Israel pays high price for soldier’s freedom

ISRAELI soldier Gilad Shalit and hundreds of Palestinians crossed Israel’s borders in opposite directions yesterday as a thousand-for-one prisoner exchange brought joy to families, but did little to ease decades of conflict.

Sergeant Shalit, 25, returned home to a national outpouring of emotion in Israel after five years in captivity in the Gaza Strip. The first few hundred of over a thousand Palestinians being freed in stages from Israeli jails were greeted with kisses and flags in Gaza and the West Bank.

“I missed my family very much,” a gaunt Shalit, his breathing laboured at times, said in an interview with Egyptian television, conducted before he was transferred to Israel. “I hope this deal will promote peace between Israel and the Palestinians.”