Publicity Ploy for Shalit Birthday?

Hamas paper refuses to print birthday letter to Gilad Shalit

By Jack Khoury

Noam Shalit has been attempting to get the leading Hamas newspaper to print a birthday letter to his son, captive Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit, but the editor has refused to run it, according to an Israeli advocacy group for abducted soldiers.

The group said Noam Shalit had used Palestinian and Israeli mediators to ask the Gaza-based newspaper, Palestine, to run a personal letter ahead of his son's 21st birthday Tuesday - his second in captivity - but that the editor said he would not cooperate with Israelis.

Noam Shalit has previously sent a letter to his son to the Palestinian paper Al-Quds Al-Arabi, considered an independent newspaper, but this time he said he was interested only in having it run in a Hamas paper.

Meanwhile, friends and family of the Israeli soldier plan to celebrate his 21st birthday in a public rally in Tel Aviv. Gilad Shalit's relatives plan to place a large birthday cake in the middle of Rabin Square.

The organizers - neighbors of the Shalit family - will hand out refrigerator magnets reading, "Gilad Shalit, we're waiting for you back home," and stickers reading, "Don't let apathy kill them."

There will also be signs posted throughout the country marking Shalit's birthday on Tuesday.

Gilad Shalit was abducted near the Gaza security fence on June 25 last year by a group of gunmen from Hamas, the Popular Resistance Committees, and a previously unknown group calling itself the Army of Islam.

Hamas has reportedly been holding Shalit since the abduction.