CONNECTION BETWEEN KIDNAPPING OF FOX JOURNOS AND GILAD SHALIT

The High Price of the Fox Kidnapping Release (TIME)
The Hamas-led government won the freedom of the two journalists, but the deal may make it harder to gain the release of a captured Israeli soldier

Palestinian security sources close to the negotiators told Time that the two Fox Newsmen . . . were kidnapped from Gaza to embarrass [Prime Minister Ismael] Haniyeh's government. The militants, who earlier identified themselves as members of the previously unknown Holy Jihad Brigades, were enraged with fellow Hamas militants because they too had joined in the daring capture on June 25th of Corp. Shalit, in which Palestinian gunmen tunneled under a wall and attacked an Israeli army post. But according to these security sources, the militant groups fell out after Hamas' military wing took control of Shalit and elbowed the other co-conspirators aside.

Haniyeh was able to secure the journalists' freedom, but at a high price: he has agreed to give these armed extremists a role in deciding the fate of the Israeli soldier, these sources said.

BY THE WAY, TODAY IS SHALIT'S 20TH BIRTHDAY.