka say about these types of deals which by the way this is obviously not the first time Israel has done this uh in fact October 7 was generated by sinir being released at gilad Shalit and the like and although it's an amazing thing Israel's official policy is we don't negotiate with terrorists uh unofficially they negotiate with terrorists all the time uh and not only to get back people who are alive but even to get back bodies bodies of dead people uh and we'll talk about that FR as well uh but the question is what does the say so just a few things to keep in mind first of all first and foremost there's obviously a very great Mitzvah called P the ransoming of captives uh is considered to be what is called a Mitzvah Raba a great Mitzvah it is so significant that we even sell a sh or sell a safer Torah in order to get the ability to Ransom shim and as the rambam explains based on the gamar in Basra uh people in captivity can suffer from a million different things obviously their lives are in danger uh a woman could be raped men could be sexually abused there could be mutilation there could be starvation there could be beatings unfortunately all of these things have happened in the past and even now they they have happened so obviously there's a tremendous tremendous Mitzvah to do what we can to rescue people who are in that very tragic and unfortunate situation the agmas neish that they've gone through and the agmas neish of their families uh is something that tears at the heart of any sensitive caring person uh particular L really that's how Jews feel Jews especially feel this raim and especially in erel which is a small country and everybody knows somebody who knows somebody meaning you're not that many degrees removed from a family that actually suffered losses or has uh relatives who are in captivity so we start off with the obvious proposition that obviously there's a great great great Mitzvah to try to bring these people home and unite them with their family I think there's no mlus about that problem is at what cost so let's start off with a mishna in m in the fourth peric that many consider to be the key to the halak understanding of the sugya and that is the MIT the mishna enumerates a number of Rabin enactments because of tiken tiken was not invented by the reform movement although they love to use the phrase ticken Olam ticken olum does appear in the mishna and in the gumar and it refers to rinic enactments for the betterment and protection of society so it'll often say we do X Y and Z because this is a tikon this is something that's of positive benefit to society and the benefit could be different in every case meaning ticken olum is not a single idea it's a general concept and what it means has to be fleshed out in each individual case so among the T that the mishna mentions is the following we do not redeem captives for more than their value so the first question we have just reading the sentence what do you mean more than their value the value of a human being is infinite trillions of dollars quadrillions of dollars what do you mean more than their value well this has a very very narrow technical meaning and that is in a slave market human beings had a value depending on your age your skill your strength your life expectancy your health and therefore everybody has a hypothetical value that's not my value of my Nish that's not my spiritual value but it's my economic value so consequently when we redeem captives when communities have an obligation to redeem captives we don't pay ransoms in excess of their economic value as a slave so if a person's economic value based on the slave Blue Book just like cars of a blue book I guess in the slave Blue Book the person would go on the market for $50,000 so we pay up to $50,000 but they ask ask for a million dollars we don't do it and the reason that's given is this limitation is a t now it doesn't explain what that is so the gamorra offers two possibilities regarding what the Tik is possibility number one isura in order to protect the public treasury a communal budget has to do a lot of things they have to build roads they have to build schools they have to have hospitals uh they have to have yesos and but medes uh they have to have medical uh care and the like if every kidnapper could demand unlimited claims for PES this would bankrupt communities and they would not be able to perform their functions so because of the put a limit on what we pay for ransoming hostages now according to that interpretation stopping right there it turns out that this is only a limitation on public ransoms meaning let's say God forbid somebody had their child kidnapped and they happened to be wealthy this happened all the time and this is not a Kamas type of kidnapping this is a plain money kidnapping where somebody says you know give you know you have to give $10 million or a million dollars by Monday morning or your child is going to be killed now normally if the father has the money generally speaking or not the parents have the money they they'll they'll they'll come up with it would prohibit it so if the concern is private people who want to come up with the money can do whatever they want it's their money to spend and if they want to use their