Israeli PM predicts tough decisions in prisoners swap talks with Hamas

JERUSALEM, June 30 (Xinhua) -- Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Monday his country will have to make difficult decisions in the negotiations with Hamas to bring back a kidnapped soldier.

Two years after Hamas-affiliated militants captured Gilad Shalit in a cross-border raid, "the negotiations for Shalit are being finalized," but the solution "won't be simple, easy or quick," Olmert said at a party meeting.

"Difficult decisions will have to be made here as well," he added, in reference to the prisoners swap deal with Lebanese militant group Hezbollah. Israeli cabinet approved Sunday the deal amid warnings that such an accord might lead to more kidnapping attempts against Israelis.

Under the deal, the Jewish state will release five Hezbollah members in return for two Israeli soldiers taken away by the group two years ago, or their bodies as Olmert has declared that the two captives are no longer alive.

The two soldiers, Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, were captured by Hezbollah militants in a deadly cross-border raid on July 12, 2006 which triggered a 34-day war in Lebanon.

The prime minister said he stood behind the decision "because I wanted the sons at home, and I particularly did not want to create a similar situation to that of Ron Arad," a pilot whose fighter plane crashed in Lebanon in 1986 and whose condition is still unknown since then. The swap deal requires Hezbollah to provide a report about Arad.

Israel and Hamas reached an Egypt-brokered truce earlier this month, which requires the parties to step up negotiations on Shalit's release. Yet this track is anything but immune from the Hezbollah track.

"I'm afraid Hamas, drawing a lesson from this deal, will harden its position," Housing Minister Zeev Boim, one of the three ministers to vote against the Hezbollah swap, told Israel Army Radio. Finance Minister Ronnie Bar-On, another opponent to the swap, warned that the price for Shalit will become so high that it will be difficult to pay it.

Just reflecting Boim's worries, senior Hamas member Mahmoud Zahar told the independent Al-Quds radio that Hamas should take advantage of Israel's decision "to release people Israel accused of having blood on their hands."

Hamas has demanded Israel to release hundreds of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails, while Israel has rejected many of the names on Hamas' list because they have been involved in deadly attacks against Israelis.

However, Amos Gilad, Israel's pointman in the Egyptian-brokered Shalit negotiations, told Israel Army Radio that the deal with Hezbollah would have no effect on the Shalit talks.

"Hamas' demands regarding Gilad Shalit have been known for sometime," he said, adding that "they haven't been influenced by the contacts with Hezbollah."

Meanwhile, Defense Minister Ehud Barak told a Labor party meeting that Israel has "a high moral obligation to return soldiers," alive or dead, adding that the same principle will guide the government in the talks on Shalit, who is believed to be still alive.