OLMERT: WE WON'T BOW TO BLACKMAIL

Olmert: "We Have No Intention of Capitulating to Blackmail"
Prime Minister Olmert told the cabinet Sunday: "We and the international community know that Gilad [Shalit] is being held by a bloodthirsty gang of terrorists who are causing us much suffering but who are mainly hurting the Palestinian population, which is bearing the results of this terrorist activity....I have instructed the security establishment and the IDF to increase the strength of their actions in order to pursue these terrorists, those who dispatch them, their ideologues, and those who sponsor them. As I said, nobody will be exempt....We have no intention of capitulating to blackmail. Everyone knows that capitulating to terrorism today means inviting the next act of terrorism. We will not do this." (Prime Minister's Office)

If Palestinians "don't sleep at night" in Gaza, they will get a feeling of what Sderot residents have been going through for weeks, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told the cabinet Sunday. Three main themes emerged during the cabinet meeting: The efforts to free Shalit will likely take weeks if not months; Israel cannot agree to a "prisoner exchange" because this would only encourage more kidnapping attempts; and Israel will use the current opportunity to smash the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza, weaken Hamas, and try to substantially alter the strategic situation in Gaza. Olmert said he told UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan that Israel would change the situation where tens of thousand of Israelis are under the threat of Kassam rockets in the south, and Palestinian terrorism emanates from Gaza into Israel. The head of Military Intelligence, Maj.-Gen. Amos Yadlin, said that "the Egyptians are willing to mediate, but are essentially only negotiating with themselves" and "are not succeeding in getting their mediation attempts off the ground." (Jerusalem Post)