money to save a child or Ransom a hostage they would have that right that's shot number one butat number two in the ticken is very different number two is the did not want to incentivize hostage taking and the fear would be that if we would give in to unlimited demands that would encourage further such activity in the future and as a result we will not pay excessive ransoms uh now lest it will encourage future hostage takings uh against the uh public at a later time Hally we actually pin like that second reason and that actually means even though a parent wouldn't listen and I'm not saying a parent will comply with this that it actually means that even a private citizen is not supposed to pay excessive ransoms again as I say most parents I probably would include myself as well might not even keep that Hal because it's your child but but as a matter of technical Hal you don't give into these demands because you are encouraging hostage taking and kidnapping in the future now the truth of the matter is if you took that to its extreme we shouldn't even pay up to their sleave value meaning why should I pay him $50,000 but apparently theim didn't want to go cold turkey and simply abandon uh the kidnapped victim so they said there'll be a limit but hopefully it won't be profitable enough to keep on keep on doing it now we have one famous example in history where this halaka was actually applied and this was to the great great uh Rabbi Rabbi mayor of renberg renberg is a was a city in Germany in Hebrew we pronounce it Rutenberg that's the name the name that is is from that and he is called maharam mirenberg uh Moreno mayor merenberg he is known primarily it's a funny thing he is known as the rebi of the rush rabeno Asher who is one of the greatest of the rim but the truth is marami Rittenberg was not just the Reby of the rush marami Rittenberg was the god hador Mish uh in Germany in the 1200s and he was in those days there was no country Germany per se there were essentially a bunch of city states Bavaria Bohemia Saxony and the like and my Ramy Rittenberg was simply taken hostage by a Duke and just held for money you know basically the hey you want your rabby back or pay us whatever it is a million ducats whatever the currency was and uh rabenu Usher his own talet wanted to raise the money to Ransom him because rasher took the hak position that the limitation of the mishna does not apply to a great and exceptional tal might call it the Great exception in which we get him back no matter what but it's interesting rev May of Rittenberg did not agree with the great exception so he told the rush Hey listen you want to Ransom me against my will because you consider me a great so if you consider me a great how can you disagree with my that I can't be ransomed so as a result my Ramy renberg remains in this impr for seven years now then he died then he died he was not killed he was not killed he he he died he died of of old age or maybe maybe the conditions there created illness now it wasn't as bad as you might think he wasn't thrown into a a hole I was more or less under Castle arrest he couldn't leave this castle and he was allowed to have talum who came so he actually gave shim and he was able to write some of hisim are from his imprisonment but I don't know was there a minion did he hear Scher know we don't really know all the conditions but for seven years he could not leave uh this castle and he insisted that the community not Ransom him because the ransom was excessive and he applied the and he insisted when he died uh the uh Duke refused to release the body for burial unless a huge Ransom was paid at this point rasher maintained his rebi died he was no longer bound by the Reb's decision and uh he also combined it with the idea that maybe a private person could do it and he got a very rich gav to pay the ransom on the condition that when the gavier dies he will be buried next to marami Rutenberg kave uh the body was released the body was buried there's still Bak in in renberg worms in worms and the next to him is the uh is the guy who pay at least was uh things have got moved who who who ransomed him this is my R so this is a famous case where the halaka was actually applied Hala laa by the way just as a little aside of the Kos of Tish which are mainly about the B mikash but towards the very end there is a Kina written by marami Rutenberg over the witnessing of the burning of 24 wagon loads of the gamorra in France uh and this virtually destroyed almost all of the Talma remember this is before printing so these are 24 wagon loads of handwritten manuscripts this basically in fact that basically destroyed Torah in France you know France was no longer a makum Torah France had been a tremendous m Torah Rashi the balos were between Germany and France Raam they all were French uh the event that kind of made it impossible to essentially learn Torah in France anymore was theal and because of some you know P papal decrees and marami Rittenberg uh he was probably not an eyewitness to it but he wrote a lamentation about uh the Torah being destroyed and and Howes and clel are crying and bereft and of course he included in it as well the deaths of the living the who died in Crusades and and various other things