JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
Men put behind bars for life in Israel are now free. It's the price Israel has paid to secure the release of the hostages from Hamas in Gaza. And that means some Palestinians serving life sentences for suicide bombings 20 years ago have been released. NPR's Daniel Estrin met one of them.
IYAD ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
DANIEL ESTRIN, BYLINE: One by one, visitors greet a man they haven't seen in 20 years.
Here's one shaking his hand, giving him kisses on each cheek. They're lining up, giving him a pat on the back.
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
(SOUNDBITE OF PATTING ON BACK)
ESTRIN: Are these friends or neighbors, relatives?
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
NUHA MUSLEH, BYLINE: These are his cousins. These are his uncles.
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
ESTRIN: I'm with producer Nuha Musleh in a living room in Hebron in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The curtains are drawn. Israel prohibits celebratory gatherings for the freed prisoners. Soldiers have come here repeatedly since the prisoner was freed earlier this month.
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
MUSLEH: "I am Iyad Abu Shakhdam from the city of Hebron."
ESTRIN: He sits next to me on a couch on his third day out of prison.
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
ESTRIN: He says, "we as Palestinians, and any occupied people in the world, have the legal right to resist the occupier." I ask about his role.
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
ESTRIN: He says, "I participated in the intifada of the early 2000s, just like any other Palestinian." It was the Palestinian uprising with suicide bombings of Israeli buses and cafes.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: (Speaking Hebrew).
ESTRIN: This was the Israeli TV broadcast in August 2004 - a double bus bombing in Be'er Sheva, a quiet desert city. Sixteen Israelis were killed. Hamas claimed responsibility. An Israeli military court found Abu Shakhdam guilty of preparing the two suicide belts. He got 18 life sentences. He was 29 years old then. Today, he's nearly 50. I asked if he thought about what he had done during his years in prison. He didn't want to answer. He wanted to talk about prison.
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
ESTRIN: He said the hardest period was after Hamas attacked Israel - October 7, 2023. Israeli prison authorities took away TVs and access to a lawyer. Inmates got a minimum caloric intake. He lost about 45 pounds. He knew nothing about what had happened in the war.
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
ESTRIN: The day of his release this month, he says he was taken to a tent and shown images of Gaza - the Israeli army moving through the streets, bodies scattered on the ground. Israel's prison services denied this is what freed prisoners are shown and declined further comment.
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
ESTRIN: He says he was in shock. He didn't know if any of it was real. It was the first time he learned what had happened in the war. Now, there's a ceasefire with the release of Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners like him
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
ESTRIN: He says, "God willing, after this war, everything will be over."
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED RADIO ANCHOR: (Speaking Hebrew).
ESTRIN: This is an Israeli radio interview with Haim Uzan. His father was one of the victims of the double suicide bombing Abu Shakhdam was convicted for.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
HAIM UZAN: (Speaking Hebrew).
ESTRIN: He said his dad had forgotten his grapes on the bus. When he got back on, the bomber blew himself up. His dad's glasses and watch survived. Nothing remained of his body.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UZAN: (Speaking Hebrew).
ESTRIN: In the radio interview, Uzan says of the man who prepared the explosives, "he was supposed to rot in prison. But, and there's a big but, he wasn't freed for no reason." Three Israeli hostages were freed in exchange. Uzan says, "inside Israeli prison, he would stay alive. Now that he's freed, his role is known - to murder more Jews. He'll do that, and he'll be a target. And I believe that way he can die. His family should be killed, too."
In the family's home in Hebron, we ask one more question. Did he have any message to tell the families of those whose loved ones were killed in the bus bombings 20 years ago?
ABU SHAKHDAM: (Speaking Arabic).
ESTRIN: He says Israeli troops killed his brother during a clash in the city in 2000. "What should the world say to my father?" he says. "We, too, are a bereaved family." Daniel Estrin, NPR News, Hebron.
(SOUNDBITE OF DE LA SOUL (FEAT. ESTELLE AND PETE ROCK) SONG, "MEMORY OF... (US)") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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