[News] Five men handed over to Hezbollah movement
Anti-Imperialist News
news at freedomarchives.org
Wed Jul 16 15:17:28 EDT 2008
Video with Samir Kuntar's brother at this link!
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2008/07/20087164497172689.html
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2008/07/2008716143549351623.html
UPDATED ON:
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
20:52 Mecca time, 17:52 GMT
<http://english.aljazeera.net/>News Middle East
Israel returns Lebanese prisoners
Almost 200 coffins containing Lebanese and
Palestinian remains were handed over [AFP]
Five Lebanese prisoners have been handed over to
the Hezbollah movement by Israel, as part of a
swap for the bodies of two Israeli soldiers.
The freed men arrived to a heroes' welcome at the
Naqoura border crossing on Wednesday, just hours
after Israel received coffins containing the
remains of Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, two
Israeli army reservists captured in 2006.
The prisoners released were Samir Kuntar, who was
jailed for three murders in Israel in 1979, and
four men captured during the 34-day war sparked
by the capture of Goldwasser and Regev.
They were the last remaining Lebanese in Israeli custody.
Hezbollah also received the bodies of almost 200
people, including the body of Dalal al-Maghrebi,
a female fighter with the Palestinian Fatah movement.
Cheering supporters
The prisoners were brought across the border in a
convoy of four International Committee of the Red
Cross vehicles before changing in military
fatigues to greet crowds of well-wishers.
Kuntar wiped away tears as he stood in front of the cheering crowd.
"We knew that you were waiting for the resistance
and it reached you. You came back free and
heroes," Ibrahim Amin al-Sayed, head of Hezbollah's political bureau, said.
The five men then boarded Lebanese army
helicopters for a flight to Beirut, to be
received by the country's president, prime minister and other officials.
"Your return is a new victory and the future with
you will only be a shinning march in which we
achieve the sovereignty of our land and the
freedom of people," Michel Sleiman, the president, said at the airport.
"I tell Samir and his companions that they have a
right to be proud of their country, their army and their resistance."
In south Beirut, tens of thousands of people,
many of them waving Hezbollah's green and yellow
flag, waited for the men to arrive at a huge
rally during which Hassan Nasrallah, the group's
leader, was expected to speak.
Hezbollah named the exchange "Operation Radwan",
in honour of Imad Moughniyah, known as "Hajj
Radwan", the group's military commander who was
assassinated in Syria in February.
Israelis sombre
In contrast to the upbeat mood in Lebanon, the
scene across the border in Israel was sombre.
At the family home of reservist Regev, a crowd of
about 50 mourners gathered and his family wept,
seeing their son's coffin displayed on television for the first time.
"It was hard to see one coffin being lowered to
the ground and then another one. It was awful to
see it. I asked them to turn off the television
because I didn't want to see it," Regev's father Zvi told public radio.
"We always hoped that Eldad and Udi would return
home alive and that we would be able to hug them."
Before the exchange there had been speculation
that at least one of the Israeli soldiers had
been alive, but Hezbollah TV confirmed that both were dead.
"The Lebanese people sacrificed almost 800
soldiers, its entire economy," he said. "For
what? For the killer of a three-year-old girl? Is
that a hero? For me he is nothing more than a little bigot."
'Difficult decision'
Miri Eisin, a former aide to Ehud Olmert, the
Israeli prime minister, said Israel found the
release of Kuntar an "incredibly difficult decision".
"Today in Israel we are mainly reflecting on the
price we pay in our country to defend our borders," she told Al Jazeera.
David Chater, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Rosh
Hanikra on the Israeli side of the border, said
that the Israeli cabinet had "agonised" over the exchange.
"[They] voted in favour of it against the advice
of the Israeli intelligence service ... which
thinks it will only encourage kidnappings," he
said. "But the bulk of Israeli public opinion is behind this deal".
Robert Fisk, a Middle East expert and journalist
with the Independent newspaper, told Al Jazeera:
"It's regarded as being the final chapter of the 2006 war."
"The Israelis certainly lost that war, they did
not get their prisoners back - not until now and
they're getting them back dead. So more than
1,000 Lebanese civilians and more than 160
Israelis, most of them soldiers, all died for
absolutely nothing and that's what today's prisoner exchanges prove."
Lebanon has declared a national holiday to celebrate the prisoner swap.
"This is a big day because it's the day we
[Lebanon] have the liberation of four or five
heroes," Wassim Manssouri, a professor in
constitutional law at Beirut's Lebanese
University, told Al Jazeera from the capital.