so it actually is towards the end of the kinos on Tish so we move a little away from the basa mikash and we focus on other tragedies uh that happens okay so now it turns out like this some pokim have taken the position that based on the principle in G of ticken olum that we don't Ransom hostages for more than their basic economic value it is actually prohibited to pay either monetary Ransom and releasing of terrorists because you have to understand there releasing of terrorists has two problems although they're related one is you're incentivizing future hostage takings because people like or other people can just say hey if every time we kidnap a gilad Shalit we can get a thousand of our people back let's start kidnapping there's a second problem which is not the same problem and that is you're releasing back into the population people who have murdered and are likely to murder again so that's a separate issue that's there's the incentivization of kidnappings and there is the danger of releasing roim back into the population I mean I understand I didn't check the list uh but I understand that for example U you know RAM henin and his Ritson were brutally murdered a few years ago you know uh and I understand that the guy that was convicted of their murder is z releaseload might say you know two or three years ago and they're they're getting out without suffering any type of significant punishment in a way it makes you almost uh support uh Ben gavier that you know kill them right away so they're not around to be released uh for deals and the I I think it's very legitimate uh a terrorist is a murderer and a murderer can be can be can be executed but okay but be it as it may I'm not sure if Israel's kesin is keep them so we have leverage for deals I I'm not sure what I'm not sure what's going through uh people's mind but be it as it may this is Shea number one Shea number one basically says you cannot make a deal that will pose dangers to the public even if it's a matter of saving existing hostages and this is the ticken this is the Tak of that we're not yes deam uh for that particular reason and this is even worse than paying monetary Ransom when you pay monetary Ransom maybe you're creating incentives for kidnapping here you're actually putting the murderers back into the into the population and even if Israel says or whatever well we have our army we have our police we have our sh Shin you know we uh we will prevent it from happening well it's true it is true that we don't always realize this that for every successful terrorist attack there are around 20 that were thwarted so L mea things could be a lot lot lot lot lot worse than we might imagine but still uh people get through things get through and people who murdered are likely to murder again they didn't do chuva uh they didn't become from peaceloving people uh in their experiment by the way you may recall a famous story that Jonathan Rosenblum uh often recounts uh about um some terrorist who had been in Israeli prison a very very long time and um his guard said you know why do you why do you still believe in your cause you know you see our army is so much bigger than yours so much stronger than yours uh your small change he says uh So eventually the guy got out and the guy was asked in an interview he says how did you maintain faith in I think Al jazer how did you maintain faith in your cause in those 25 years of imprisonment he said I mean listen to this this is horrendous the mon St the moner story yeah he said you know you're right I there were many times I gave up but then I saw my guard eating bread during pesak and I said to him he says what are you eating bread it's your holiday not allowed to eat bread and the guard said ah who cares about things that happened you know 5,000 or 4,000 years ago I don't care about that stuff so the terrorist said then I know we would win because we care about what happened thousands of years ago and they don't sad tragic but it it then there's something to learn may may says which means we can sometimes learn things from the enemy uh the enemy employs its passions for evil and destruction but they have a passion we have to take the passion for that which is good and that which is true but we need to take the passion we need to have the care we need to care enough about this so this is position number one now yes opion have to do yes releasing yes so please I'm in the middle of a share so I mean this this is what I this is what this is what I'm talking about right I know okay he who is patient will be rewarded I mean I said there are three I started the classes there are three opinions I just finished opinion number one right that means there's a two and there's a three okay so the two and the three are going to address what you're raising okay okay opinion number two and uh the truth of the matter is this has been followed by many many GM most notably Raji ysf going back much earlier with galit and Raj says that re Yos greet greet him although I did not find re Yos say one thing or the other but Raja says that um reel Yos agreed and the present RAF Rashi this rafar Rashi who Raj's son takes the very same position and that is they base this on a tosos in gon that changes the sugya lagam toos