Re: POW-Remains Swap Planned in Middle East

Date: January 26, 2004

"Israeli Soldiers Dig Up Bodies of Lebanese Militants in Preparation for Prisoner Swap

By Ramit Plushnick-Masti
Associated Press Writer

JERUSALEM (AP) - Israeli soldiers on Monday began digging up 59 bodies of Lebanese militants buried in a small plot in northern Israel, a first step toward a prisoner swap with the Hezbollah guerrilla group that is to take place this week.

Ultra-Orthdodox soldiers wearing skullcaps removed numbered metal grave markers from each burial site before removing the bodies. The fenced-in plot overlooking the pastoral hills of the Galilee region has been used as a cemetery for Lebanese killed in clashes with Israeli soldiers.

The swap is to take place Thursday. Israel will hand over the bodies and release 436 prisoners - 400 Palestinians, 35 from Arab countries and a German convicted of spying for Hezbollah.

In exchange, Hezbollah will hand over an Israeli businessman and the bodies of three soldiers captured by the Shiite group in 2000. Military rabbis have declared the soldiers dead. Part of the swap is to take place in Germany.

Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah shook up the families of the three soldiers Sunday when - smiling broadly - he refused to say at a news conference in Beirut whether the soldiers were dead or alive.

Efrat Avraham, the sister of soldier Benny, said she believed Nasrallah was simply seizing an opportunity to inflict more pain on the families. "I don't let this evil man disturb my peace," Avraham told Army Radio.

The prisoner swap was announced late Saturday, after nearly four years of German-mediated negotiations. Following the exchange, the sides will open a second round of talks to obtain information on missing Israeli airman Ron Arad, who was shot down over Lebanon in 1986.

Nasrallah told reporters Sunday that Hezbollah would form a committee to seek information on Arad and four Iranian diplomats who disappeared in Lebanon in 1982 during the Israeli invasion.

Israel has said that if it receives detailed information on Arad's fate, it will release Lebanese militant Samir Kantar, who has been held in an Israeli jail since 1979 for killing three Israelis.

Chen Arad, the navigator's brother, told the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot that if it becomes apparent that Arad is dead, his family does not want the body back if it means releasing more prisoners convicted of killing Israelis.

"If it turns out that Ron isn't alive and they provide us with concrete proof of his death, we ask that the state of Israel not release even a single Palestinian prisoner, or anyone else, in exchange for his body," Arad was quoted as saying.

Meanwhile, the family of Israeli businessman Elhanan Tannenbaum said he may be questioned by Israel's security service after his return to Israel. Tannenbaum reportedly was kidnapped while engaged in shady business deals.

In Gaza City, about 50 women and children demonstrated outside a Red Cross office, demanding the release of their relatives from Israeli jails.

Fatima Abu Gadien, 62, said she doesn't believe her son, Osama, would be released in the upcoming swap. Osama has been in prison since 1988 for killing two Israelis. Only Palestinians not involved in killings are eligible for release in this week's exchange.

Families in Lebanon, meanwhile, were eagerly awaiting the prisoners' return.

"I have been waiting for this day for 17 years," said Jamileh Nasser, flanked by visitors in the sitting room of her modest second-floor apartment in Rumaile, a coastal town 20 miles south of Beirut. "I have been waiting for the day when I hear that Anwar, the light of my eye, will be released from the darkness of prison."

Yassin, 35, was captured in 1987 after being wounded in an attack on Israeli troops on the foothills of Mt. Hermon, south Lebanon, which were then occupied by Israel. He was tried in an Israeli court and sentenced to 30 years in prison."