Hizbullah claimed another significant victory in its struggle with Israel this week, proclaiming it a "gift to Arabs and Palestinians", reports Mohalhel Fakih from Beirut Israel and Hizbullah have simultaneously confirmed a German announcement that both sides agreed to resolve one of their most sticking disputes following Israel's May 2000 pullout from southern Lebanon. Today, Israel will release 23 Lebanese prisoners, including prominent figures Sheikh Abdel-Karim Obeid and Hajj Mustafa Dirani, 400 Palestinians, and 12 other Arab prisoners, as well as a German citizen that Israel claims is a member of Hizbullah. In exchange, Hizbullah will release Israeli businessman and army reserve colonel Elhanan Tannenbaum, and three soldiers whom the group captured in 2000. On Friday, Israel will return the bodies of 59 Lebanese and Palestinian fighters. Hizbullah Secretary-General Sayed Hassan Nasrallah told a news conference in Beirut on Sunday, that the Lebanese and a number of Arab detainees will be flown to Beirut. The Palestinians, he said, will return to the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Nasrallah added, his group will deliver the four Israelis to a German mediator in Lebanon on Thursday. He refused to say whether the three soldiers are alive. Israel has declared them dead. Nasrallah, whose group and its backers Lebanon, Syria and Iran, have been coming under intense international pressure to disarm its fighters, said the deal was a "gift to all the Arabs", especially "the Palestinian people". Nasrallah had pledged to Lebanese and Arabs, in a series of televised addresses last year, to win the release of all the Lebanese and Arabs that Israel has been holding, including Samir Qontar, the longest-serving prisoner in Israel. He was detained for a 1979 attack in Israel, and will not be released on Thursday. "Samir will be Hizbullah's central issue in the coming weeks," Nasrallah said. He promised to extract the release of Qontar, a Druze Lebanese, in the next two or three months. Nasrallah had met with the Druze leader, the head of the Progressive Socialist Party, MP Walid Jumblatt, to update him on the deal before it was announced. Druze politicians in Beirut were quick to hail the accord. After meeting Nasrallah on Sunday night, Culture Minister Ghazi Aridi, a prominent Druze official, described the swap agreement as successful. "The latest accomplishment proves that the resistance is an Arab and Islamic resistance," Aridi told reporters. He said Nasrallah is "committed" to the release of Qontar. Hizbullah and Israel will be engaged, through German mediators, in a second phase of negotiations to free Qontar, and determine the whereabouts of Israeli airman Ron Arad, whose plane was shot down over Lebanon in 1986, and four Iranian diplomats. They were kidnapped during Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon, the bloody climax of the 1975-1990 civil war. On Friday, Israel will deliver the bodies of the Lebanese across the volatile border in southern Lebanon, which witnessed heightened tensions last week, after Hizbullah attacked a bulldozer that crossed the United Nations-demarcated "Blue Line". An Israeli soldier was killed and another was wounded in the incident, drawing Israeli shelling of targets in Lebanon, with no casualties. Although the UN confirmed that the bulldozer had crossed into Lebanon, the US blamed Hizbullah for the latest bout of violence, describing it as a terrorist group that has been impeding peace moves in the region. It reiterated calls on Lebanon to deploy the national army along the frontier. France, a traditional ally of Beirut, also urged the government to send its soldiers to the border. Lebanon has so far refrained from sending security forces all the way to Israel's border in the absence of a peace agreement. Beirut stood firmly behind Hizbullah, saying it remains a "legitimate" resistance movement engaged in a struggle to oust Israel from the Shebaa Farms region. The UN has declared the Shebaa Farms to be occupied Syrian territory, but Lebanon and Syria both say the disputed area is Lebanese land. Despite the recent flare-up of violence and tough US statements in condemnation of Hizbullah, President Emile Lahoud hailed the swap as a "clear recognition" by Israel of Hizbullah as a "legitimate power". "The liberation of the prisoners and detainees through this method of negotiation is a clear recognition by Israel that the resistance is legitimate and national and is not a foreign terrorist movement ... otherwise it would not have negotiated through a friendly nation and with the knowledge of Lebanese authorities," Lahoud said. Hizbullah's media trumpeted the accord as a "victory" for the group and another milestone following the liberation of southern Lebanon in May 2000. Hizbullah had led the campaign to oust Israeli troops from the occupied region. Al-Manar television correspondents interviewed the families of prisoners who will be released today. Many, especially in the occupied Palestinian territories, decorated their homes with portraits of Sayed Nasrallah. In Beirut, newspapers heaped praise on the group. As in May 2000, Hizbullah's triumph was declared an "Arab and Islamic victory". "This achievement by Hizbullah will not be forgotten by any Lebanese or Arab," former Lebanese Prime Minister Selim Hoss said in a statement. The Christian opposition also welcomed the accord. "This file will not be fully closed until a just and comprehensive settlement to the Middle East conflict is reached, to end confrontations ... and to put an end to Israeli aggressions on Lebanese territories," opposition MP Boutros Harb was quoted as saying. But Nasrallah did not make any such commitment to pursue a holistic solution to the conflicts of the Middle East, preferring to focus on Lebanon for the time being. "The resistance has many options to pursue the liberation of detainees and Lebanese land that remains under occupation," Hizbullah's chief said. He added, Hizbullah is "ready to kidnap more Israeli soldiers if the need arises".