and gon in one answer suggests that the whole limitation of not paying excessive ransoms only applies where the host's life is not in danger in a nonp situation an example would be marami Rittenberg marami Rittenberg apparently you know they they were not threatening to kill him I mean they held him till he died uh meaning as strange as it was it was not a life-threatening situation so then and only then do we say you know you got to let him sit in order not to hurt the public in the long run but says tosos this is tosos says toos when someone's life is in danger when when someone could be killed any moment in time a om there is nothing other than the three big a murder uh and sexual immorality but everything else we do to save lives so now now this changes the picture totally because it turns out according to that situations like Kamas have nothing to do with the they're talking about kidnappers that are just holding people for money and they're not even threatening to kill just gonna hold a person indefinitely soav the mishna says we don't pay excessive ransoms but somebody whose life is on the line and many have already have already been killed and any second God forbid people can be killed so in such a situation overrides everything I do want to point out right off the bat that this is Aon OS in one answer does say PES overrides the ti the ran says no the ramban says even if they're gonna die you don't do it and that so the ramban is position number one to us is position number two it seems that in a way I don't I don't want to call it automatically D versus split I don't want to put it that way although it seems to be almost that way that is much of theim take a much harder line position consistent with sha number one that we don't give in because you're endangering future people many I mentioned who and reel in these are earlier cases they did say is Paramount now one might argue well wait a second you're telling me we should get the hostages home because of their what about the danger to life that we're causing by the release so here ra invoked a principle and you know you could debate this principle that says a the doubt cannot override the present certainty meaning right now right now this minute we have 100 whatever number we have we hope it's that many who are whose lives are in a clear and present danger we have a way of saving them you're telling me well but if I save them by releasing terrorists or paying excessive ransoms I am possibly endangering that's a suff meaning to say maybe yeah maybe not maybe the security will be improved the Army the the borders Etc uh maybe Trump gave Nan R to kind of continue destroying Kamas after the hostages are released meaning of course he was he wasn't talking about this he's not alive but his basic idea was you got to deal with the present certainty of PES and you ignore the long-term risks of PES and even though the Mish seems to say that we don't pay the excessive ransoms we don't give in but ravaja fkins like the toos in G that that's only talking about a very rare situation actually where a life is not being threatened now again that's very very rare I mean even even in kidnappings for money they usually give a deadline they say money or will kill you know so the truth of the matter isaja is almost marginalizing the whole rule of not giving in uh because uh he limits it to a situation where no life is being endangered and in the vast majority certainly in political hostage Taking Lives are very much in danger and even in you know just plain uh private kidnapping often a life is going to be threatened because they'll give deadlines the kidnapper doesn't want to slep around slip around somebody for 10 you know 20 years whatever it would be so they're usually going to kill all right so according to Raj there is no problem I mean there's a obviously there's an emotional problem and obviously it's very very painful but Hally these types of deals would be permitted now let me mention aeta number three in this whole area and sheeta number three leads to the same conclusion as sheeta number one don't give in but they do it through a different Paradigm and this was something that rakov ketki had said many many years ago and more recently referal Shar at at Yu took the same position and that is this should not be viewed hostage taking should not be viewed as kidnapping rather this is an act of War we're dealing with mil and remember there are two types of wars in Hal there is what is called mil Mitzvah there is what is called a Mitzvah War a mandatory war and there is what is called optional Wars now a mandatory War a Mitzvah War the rambam says there are three types of Mitzvah Wars one is the war against amalik which does not exist as a separate nation today the other is a war against the seven indigenous Nations who inhabited Canan and that too does not apply so two of the three categories are simply not applicable today but there is a category three of Mitzvah that very sadly is still very relevant today and that is Isel Madar to save the Jewish people from an enemy that is seeking their destruction a war of defense against an enemy who is trying to destroy us that is a even now just as an aside you may wonder what is a what is an