Elhanan Tannenbaum, a disgraced former Israeli colonel who was held prisoner by Hezbollah for several years, died on Monday. He was 78.
Tannenbaum, whom Hezbollah captured in 2000 and freed in 2004 as part of an exchange deal with Israel, confessed after his release to traveling to Brussels and Dubai as a consultant to a would-be drug dealer from Lebanon.
A colonel in the reserves who initially after his release claimed to have been on a mission to track down missing Israeli Air Force navigator Ron Arad, Tannenbaum was abducted in Dubai and taken to Lebanon, where Hezbollah held him. Tannenbaum was trying to earn $150,000 to pay back a gambling debt. He was demoted to private.
Israel freed 436 Palestinian and Lebanese prisoners, many of them terrorists, in exchange for Tannenbaum and the bodies of three Israel Defense Forces troops killed and taken by Hezbollah in 2000.
The terrorists freed in the exchange are believed to have been responsible for killing dozens of Israelis. The deal for Tannenbaum’s release was among Israel’s most controversial swaps.
