Five eagles were set free from the Carmel wildlife reserve yesterday, including among them Mendelssohn, the first eagle chick to hatch in the reserve after 53 years.

Named after the late Heinrich Mendelssohn, one of Israel's leading zoologists, Mendelssohn had been returned to the wild over a year ago and settled on Mount Carmel. But the rocket volleys during the Second Lebanon War - which caused many bush and forest fires on the mountain - scared him away, and Mendelssohn was believed to have left the country in search of a more calm nesting area.

The transmitter attached to Mendelssohn's body stopped working, and all contact with him was cut off.

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Mendelssohn returned to the reserve two months ago, and was observed sitting on the roof of the cage in which he had grown up. He was captured and examined, then joined the four eagles that had been brought to the reserve for fitting with transmitters.

All the eagles received special wing tags to help identify them from the ground during their flight.

"Monitoring eagles is part of our work to preserve and nurture the eagle community in Israel, and helps us to prevent attempts to harm the eagles, like poisoning," said Eli Amitai, director of Israel Nature and National Parks Protection Authority.

Amitai said the eagles in the north suffered over the past year from the war and poisoning. "We hope to restore the eagle community and return to the time in which many raptors, especially eagles, were seen in Israel's sky," he said.