optional War so this will sound very very strange an optional war is actually a war of expansion we simply want to acquire an oil field in Saudi Arabia now you might be a little shocked what do you mean Jewish law permits an aggressive non-defensive war of expansion that sounds pretty bad so the truth of the matter is the conditions for that are so limited they require a m they require a decision of the Sanhedrin which we don't have and they require prophetic confirmation in other words God has to give you permission through the orm V the coen's breastplate so de facto therefore there is no no legitimacy B for a war an aggressive war of expansion can't do it the only legitimacy of any war is the Paradigm of mitvah and of the categories of mitvah all we have is that third category to defend ourselves against enemies now that may include preemptive strikes meaning that doesn't mean we have to wait we can go into Lebanon things like that but all of it has to be in the nature of Defending against an enemy and every single war that Israel has fought including 1948 was a defensive War remember unlike the American Revolution let's say that in which the war established the state of Israel that's absolutely not the case the state of Israel had been established before the war it was the establishment of the state that caused a war of independence which was defending ourselves from armies that tried to destroy us the very first minute of the existence of the state so now I'll talk about and the draft a little later I'll get to that although it's not my topic but I just want I just want to mention what rakov kesi said what said they said when there's a and hostage taking is one of the weapons that the enemies are using in waging that war he says in a war the goal of the Tyra is to destroy the enemy I don't mean necessarily kill the enemy unless it's am like you don't have to kill them but to defeat the enemy to be sure that they can't continue to do what they're doing so as a result there's no room for giving in to terrorism and the like because you're emboldening an enemy meaning the mishna is dealing with private kidnapping so to speak when you're dealing with war you are to destroy the enemy and anything that builds up the enemy is against the Mitzvah of Waging War the MIT of Waging War says there's a Mitzvah to wage war consequently you can't compromise you can't give in so the point I'm making is this leads to the same conclusion as the first view but in a different way not applying the tikam of but looking at the idea of and the to defeat an enemy you may recall those of you who are older uh this was before inbi now inbi was interesting inbi was a pretend a hostage deal but it turned out to be a rescue a military rescue effort in other words Israel was lulling the terrorists into security by proposing terrorist uh or prisoner prisoner swaps as they were called laa that didn't happen what happened instead was the amazing miraculous uh military Ray that basically rescued rescued all of theim except an elderly woman had died earlier not not not as part of that effort and of course uh Nano's brother Yoni Nano yonathan who was leading that was the was the casualty uh but in terms of the ability to pull off this this military effort it truly was it really was a miracle I mean in quite a literal sense uh what had to be done was Lila Lila Mina so and TBI itself did not involve prisoner releases although it was on the table but before that you might recall uh there was a hijacking and uh rev hutner uh the rash of K Berlin was actually on the uh on the plane and there were people who wanted to I mean every Jewish life matters but there were people who especially wanted to raise money to somehow get him off together I don't know if he would have accepted it or not uh but rakov kineski who was a very clo very close friend of rutner was against it he said you cannot give in to these demands this is an enemy that wants to destroy you and when you encourage them uh they'll just do it again and again and again and again and rakov maintains and this is very hard to say and it's very hard to hear that even if it means that the captives are going to die this is how we compared it to it is similar to the sacrifices of when we wage war against an enemy we sendim to fight against the enemy we are sending people tragically who might be going to their deaths but this is the cost that the Torah puts on waging a war against the enemy so the hostages in a sense are like involuntary meaning again I I I hate the sound callous and I'm not I am really not callous I'm just describing from a very maybe coldblooded objective way that in a sense this is part of the cost rakov said of War die prisoners of War die or you know captives die because giving in will embolden the enemy and create greater dangers but the point is that both rakov and R who was commenting about the temporary situation are disassociating it from the general problem of pigon because they say when there is Mitzvah there is a different dynamic in place and that is Mitzvah I mean the very words a Mitzvah to wage war means Mitzvah to defeat the enemy and not Empower it at the same time at the same time however once you make it a military issue it actually gets a