Germany: appeasment sabotages fight against terror

Scotsman.com News - International - Hezbollah killer freed as hostage is released

According to several stories today, Germany has released convicted hijacker/murderer Mohammad Ali Hammadi, a member of Hezbollah, and returned him to Lebanon. Hammadi has been in prison for 18 years for the hijacking of a TWA flight in Beruit in 1985. During the hijacking, American Robert Dean Stethem was murdered, and his battered corpse thrown from the plane. Germany had repeatedly denied American requests for extradition because they did not want him to face the death penalty. The U.S. had been appeased by the pledge that Hammadi would remain in jail for the full life sentence.

The release of Hammadi mysteriously coincides with the release of German archaeologist Susanne Osthoff who had been kidnapped in Iraq. She was inexplicably released by her captors shortly after Hammadi was returned to Lebanon. First Spain, now Germany giving in to terrorist demands. It must be a European mindset that makes appeasement so easy. Appeasement as a foreign policy just doesn't work. It never has. It didn't work in 1939 with an aggressive Germany, it didn't work in 1994 with Slobodon Milocivich and it won't work now with an aggressive holy war.