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Last update - 12:23 06/08/2008
Israel frees 5 Palestinian prisoners in final stage of Hezbollah prisoner exchange
By The Associated Press, Reuters and Haaretz Service
Tags: palestinian prisoners 

Israel released on Wednesday five Palestinian prisoners as part of a swap deal with the Lebanese Hezbollah guerrilla group that brought the
bodies of two Israeli soldiers home in mid July.

The Israeli cabinet approved their release earlier this week, marking the final stage of the swap deal with Hezbollah. None of the released Palestinians was involved in deadly attacks against Israelis, Israeli officials said.
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Last month, Israel released five Lebanese prisoners, included notorious terrorist Samir Kuntar, in exchange for the bodies of Israel Defense Forces reservists Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, who were abducted by Hezbollah in a cross-border raid in July 2006.

Israel's Prisons Service said the five prisoners have left their prison in central Israel and made their way into the West Bank. All five are teenagers serving short sentences for throwing stones and were due to be freed next year, according to information published on the Israel Prisons Service Web site.

The five were driven midmorning from a prison in central Israel to the West Bank town of Tulkarem, where one of the group, 15-year-old Zakariya Shurbaji, told reporters they were only informed of their impending release a day earlier and were never told that it was part of the deal with Hezbollah.

By insisting on the release of a token number of Palestinians, Hezbollah
sought to bolster its standing beyond its core following of Shiite Muslims to the broader Arab world.

Four of the youngsters freed Wednesday said they were supporters of the
secular Palestinian nationalist Fatah movement and the fifth said he was
involved in the radical leftist Democratic Front for the Liberation of
Palestine.

Shurbaji said they were all grateful to Hezbollah's leader.

"I say thank you to Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah for all the efforts he made on our behalf," he said.

According to a source in Jerusalem, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert decided to release only five prisoners due to the unsatisfactory nature of Hezbollah's report on its efforts to determine the fate of missing Israel Air Force navigator Ron Arad, who disappeared after his plane was shot down over Lebanon in 1986. The report, part of the prisoner exchange deal, did not include any new information and was widely considered not to have met the deal's terms.

During a meeting with United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in Paris last month, Olmert announced that in light of the unsatisfactory report, Israel will only release a handful of prisoners, and will retain the sole right to determine their identities. Thereafter, Olmert told Ban, Israel will consider the prisoner swap as having been completed.

Related articles:
  • 5 more prisoners to be freed in last part of swap
  • Israel to Hezbollah: Forget Palestinian prisoners in swap for IDF soldiers
  • Hezbollah: Approval of swap deal shows our word is supreme
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      1.   Still 10995 Pal. in Israel prison 11:34  |  Dav 06/08/08
      2.   disgusting 11:50  |  disgusted 06/08/08
      3.   Correction: charged with weapons and stone throwing 13:32  |  Ilan 06/08/08
      4.   Correction: charged with weapons and stone throwing 13:33  |  Ilan 06/08/08
      5.   So Israel renegates on the deal 14:03  |  Sarah 06/08/08
      6.   well..... 14:06  |  rm 06/08/08
      7.   Don`t be surprised, Disgusted! 14:09  |  Jim 06/08/08
      8.   Dear Disgusted 15:14  |  Jameel @ The Muqata 06/08/08
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