Israel remains deadlocked with the United Nations over the future of a videotape, filmed by UNIFIL forces the day after the kidnapping of three IDF soldiers in southern Lebanon in October 2000. While Israel demands that the U.N. provide Israel with an unedited version of the tape, the U.N. is only willing to allow Israeli representatives to view, and not receive, an edited version.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon telephoned U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan Monday night and demanded that the organization turn over to Israel all material that could possibly shed light on the fate of the kidnapped Israeli soldiers. Annan reiterated the U.N.'s refusal to hand over an unedited version of the videotape. Since then, the United Nations has apparently hardened its position, and does not plan to provide Israel with a copy of the tape at all.

"We're caught in the middle here," said a spokesman for

"The Israeli Defense Ministry… wants something we are not willing to provide." - U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard

the U.N. Secretary-General, Fred Eckhard, at a press briefing at U.N. headquarters in New York this week. "The Israeli Defense Ministry… wants something we are not willing to provide." Eckhard stressed that the U.N. offer to let Israel view an edited version of the tape remains on the table.

The United Nations is trying to remain neutral in the Israel-Lebanon dispute, a position that Israel cannot accept when the lives of hostages are at stake. Defense Minister Benyamin Ben-Eliezer found the equal treatment accorded by the U.N. to Israel and the Lebanese representatives to be "inappropriate and inexplicable."

In a letter addressed to Annan on Sunday, Ben-Eliezer said, "Not only was Israel the only party to inquire about and request the video film, it was the victim of an unprovoked attack originating from Lebanese territory in clear breach of the Security Council resolution that Israel has fully endorsed and implemented." Ben-Eliezer said that in a case where Israeli nationals were abducted and being held incommunicado for over nine months in Lebanon, "applying a symmetrical yardstick to both sides discriminates against the victim in favor of the aggressor."

The United States yesterday backed Israel's demands to receive the videotape. U.S. envoy Cameron Hume argued for the tapes at a closed U.N. Security Council briefing. "On balance it would be best that the tapes would be released undoctored and unedited,'' Hume told Reuters after the meeting.

Could the U.N. have prevented the kidnapping?
President Moshe Katsav asked on Monday afternoon whether the U.N. had taken all the necessary steps to prevent the kidnapping. "In my innocence I thought the United Nations was an institution that leads in all matters dealing with returning captured soldiers home," Katsav said.

Maj. Gen Uzi Dayan, head of the National Security Council, told an Israeli Channel Two news program Monday night that "it appears that the UNIFIL men could have done a lot more to foil the abduction."

Many of the media reports in Israel have focused on the role of the Indian contingent in UNIFIL. Some Israeli journalists have raised suspicions that Indian soldiers had been bribed by the Hizbullah to look the other way when the abduction took place. According to Ha'aretz, there is growing concern in the Israeli Foreign Affairs Ministry and in the Israeli embassy in India that the growing controversy may sour relations between India and Israel. One prominent Indian daily, the Hindu, headlined its coverage of the subject: "Israel trying to drag Indian Army into conflict."

Hizbullah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah claimed that Israel would not gain any information about the fate and condition of the three Israeli soldiers and the one citizen held hostage in Lebanon by viewing the U.N. videotape. Speaking to a gathering in Beirut, Nasrallah said the Hizbullah rejects "the United Nations' turning over the videotape filmed on Lebanese soil. To us, this act puts the UN forces in the category of espionage on behalf of the enemy and providing it with information."

Jean-Marie Guehenno, the U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping, insisted at yesterday's Security Council briefing that the videotape did not give any clues regarding the kidnapping. If that is the case, Israelis continue to wonder what motivates the United Nations' refusal to provide an unedited copy of the tape.

© 2001 Koret Communications Ltd. All rights reserved. Terms of Use.