Israel moves Hezbollah prisoners ahead of swap

By Rami Amichai

HADARIM PRISON, Israel (Reuters) - Israel prepared on Monday for a prisoner swap with Hezbollah by moving four Lebanese guerrillas in its custody to a holding facility ahead of Wednesday's U.N.-mediated exchange.

Maher Qorani, Mohammad Srour, Hussein Suleiman and Khodr Zeidan were transferred from Ashmoret prison, near the coastal city of Netanya, where they have been held since their capture in the 2006 Lebanon war, to Hadarim jail some 11 kilometers (7 miles) away, a Prisons Services spokesman said.

There, they joined Samir Qantar, a Hadarim inmate who is also slated for release on Wednesday. Qantar, the most high-profile Lebanese prisoner in Israel, was jailed for life for killing a policeman, another man and his 4-year-old daughter in a raid in the northern Israeli town of Nahariya in 1979.

In return for releasing the five men, Israel will recover two of its soldiers, captured in a cross-border raid that triggered the 34-day war with the Iranian-backed group two years ago.

Hezbollah has given no word on the condition of the soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, although Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said they are probably dead.

Under the deal, negotiated by a German intelligence officer, Israel will also hand over the bodies of 200 Arabs killed while infiltrating northern Israel, and Hezbollah will return the remains of Israeli soldiers killed in south Lebanon in 2006.

A van with darkened windows transported the four prisoners to Hadarim prison. At the facility, they and Qantar will undergo medical tests before being driven to the border crossing at Naqoura, on the Mediterranean coast, for Wednesday's exchange.

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