Israel approves Hezbollah prisoner swap

JERUSALEM (CNN) -- Israel's Cabinet gave final approval Tuesday morning for a prisoner swap with Hezbollah which has been set for Wednesday, the government said.

A makeshift memorial shows captured soldiers Ehud Goldwasser, left, and Eldad Regev.

Although the Israeli government described this as a prisoner swap, many Israelis expect it to be an exchange of the bodies of two Israeli soldiers held by Hezbollah for five live prisoners held by Israel and the corpses of dozens of "infiltrators and terrorists" now in Israeli custody.

Under the exchange with the Lebanese Shiite Muslim militia, Hezbollah prisoners, including convicted murderer Sami Kuntar, would be traded for two kidnapped Israeli soldiers abducted in 2006 and presumed dead.

The abduction of those soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev sparked the 34-day war between Israel and Hezbollah two years ago.

Part of the agreement is a report from Hezbollah on the status of long-missing Israeli airman Ron Arad. That report was released recently, but Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert described it Monday as "absolutely unsatisfactory."

Although Israel's Cabinet approved the outline of the prisoner swap two weeks ago, it waited until it could review the Ron Arad report before granting final approval.

Arad was the navigator of an Israeli warplane that crashed in Lebanon in October 1986. His family's last contact with him came in 1987, and former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon promised the Arad family in 2004 that Kuntar would not be released unless Hezbollah provided information on Arad.

Kuntar has spent the last three decades in an Israeli jail for the deaths of four people in a terror attack in which an Israeli police officer, a father and his four-year-old daughter died. A two-year-old daughter suffocated as her mother tried to stop her from crying as they hid from Kuntar.

Along with Kuntar, four Lebanese fighters will be released and the bodies of what Israel says is "dozens of infiltrators and terrorists, including eight members of Hezbollah, will be delivered to Lebanon."

Information on four missing Iranian diplomats will be delivered by Israel to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. And Israel says Palestinian prisoners will be released after the deal is implemented.

"The number and identities of the prisoners will be determined at the sole discretion of the state of Israel," Israel said.