little more complicated because you have to look at long-term objectives meaning I I know nothing about this but some people have said some people are saying that when Trump who really I mean although this this was I mean when Biden says this is what he said you know six months ago that's actually true Biden was always calling for these these releases but obviously it was Trump putting pressure that this got to be done before uh the inauguration so there are people who say and again I'm I'm an ignoramus here I'm not claiming any knowledge whatsoever that uh Trump's pressure certain maybe assurances were given to Nano such as you can resume the battle right away or you can go after Iran and we're not going to stop you if you want to bomb their nuclear facilities so here is the point meaning the following if we were simply saying we are releasing in the terrorists to get back the hostages rakov would suggest that's a wrong calculus because you can't endanger the war effort but if there's something beneath the surface which I don't know that it's not just releasing the hostages but this might be a way in which a longterm might be achieved then it would in fact be justifiable you see because then the general public becomes theim who may face certain risks because in the long term there'll be a bigger Victory so it's very very subtle you have to differentiate between a purely humanitarian calculus meaning we have to get these people out which is obviously understandable but may be illegitimate in time of War versus a military strategy calculus which may in fact mean that this may help the long-term effort I don't know all I'm saying is these are possibilities that people are floating around and nobody knows what's true and what's not true uh you know the truth of the matter is one of the lessons here is when when Trump got elected so the Euphoria among so many segments of of the Jewish people was so so great I mean it was almost Messianic you know mashiah mashia and then you know he walks back a little bit and he puts pressure for these types of deals and people think well is Trump really a friend or what's going on here I mean Trump is still mad that too gave Biden congratulations you know four years ago you know it's still still bothering him and the like so the ultimate lesson here is a very simple lesson cursed is the man who puts his trust I'm sorry I'm sorry sorry I'm sorry right so cursed is the person who puts his trust in man says do not trust in princes uh so really Hashem is kind of telling us yeah Trump is a is a good shal you know he could be a good he could be a good shal but you know things can turn on a dime and our main point is as the United States currency says in God we trust it's too bad Israel's currency doesn't say that um but at least the US coins say In God We Trust yeah yeah um so there's a related problem of sending in to resue hostages or to rescue bodies which has been done so isn't this money yeah yeah yeah yes so let me let me address what what two peripheral problems one is let's assume you go with Raj's position not one and three position two and you do permit you actually do permit releasing the terrorists in order to get back theim let's say you do permit it would that apply to dead bodies remember Israel has released prisoners in the past not only to get live soldiers back or live prisoners back live hostages they've done so to get dead bodies that they could give a Jewish burial to now a Jewish burial is a very very important thing to be sure but it's not P so here's the question if you maintain of course that you can't release terrorists even for people who are alive ker you couldn't do it for dead bodies but I'm going like the second position if you go with Raj's position that you would allow doing this for live hostages is there any conceivable header to do this for dead people it's not yes of course it's a great Mitzvah but on the other hand you're endangering the public in order to get back a dead body so here the the heter is even more it's even Le less clear but some have developed the following arguments the following they have actually said even getting back dead bodies is a matter of PES in the sense of combat morale one of the things that gives a soldier and strength is the sense that the Army has their back they will not be abandoned they will not be abandoned if they're alive and they will not be abandoned if they're dead if they know ahead of time that if they're taken or they're killed no one's going to care about them so some have argued that that may affect their Devotion to their cause which could ultimately result in P it's a very attenuated p and in fact logically it seems to me the P of releasing the terrorists is much greater risk than the soldier losing his faith because they're not going to reclaim him when he when he if he dies but nevertheless some have tried to make the PES argument even there now your question uh which goes to the inbi rate now that's a different question question yeah the question was that uh when you let's talk about a rescue mission instead of talking about terrorist release we're talking about let's send our Lim to go through and and rescue and what you're doing is like and tby was an example a miraculous