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CNN Live At Daybreak
Trading Prisoners, Israel-Hezbollah Swap
Aired January 29, 2004 - 06:03 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: As we've told you, despite this latest violence, a prisoner exchange will take place. Some 400 Arab prisoners will be released in exchange for an Israeli businessman and the bodies of three Israeli soldiers.
We want to take you live to Beirut and Brent Sadler (AUDIO GAP).
BRENT SADLER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning. Carol.
Well, that attack in Jerusalem is certainly casting a shadow of uncertainty over a very convoluted prisoner swap. Let's take you to some pictures we've just had in recently from a checkpoint leading to Hebron in the West Bank, where hundreds of Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli jails will be sent to their homes in the territories in the coming hours -- this, part of a multi-faceted exchange of the living and the dead involving Israel and also Hezbollah, the military Lebanese group.
What you have on the ground happening, the nuts and bolts of this deal -- which has really been the subject of anguished debate in Israel about the wisdom of such a deal -- sees the return to Israel of three bodies of soldiers abducted originally by Hezbollah on a cross- border, a bloody cross-border raid some three years ago; just confirmed really in the past 24 hours that those soldiers are dead. Also, the release of the living, in terms of Israel, and that is a Reservist Army colonel called Elhanan Tannenbaum, a businessman who may have been kidnapped by Hezbollah as part of an overseas sting operation.
This is what Tannebaum had to say -- the first time we've seen him now in over three years -- when he was interviewed by a Hezbollah TV interviewer while he was still in captivity, of course, here in Beirut. Let's listen to Tannenbaum.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ELHANAN TANNENBAUM, ISRAELI BUSINESSMAN (through translator): I never considered Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, but my view has changed further. Their humanitarian treatment of me and the food I got and their treatment of things I have said definitely changed my view of them. I now have a much more humanitarian image of the Hezbollah than I had before.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SADLER: Israeli officials will point out that that interview was done when Tannenbaum was in captivity; therefore, arguably under distress.
Now, in terms of what happens elsewhere, the most famous of Israel's missing is an aviator called Ron Arad, who really is the background behind why Israel was abducting a couple of top Hezbollah officials 10 and 15 years ago. The fate of Ron Arad, who was shot down in 1986, Arad not part of this deal. But those who were kidnapped by the Israelis, though, to be held as bargaining chips are being released in this deal.
So, you can understand it's taken years, Carol, of secret and very, very tough bargaining, with the Germans acting as interlocutor, to set this deal in place -- a deal now going on even as the ramifications of this latest terror strike in Jerusalem are now being felt here in the region -- Carol.
COSTELLO: Such a complicated situation. Stick with me for just a moment. We have new pictures to show our viewers. This is of Israel turning over the remains of 60 Lebanese militants. That's also part of the deal. An Israeli military truck, as you see, took the bodies to Israel's northern border with Lebanon, and looking like pallbearers. Israeli soldiers carried the coffins one by one, placed the wooden boxes into a Red Cross truck, and then that rumbled through a border crossing.
I wanted to ask you about those negotiations between Israel and the terrorist group, Hezbollah. Doesn't this give Hezbollah legitimacy, Brent?
SADLER: Absolutely, Carol. Observers on the ground here are reinforcing the point that Israel, through the Germans, has been negotiating with Hezbollah. And Hezbollah is really making the most of this, exploiting the Islamic resistance for, what they say, forcing under pressure the Israeli state to release hundreds of Palestinians and key players in the whole sad, sorry business of (UNINTELLIGIBLE) or hostage-taking over the past 10 to 15 years.
Indeed, Hezbollah will capitalize on this, and in villages right across Lebanon this day you are seeing celebrations for what will effectively be portrayed here as the return home of heroes, if you like, of the Islamic resistance.
And also when those first Lebanese start coming here in the airport in the coming hours, you're going to have the president of Lebanon, Emile Lahood, the prime minister, Rafik Hariri, and the speaker of the parliament, Nabih Berri, representing the main religious groups here, all at the airport for these formal ceremonies to receive the first Lebanese prisoners.
And those bodies you mentioned, 59 of them, resistance fighters killed during Israel's occupation of South Lebanon that ended three years ago, those are coming across the border.
So, you can see just how complicated it's been to put this deal together on a day such as this coming to fruition when a suicide bomber has again struck in Jerusalem -- Carol.
COSTELLO: All right, Brent Sadler reporting live for us from Beirut, Lebanon, this morning.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.
