Hamas releases cartoon about captured Israeli

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"Hamas released an animated film Sunday bearing a grisly message for Israel: If it doesn't meet the Islamic militant group's demands, an Israeli soldier it has held for nearly four years could return home in a coffin."

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"The website of Hamas' armed wing, which posted the video, said it was intended to pressure Israelis to accept demands for a prisoner swap and warns the Israeli government it could regret not making a deal quickly.

Schalit's father, who has become a recognizable face in Israel, is the main character of the three-minute, 20-second short, in Hebrew with English and Arabic subtitles. Noam Schalit is normally clean-shaven, but he appears in the film's later scenes with a cane and scraggly gray beard, suggesting he has grown old while awaiting his son's release.

The elder Schalit passes billboards on which Israeli leaders vow to free his son or get information on his fate. He reads a newspaper ad offering $50 million for information on his son's whereabouts, then tosses it in the trash.

The soundtrack includes clips of his son's voice taken from a Hamas video released last October to prove the soldier was still alive. That video came amid talks aimed at trading Schalit for about 1,000 Palestinians prisoners. Negotiations have since stalled.

Toward the end of the film, screen text in Hebrew and Arabic informs viewers that the Israeli government's efforts to clinch a prisoner swap deal succeeded. Noam Schalit sits near Israel's Erez border crossing with Gaza, where a black van unloads a coffin draped in an Israeli flag.

The father screams, then wakes up, finding himself sitting at a bus stop. A screen text reads: "There is still hope."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100425/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_hamas