Today's Situation

Besieged Thursday, September 07, 2006

But Olmert’s office issued a statement saying that the only promise he made about the siege, which has been in place since the war broke out on July 12, was that it would be lifted when there were international troops in place to make sure Hizbollah does not try to smuggle the two soldiers, Goldwasser and Regev, out of Lebanon, presumably to Iran.

That is what is popularly assumed to have happened to navigator Ron Arad, missing for the last 20 years. Captured in 1986 in south Lebanon when his plane was shot down by Amal militiamen, he was held by Amal until they handed him over to Hizbollah, who some time later apparently handed him over to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards in Lebanon at the time. Since then, all contact with Arad’s captors dried up, though there were hints and rumors that the Mossad and German mediators followed up into the mid-1990s, leading nowhere.

The Ron Arad case is in the forefront of the minds of everyone dealing with the case of the missing soldiers, not least because of a Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation documentary that over the last two nights has been broadcast on Channel 10, the liberal-commercial channel owned by among others Arnon Milchan. The documentary includes never before seen footage of Arad smoking a cigarette, telling an interrogator in English what he studied in flight training school. The images are believed to be from the period he was held by Amal. For Israeli intelligence, the video is a terrible embarrassment. For several years there has been a $10 million reward for information about what happened to Arad, with no takers. Israel and Hizbollah’s most recently prisoner exchange deal explicitly included an article in which Hizbollah would provide any information it had about Arad’s fate -- and in the documentary, Hassan Nasrallah speaks openly about sending bone fragments to Israel for DNA testing. There are at least two embarrassing questions they are asking now in the Mossad and Military Intelligence. If this video of Arad was floating around for 18 years, how much more information is floating around? And if Nasrallah had access to the videotape showing Arad, why didn’t he offer it to the Israelis in the second part of the deal for Elhanan Tennenbaum and three dead soldiers in exchange for a first round of Lebanese prisoner releases, to be followed by the release of Samir Kuntar, convicted in an Israeli court for the cold-blooded murder of an off-duty policeman and his toddler son during a botched terror operation in Nahariya in the 1970s. Nasrallah has explained that the kidnapping on July 12 was meant to circumvent his problem that he did not have any more information about the missing navigator. He wanted Israeli hostages to trade for Kuntar, who has become somewhat of a hero in Hizbollah circles, mostly because of all the attention he has been getting.

But while the Arad case is bothersome, something even more worrying has come up for the top tier of the army. According to Ze’ev Schiff of Haaretz this morning, two top IDF officers, operations chief Maj. Gen. Gadi Eisencot and Intelligence’s research boss Brig. Gen. Yossi Beiditz, were vehemently opposed to the plan to launch a broad ground invasion of Lebanon just hours before the UN was to decide on a ceasefire. They were so opposed, that they not only spoke out in meetings, but Beiditz sent a letter to Olmert and to Defense Minister Peretz, citing his concerns. Chief of Staff Halutz was reportedly furious about the brigadier leapfrogging him to complain directly to the political echelon.

That kind of incident won’t look good in any inquiry that ever gets going, whether it is Olmert’s preferred toothless blue ribbon panel or the judicial inquiry headed by a Supreme Court justice, with powers to subpoena, grant immunity, and make recommendations for ministers as well as senior officers, to be removed from office.

Meanwhile, the increasingly jingoistic tabloid Maariv reported today that Olmert is growing impatient with Peretz -- but not as defense minister, rather as Labor Party leader. Peretz is having a difficult time maintaining discipline in a party that senses his blood in the water because of the war and its alleged mismanagement (even though he says his performance was beyond reproach and those to be blamed for the poor performances by troops were his predecessors, who held office for years, not six weeks, before the war broke out). With the 2007 budget votes beginning shortly, the Maariv headline seemed to be a message to Peretz to prove he has faction under control. Not that Olmert has much choice instead of Labor. He needs Yisrael Beitenu plus the Likud, which he won’t get because Netanyahu has his own plans to leverage the anticipated disintegration of Kadima into a new Rightist-Religious coalition. So, instead of the Likud, Olmert could turn to the radical-Rightist National Union bloc, but that would scotch any plans he might have for political overtures toward any Arabs in the coming three years.

And speaking of overtures, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni has now weighed in with a call for talks with PA President Mahmoud Abbas. Will it happen soon? It surely won’t take place without the return of abducted corporal Gilad Shalit. Will that take place soon? The current betting is that might happen in time for Ramadan, which this year coincides with the Jewish New Year holidays, so that Israel could release a few hundred prisoners in time for the Muslim holiday.

One technical problem that might get in the way of things. Formally, the president is supposed to sign clemencies for any prisoners released before their sentence is over. But President Moshe Katsav was being questioned again today by police about his demands for apparently violent sexual favors from women who worked for him. He keeps denying he did anything wrong. But police sources are consistent, telling all the media that it’s no longer one woman’s word against the smalltown mayor turned Likud MK and minister who became the country’s ceremonial and symbolic leader. In fact, it seems the police have at least five other women who have told them about Katsav’s predilections.

Today's Situation || Yesterday's Situation