Flyer Alive After 17 Years
September 28, 2003
Herald Sun Sunday
Jay Bushinsky
An Israel Air Force navigator missing for 17 years is alive in an isolated Iranian jail, according to a secret report. The family of Lt-Col Ron Arad believed he had died after ejecting from his stricken Phantom fighter-bomber over Lebanon in 1986.
Now they have taken court action to force the Israeli Government to reveal findings of the report that Arad is alive.
They hope he will be released from Iran next month as part of a prisoner exchange being worked out between Israel and Lebanon's Hizbollah militia.
The report, by a special committee set up last year, contradicts previous statements by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon that the only missing Israeli still alive was businessman Elhanan Tannenbaum.
Mr Sharon hinted this week he would be able to pluck several "cards" from Europe's deck of suspected Muslim terrorists to exchange for information about Arad.
"We have good bargaining chips, in which the Iranians are interested, and in which Hizbollah is very, very, very interested," said Mr Sharon.
The pending prisoner exchange deal being formulated with a German intermediary would see 400 Lebanese, Syrian, Jordanian and Palestinian captives released in return for Tannenbaum and the corpses of three Israeli soldiers. Arad's release is not yet part of the deal.
The Israeli High Court yesterday ordered the Government to release a censored copy of the report on Arad.
The report is said to conclude Arad was captured by the Shiite Amal militia and sold two years later to Iranian Revolutionary Guards.
The navigator's brother, Dudu Arad, told the Jerusalem Post yesterday: "The report states Ron is alive, and we must do everything to ensure his return. I'm sorry to say the report is currently on the prime minister's desk, and is being ignored. Israel is sacrificing Ron. The report must be implemented, and if the Government chooses to bury it, it is also burying Ron.
"We will turn this country upside down to get the Government to do all in its power for Ron's return."
The Arad family last week took action in a bid to stall the prisoner exchange.
Among prisoners to be released is Hizbollah official Mustafa Dirani, snatched by Israel in 1994. Arad's family has filed suit against Dirani, who is said to have sold Arad to the Iranians.
"We will fight to the end to ensure that Dirani isn't released," Arad's other brother, Chen, told the Post.
"This lawsuit is the only means of holding Dirani here. I feel as if I am at war.
"Ron is a soldier. Israel does not abandon it's soldiers."
http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,7391083%255E663,00.htmlPer Amy Waters Yarsinske No One Left Behind: The Lt. Commander Michael Scott Speicher Story he, too, is alive.