Hizbullah fighters will resume operations to capture Israelis if Ariel Sharon's government rejects "a last chance" to negotiate an exchange of prisoners being held by both sides, the Lebanese movement's chieftain said Sunday.
"We will give the negotiations on the issue of prisoners and detainees a last chance," Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah said during a rally in the southern Lebanese village of Jibsheet to observe the 14th anniversary of Israel's kidnapping of a prominent Shiite leader, Sheikh Abdul-Karim Ubeid.
"After that, we will consider negotiations to have...reached a dead end and that the number (of Israelis we have in captivity) is not enough for a successful prisoners' exchange," Nasrallah declared.
"Then, we will work day and night to have in...(Hizbullah's) possession new Israeli captives."
In late 2000, Hizbullah said it had captured reserve officer Elhanan Tenenbaum, who it said was a Mossad agent. Nasrallah said on Sunday he would no longer reveal the condition of Tenenbaum. "I have said in the past that...Tenenbaum was alive because he came to Lebanon and did not come dead. His family has declared on more than one occasion that he had a dangerous illness and this is true and we were concerned with his health condition," he said.
© 2003 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