Aired January 29, 2004 - 06:03 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: As we've told you, despite this latest violence, a prisoner exchange will take place. Some 400 Arab prisoners will be released in exchange for an Israeli businessman and the bodies of three Israeli soldiers.
We want to take you live to Beirut and Brent Sadler (AUDIO GAP).
BRENT SADLER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning. Carol.
Well, that attack in Jerusalem is certainly casting a shadow of uncertainty over a very convoluted prisoner swap. Let's take you to some pictures we've just had in recently from a checkpoint leading to Hebron in the West Bank, where hundreds of Palestinian prisoners released from Israeli jails will be sent to their homes in the territories in the coming hours -- this, part of a multi-faceted exchange of the living and the dead involving Israel and also Hezbollah, the military Lebanese group.
What you have on the ground happening, the nuts and bolts of this deal -- which has really been the subject of anguished debate in Israel about the wisdom of such a deal -- sees the return to Israel of three bodies of soldiers abducted originally by Hezbollah on a cross- border, a bloody cross-border raid some three years ago; just confirmed really in the past 24 hours that those soldiers are dead. Also, the release of the living, in terms of Israel, and that is a Reservist Army colonel called Elhanan Tannenbaum, a businessman who may have been kidnapped by Hezbollah as part of an overseas sting operation.
This is what Tannebaum had to say -- the first time we've seen him now in over three years -- when he was interviewed by a Hezbollah TV interviewer while he was still in captivity, of course, here in Beirut. Let's listen to Tannenbaum.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ELHANAN TANNENBAUM, ISRAELI BUSINESSMAN (through translator): I never considered Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, but my view has changed further. Their humanitarian treatment of me and the food I got and their treatment of things I have said definitely changed my view of them. I now have a much more humanitarian image of the Hezbollah than I had before.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SADLER: Israeli officials will point out that that interview was done when Tannenbaum was in captivity; therefore, arguably under distress.
Now, in terms of what happens elsewhere, the most famous of Israel's missing is an aviator called Ron Arad, who really is the background behind why Israel was abducting a couple of top Hezbollah officials 10 and 15 years ago. The fate of Ron Arad, who was shot down in 1986, Arad not part of this deal. But those who were kidnapped by the Israelis, though, to be held as bargaining chips are being released in this deal.
So, you can understand it's taken years, Carol, of secret and very, very tough bargaining, with the Germans acting as interlocutor, to set this deal in place -- a deal now going on even as the ramifications of this latest terror strike in Jerusalem are now being felt here in the region -- Carol.
COSTELLO: Such a complicated situation. Stick with me for just a moment. We have new pictures to show our viewers. This is of Israel turning over the remains of 60 Lebanese militants. That's also part of the deal. An Israeli military truck, as you see, took the bodies to Israel's northern border with Lebanon, and looking like pallbearers. Israeli soldiers carried the coffins one by one, placed the wooden boxes into a Red Cross truck, and then that rumbled through a border crossing.
I wanted to ask you about those negotiations between Israel and the terrorist group, Hezbollah. Doesn't this give Hezbollah legitimacy, Brent?
SADLER: Absolutely, Carol. Observers on the ground here are reinforcing the point that Israel, through the Germans, has been negotiating with Hezbollah. And Hezbollah is really making the most of this, exploiting the Islamic resistance for, what they say, forcing under pressure the Israeli state to release hundreds of Palestinians and key players in the whole sad, sorry business of (UNINTELLIGIBLE) or hostage-taking over the past 10 to 15 years.
Indeed, Hezbollah will capitalize on this, and in villages right across Lebanon this day you are seeing celebrations for what will effectively be portrayed here as the return home of heroes, if you like, of the Islamic resistance.
And also when those first Lebanese start coming here in the airport in the coming hours, you're going to have the president of Lebanon, Emile Lahood, the prime minister, Rafik Hariri, and the speaker of the parliament, Nabih Berri, representing the main religious groups here, all at the airport for these formal ceremonies to receive the first Lebanese prisoners.
And those bodies you mentioned, 59 of them, resistance fighters killed during Israel's occupation of South Lebanon that ended three years ago, those are coming across the border.
So, you can see just how complicated it's been to put this deal together on a day such as this coming to fruition when a suicide bomber has again struck in Jerusalem -- Carol.
COSTELLO: All right, Brent Sadler reporting live for us from Beirut, Lebanon, this morning.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com.
