Israel ready to swap 2 Lebanese prisoners for IDF soldiers

By Aluf Benn and Shlomo Shamir

Israel will release two Lebanese prisoners in return for the two soldiers abducted by Hezbollah, as part of a cease-fire agreement, government and defense officials said on Monday.

The sources added that the UN Security Council would call for a cease-fire in Lebanon on Friday, and it could take effect as early as Saturday.

Alternatively, the fighting might continue for a few more days.


Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told British Prime Minister Tony Blair that as soon as an international force deploys along the Israel-Lebanon and Lebanon-Syria borders, "it will be possible to implement a cease-fire."

Immediately after soldiers Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser were captured, Olmert said that Israel would not negotiate a prisoner exchange for their release  a position he also took following the abduction of Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit in the Gaza Strip. Olmert's position received international support in the concluding statement issued by the G-8 summit, which called for the unconditional return of all Israeli captives.

However, with the fighting still ongoing, government and military sources said recently that Israel would find it difficult to insist on this position in negotiating a cease-fire.

The sources said that Israel would apparently agree to release Abu Amra Mamad, convicted of weapons possession, plus one illegal alien. It will not agree to release Palestinians. A government source added that Israel would also refuse to release Samir Kuntar, who murdered the Haran family and a police officer in Nahariya in 1979. In the last prisoner exchange with Hezbollah, the "Tennenbaum deal" of January 2004, it was agreed that Kuntar would be released only in exchange for information about missing airman Ron Arad