Israel frees 26 prisoners to start peace talks

RAMALLAH: Israel freed 26 Palestinian prisoners yesterday to keep US-sponsored peacemaking on course for a second round of talks, but diplomacy was dogged by Israeli plans for more Jewish homes on occupied land the Palestinians claim for a future state.

Negotiations were due to convene with little fanfare in Jerusalem, the holy city at the heart of the decades-old conflict of turf and faith. The envoys held first talks in Washington last month, ending a three-year stand-off.

Paving the way for the continuation of negotiations, Israel released an initial number of Palestinians serving long jail terms, many for deadly attacks on Israelis, busing them in the dead of night to the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.

They were welcomed by hundreds of Palestinians, including President Mahmoud Abbas, who kissed some of the men and flashed victory signs.

“We congratulate ourselves and our families for our brothers who left the darkness of the prisons for the light of the sun of freedom.

“We say to them and to you that the remainder are on their way – these are just the first,” Abbas told the crowd in the West Bank capital of Ramallah, where 11 ex-prisoners arrived.

The other 15 went to Gaza, a territory under the control of Abbas’s Islamist Hamas rivals, and were received by their relatives who set off fireworks and shot guns into the air in celebration.

“I never expected to see him again… The joy of the whole world is with me,” said Adel Mesleh, whose brother, Salama Mesleh, was jailed in 1993 for killing an Israeli.

“I am happy he was freed as a result of negotiations. Negotiations are good.”