Palestinian reaction
Celebrations were also under way in Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank.
"The exchange is seen as a victory for Arab
resistance," Nour Odeh, Al Jazeera's correspondent, in the West Bank, said.
Kuntar is a member of Lebanon's Druze population.
Walid Jumblatt, Lebanon's Druze leader, told Al
Jazeera: "My father was the founder of a
Lebanese-Palestinian coalition to fight Israel
and recover the Palestinians' rights. My father would be happy."
"I am happy [too], but we should not forget the
Palestinians who are detained in their own land," he said.
The Hezbollah exchange has prompted the public in
Arab countries such as Jordan and Egypt - which
have both signed peace deals with Israel - to
question why their governments have not been able
to repatriate the bodies of their soldiers.
Source: Al Jazeera and agencies
Feedback Number of comments : 9
Mike Vanderweide
United States 16/07/2008
Hezbollah has committed a war crime
Hezbollah's leaders should be tried for war
crimes for killing uniformed prisoners. When has
it ever been acceptable to kill uniformed
military prisoners? They should be put on trial immediately.
Chet Baker
Great Britain (UK) 16/07/2008
Shame on Arabs for glorifying murder of children
Samir Kuntar smashed a child's head against a
rock after murdering the father in front of him.
One would have to go back to the Nazis to find
similar behavior. That Lebanon could declare a
national holiday for the release of such a
monster is a national shame for that country.
Gern
United States 16/07/2008
Returned Prisoners
So a child murderer (Kuntar) in Lebanon is
considered a hero. Humans as spiritual beings are
typically appalled by this behavior. Lebanese
muslims are not. With all that is going on in the
muslim world today I'm not surprised.
ibrahim
Palestinian Territory 16/07/2008
the d-day
I feel a full satisfaction by this prosiner swap
it's the day of victory for lebanese and all of
arab jehad in all the arab and islamic countries
thankxxxxxxxxs for the resistance
Raj
Afghanistan 16/07/2008
Why so hue and cry about two dead bodies of
Israel. Hundreds of palestinians have died and
nobody bothers. hundreds are being tortured in
american prisons and no one raises voice. Let
Israelis also feel the pain of death.
lara
Lebanon 16/07/2008
Israel invaded Lebanon 6 times since 1978. In
2006 ISRAEL killed 1300 civilians and destroyed
entire villages.If those are not war crimes, then
what are they? Israel threw 100,000 cluster bombs
in the last 72 hours of the war maiming,wounding
and killing innocents.âIsraelâs uniformed
soldiers should not dieâ but death to us.Racism
at its best.Ironically,Israel often repeated that
Arabs understand the language of force it seems
that it is the one that only understands the language of force.
Samira
United States 16/07/2008
Heros?
"...liberation of...heroes". Heroes?Samir Kuntar
murdered 3 people, including a 3 1/2 year old
girl. In what twisted mind can such a man be
considered a hero? Israel glorifies human life
while Hezbollah leaders glorify plain Israeli
suffering. What reason is there to play with
peopleâs minds and hearts and giving them hope
that their sons are alive? When killing Israelis
is the main value of a movement (rather than
coexistence), there's very little hope for
resolution to this ongoing conflict.
Pierre Jonvoux
France 16/07/2008
Israel has been defeated!
It is great that Lebanon is rejoicing as it well
should! The Israeli capitalist war machine has
been defeated by a poor people's militia!! Hurrah
to Freedom! As for Mr.Mike's comment about war
crimes, it is consistent with western hypocrisy.
He suggests Hezbollah should be prosecuted for
the death of 2 Israeli soldiers, but Israel has
nothing to account for the massacre of 1,000
innocent unarmed civilians! The hypocrisy of
people like Mike is shameful to say the least.
mohammed El Haq
Morocco 16/07/2008
answer to the first comment
It is ironic that an American dares talking about
war crimes! Hizballah has behaved within the
accepted standards of war. Why not talking about
the 800 Palestinians kidnapped by the Israelis?
Why not talk about the bombing of civilian areas
by the Israeli army? Why not talking anout the
Israeli minister of defense showing and
mutilating the corpse of a Palistinian fighter ( the hero Dalal Al Moghrabi)?
Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
415 863-9977
www.Freedomarchives.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/news_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20080716/6a24eca4/attachment.htm>
More information about the News
mailing list