LEBANON: Lebanese television to broadcast documentary containing unseen footage of Ron Arad, Israeli navigator missing in action over Lebanon in 1986

Lebanon Broadcasting Corporation (LBC) announced it will air the documentary containing unseen footage of Ron Arad on September 6. The channel is already running a trailer of the programme showing black and white footage of Arad against a wall. Elie I. Harb, LBC assistant editor in chief, believes the footage were taken one or two years after his plane was shot down over Lebanon in 1986. The footage shows a bearded man bearing close resemblance to Arad. The fate of the missing pilot has been the source of speculation in Israeli for the last twenty years. "The idea was born in the last year, 2005. So, we did have footage, we were in contact with a famous journalist in Lebanon who is Ibrahim al Amin. So, he did contact us and told us that he got footage and he would like, I don't know, to do a documentary about, about this issue. So we did take the idea, we did buy the footage and he did prepare it for us. So we did the work, the work take at least one year," Harb described, declining to confirm the amount paid for the footage. The documentary has created a stir in Israel. Harb played down its importance. "... If it wasn't, if we didn't have the ordeal in the last month, nobody would talk about it, I think so, we think so. May be there is too much talk because there was war, and because the situation now, because we are talking about exchanging the prisoners from both sides, this is the issue," Harb added. Harb also said the scheduling of the documentary three weeks after the end of the last war -- triggered by the capture of two Israeli soldiers by the Hizbollah -- was is a coincidence. He said the channel couldn't air it in June because of the World Cup, or in July and August because of the war. "In September, we have the Ramadan, so we will stop our documentaries and political shows for one month and a half. So we did think, we did take the decision, this is the timing, from... the first ten days of September. If we are talking about first of all commercially, this is the good, the good time. So we did take the decision, this is very simple... No more than that," Harb commented.

ITN Source | September 2, 2006

Tags:. .importance. .chief. .june. .didnt. .buy