example and another examples where hostages are freed by the Army going in in a very very high-risk Dangerous Mission which may have many casualties more than whom you're rescuing right you're rescuing uh five people and you might lose 20 people right does halaka allow that does halaka allow dangerous high-risk rescue missions even if they're for the purpose of p uh that is a good question uh so I'll tell you this uh both RAB elzar venberg and um rasher Vice develop an idea that I don't know if it has a solid m in kazal and they've talked of the idea of T and that is in any society there are t dim which by their very nature involve endangerment of Life policemen fireman Soldier driving car and the argument goes that once you've assumed that t the does allow you or maybe even compel you to risk your life for that mission meaning to say theim that the tah puts on a soldier on a policeman on a fireman are different than the that are placed on a regular person now as they say you know in secular law there's certainly such a concept that's your job in Hala it's not really clear to me that a policeman somehow has more of a more of a hedra to risk his life than anyone else but yet on the other hand that is the job so both rash rice and Ral do say that they are permitted and even to assume high-risk operations because that is the task that is the T that they have and a society is permitted to create taim that are called high-risk t uh so that would be the the idea there yeah yeah as far as the burial of Deb people to endanger others it's not just the soldier himself it's the whole community and we see how important it was here yesterday a soldier was Reed after 10 and a half years of being H and was the cly represent of L that feel that this is what binds us as a community so the moral ethical National implications of this take on a wider Ro specif or a specific person yeah that's a that's that is that is a very excellent point um it is a subtle point and it's not entirely clear how halaka integrates that point and that is there are certain attitudes that a society needs to be able to function in a productive and growing way and that requires a sense of cohesion and a sense of mutual caring and when a society behaves with abandonment and the like that can have all sorts of Ripple effects and fissures and cracks that in the long run can severely undermine a sense of national Consciousness uh that's a very very true yeah and ultimately it it could translate into p in a long run uh as I say yeah yeah yeah he says it's because society that didn't fun yeah but what but again the the the specific question is all of that is very very true the question is whether that just ifies you know releasing terrorists who who may you know that's going to be the the very difficult question you're exposing people to I was talking specifically about the barer no I understand that but but I but I was I was referring to the context of we're going to release you know a thousand terrorists so we can get back dead bodies so we can bury I I understand the burial is important I understand that uh the question becomes would that justify at what cost yeah uh yeah I'm sorry uh yeah left instruction sometime before he was killed that if the Israeli soldiers get to prisoners as hostages they should be killed like in the case of pers po gold so how did these sheets apply to such a situ well well uh that's that's the interesting question the in other words the person himself said that he didn't didn't want to be released sinir said oh sinir I said yeah what did you say Cen gave instructions sometime before he was captured um that that if the so Israeli soldiers are are surrounding get to the get to where the hostages are located then kill them right Hamas must kill them theost kill the hostages yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah well again uh like like like uh like the opinions that say that the of the hostages is the most important thing that was Raj's opinion we would actually call off that mission uh and try to get them freed like the other opinions that we don't compromise the war effort we got to go on we as hard as this is I mean how do you tell a mother um about this you know how do you tell a mother you know your child is going to die because we're not going to compromise with terrorists it's a very very difficult thing on the other hand I believe that one of the uh parents actually made the argument that I will scream and cry for my child to be released and I pray that you don't listen to me an amazing an amazing double set meaning yeah I want my child back no matter what I want you to kill but you got to war you got to war going on and I can't always let my private desire override that uh very very difficult again again I I know I'm maybe sounding academic objective I'm just trying to go over sheas here uh I do understand how painful it is and this is why we have such a mixture of of happiness and maybe being upset uh the happiness of every K being released is everyone has to be very very very much on the other hand uh you know there are dangers and the question is is was that the right decision so will uh maybe continue a little bit next week and then go on to another topic be well take care e