Court to weigh injunction against talks for Israeli-Hamas deal

“We have turned the soldiers into trash,” Leah Goldin bitterly stated.

AUGUST 16, 2018 11:32

Updated: AUGUST 17, 2018 00:43

Leah Goldin, mother of Hadar, speaks at a press conference, August 5, 2018 (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST) — Leah Goldin, mother of Hadar, speaks at a press conference, August 5, 2018

(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)

The High Court of Justice has agreed to hear a request for a temporary injunction to stop any Israeli efforts to negotiate a deal with Hamas.

Simha and Leah Goldin filed the petition on Wednesday as part of their larger campaign to pressure Hamas to return of the remains of their son, Hadar, and those of Oron Shaul, both of whom are presumed to have been killed during the 2014 Gaza war. Hamas is also holding three Israeli civilians captive in Gaza.

But according to the Goldins, the special ministerial committee on MIAs and POWs has not met since January 17, 2017.

On Wednesday they filed a petition to the court asking for a temporary injunction against any further advancement of work toward a long-term truce with Hamas unless the ministerial committee is convened.

The Goldin and Shaul families have argued that any such truce, or even the “quiet-for-quiet” understanding reached this week with Hamas, must include the return of the remains of their sons as well as the captives.

But the Goldin family noted in this petition that the issue here was not whether the return of the soldiers and release of Israeli citizens should be part of a Hamas.

The petition’s focus is on the government’s failure, in what it says amounts to almost “criminal neglect” in failing to hold a ministerial committee whose purpose is to hold such talks.

Demonstrations outside PM’s residence for Hadar Goldin and Oron Shaul, June 3, 2018 (Daphna Krause/The Jerusalem Post)

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“The committee’s failure to convene is even more alarming in view of the reports that Israel is about to reach an agreement with the Hamas terror organization within the next few days without resolving the issue of how to return the IDF soldiers and Israeli citizens to Israel and without even having a discussion in the committee set up for that purpose,” the Goldins stated in their petition.

The court told the state it has five days to submit a written response.

Leah Goldin told Army Radio that those who are setting the terms of the deal are the same ones who order him to enter Gaza without proper protection.

“We have turned the soldiers into trash,” Leah stated sharply.