MIA's families challenge Sharon

JERUSALEM, Nov. 2 (UPI) -- The anguish of the families of three Israeli soldiers the Lebanese Hezbollah abducted 13 months ago erupted Thursday at a meeting with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon the moment he told them he believed their loved ones were dead.

Hezbollah has persistently denied International Red Cross and others' requests for access to the soldiers and information on their fate. However the Israel Defense Forces said this week that new, reliable intelligence it received led it to conclude "with a high probability" that the three are dead.

Sharon hosted the families round the cabinet table and found himself under a torrent of anger the moment he said the government believes, "They are not among the living."

"I don't believe you! You have no proof!"Adi Avitan's mother, Zipora, called out.

Disdainfully pushing a sheet of paper on the table she said: "I don't want them to bring you a drawing on a page and tell you, Prime Minister, here is the proof. No! I want you to see them!"

"You say you have a slight doubt and you are abandoning them," Adi Avitan's brother, Eyal, charged.

An Indian soldier serving with UNIFIL took pictures around the time of the abduction and the Maariv newspaper quoted the Avitan family as saying they show at least two soldiers leave the area on their feet. "Every child in the village of Chebaa (in Lebanon) saw that cassette," Adi Avitan's father, Yaakov, told Maariv.

Benny Avraham's father, Haim, told Sharon: "All year long they told me nothing and now they say "Your son is not alive.'"

"The IDF didn't carry out one operation to return our sons!" he reportedly added.

Part of the time Sharon sat with his head bowed. "You are talking out of pain," he said.

"It was a failure from the first moment," Zipora Avitan slammed. A military inquiry showed a series of military mistakes that led to the soldiers' approach to the border fence where they were bombed and abducted.

Sharon denied Israel was abandoning Israeli prisoners of war. He argued the Israel Defense Forces "had the courage, honesty and responsibility to tell the truth as painful as it may be. It wasn't simple."

The army's Chief Chaplain, Brigadier General Israel Weiss, is now holding consultations whether to formally declare the soldiers dead. The families are trying to dissuade him from doing so.

"Don't take away our hope," Efrat Avraham appealed to Sharon. "Let us have the slight hope that we still have in our hearts; the one hope that keeps us still alive. Look at the families. They have no strength, Prime Minister. Their eyes are dry from so much crying."

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