Good news for sure, but when the Beeb broke this story late lawst night, their coverage was filled with idiotic statements like "Alan Johnson doesn't deserve this because he is a friend to the Paletinian people"; "this is a victory for the Palestinian people", etc, as if Alan Johnson's life was saved by virtue of the fact that he's written sympathetic articles, i.e. less sympathetic journalists would have been more deserving of kidnap and execution.
Also, the BBC put him straight on the air immediately after he had been released, which I thought was a bit unnecessary.