Copyright 2003 Haaretz
September 30
HEADLINE: High Court postpones prisoner swap ruling until Oct. 9
BYLINE:Jonathan Lis, Haaretz Correspondent, and Haaretz Service
The High Court of Justice on Tuesday postponed
until October 9 its ruling on a petition against a
prisoner swap that would include Lebanese militant
Mustafa Dirani.
The petition was brought by the
family of missing Air Force
navigator Ron Arad, which is
seeking an interim injunction
to prevent the state from
including Lebanese militant
Mustafa Dirani in a prisoner
swap with Hezbollah.
The Arad family believes that
Dirani is too important a bargaining chip to be
released without any information being offered
on the missing navigator in exchange for
Dirani's release.
The petition asked that the deal be delayed at
least until the family has a chance to review
the Vinograd report, which contains details on
Ron Arad's case since he went missing 17 years
ago.
The High Court ruled last Friday that Ron Arad's
family must receive a copy of the report, but
the copy submitted to the family will be
censored for sensitive military information.
The Arad family is expected to receive the
modified report by the end of the week.
The Vinograd committee was appointed last year
to review Arad's case, and determined that
there is no available information that refutes
the defense establishment's working assumption
that the navigator is still alive.
Earlier in the month, three of Arad's relatives
filed a NIS 100 million lawsuit against Dirani,
one of the Lebanese captives whom Israel is
reportedly planning to release as part of the
prisoner exchange now being negotiated with
Hezbollah.
The family is suing Dirani for damages resulting
from the "shocking and inhumane" acts to which
Ron Arad was subjected, including assault,
wrongful imprisonment and selling him to the
Iranian Revolutionary Guards who took him to
southern Iran where the trail ends. The family
says that Dirani, who held Arad for at least
two years, thus thwarted efforts to free Arad
and is demanding NIS 100 million in damages.
Arad has been missing for the last 17 years,
when his plane went down over southern Lebanon
in October 1986.
The petition states that Dirani, whom Israel
kidnapped in 1994, was involved in snatching
Arad from the Amal militia group in October
1987 and sold him to Iranian agents a few years
later.
A number of reports say that as part of a deal
with Hezbollah, said to be about a week away,
Israel would release Dirani and another
Lebanese militant leader, Abdel Karim Obeid,
kidnapped in 1989, as well as other
Palestinian, Lebanese and Syrian prisoners.
The Lebanese newspaper al-Mustaqbal has reported
that the prisoner swap with Hezbollah was
likely to take place on Yom Kippur, October 6.
This would mark the 30th anniversary of the Yom
Kippur War, seen in the Arab world as an
important victory over Israel.