Israel Matzav

Goldwasser and Regev for Kuntar and several lesser lights?

The Lebanese daily al-Watan is reporting that Israel and Hezbullah have agreed on the outlines of a deal that would return kidnapped IDF soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev to Israel in exchange for murderer Samir al-Kuntar (Blogger's picture capability died while I was doing this post so no picture), eight other Lebanese terrorists and an undetermined number of 'Palestinian' and other Arab terrorists. Al-Watan was the first newspaper to break the story of Monday's deal in which Israel traded two dead Hezbullah terrorists and one live but allegedly ill one for the body of an Israeli who drowned off Israel's northern coast nearly three years ago.

If Israel makes this deal, it may be giving up on ever getting information from Hezbullah on Ron Arad, who was captured after bailing out of his plane over Lebanon on October 16, 1986 - twenty-one years ago yesterday. In the aftermath of the Tannenbaum exchange in 2004, Israel was to have traded Kuntar for 'significant' information about Arad. Hezbullah claimed they couldn't find any. It is less clear what this deal would mean for the families of Zack Baumol and Yehuda Katz, who are still missing from the 1982 battle of Sultan Yakub. There were reports that they were seen being paraded through the streets of Damascus as prisoners in the aftermath of that battle, but they have not been heard from since.

According to Haaretz, Hezbullah is insisting that Israel first release a large number of 'Palestinian' and Arab terrorists in exchange for 'information' about Goldwasser and Regev. It is not yet clear whether Israel will be willing to do this. The report also says that the "information" that Israel received about Arad in Monday's exchange was a recitation of Hezbullah's efforts to find out about Arad's fate since the Tannenbaum exchange more than three years ago.

Follow the Kuntar link above. He's one of the most heinous murderers in the history of the State of Israel. He was also Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah's main objective in starting last summer's war.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 4:40 PM