"Thomas Sutherland (academic) Dr Thomas Sutherland (May 3, 1931 – July 22, 2016), Dean of Agriculture at the American University of Beirut in Lebanon, was kidnapped by Islamic Jihad members near his Beirut home on June 9, 1985. He was released on November 18, 1991 at the same time as Terry Waite, having been held hostage for 2,353 days. Born in Falkirk, Scotland on May 3, 1931, Sutherland was signed as a 17-year-old by Rangers F.C. Sutherland obtained a BSc in Agriculture from the University of Glasgow, and moved to the United States in the 1950s. He was received a"
"Yasser Arafat Mohammed Yasser Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini (; ; 24 August 1929 – 11 November 2004), popularly known as Yasser Arafat ( , ') or by his kunya Abu Ammar ( , '), was a Palestinian political leader. He was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from 1969 to 2004 and President of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) from 1994 to 2004. Ideologically an Arab nationalist, he was a founding member of the Fatah political party, which he led from 1959 until 2004. Arafat was born to Palestinian parents in Cairo, Egypt, where he spent"
"Lawrence Jenco Servite Father Lawrence Martin Jenco, (27 November 1934 - 19 July 1996), a native of Joliet, Illinois, United States, was an American Catholic priest famous for being held hostage in Beirut, Lebanon by Islamic radicals. He was held for 564 days before being released and allowed to return to the United States. He died in Illinois, of cancer, in 1996. He is buried in The Queen of Heaven Cemetery in Hillside, Illinois. Jenco was taken hostage in Beirut by five armed men on January 8, 1985, while serving as director of Catholic Relief Services there. In his book,"
"Benjamin Weir Benjamin Weir (December 20, 1923—October 14, 2016) was an American hostage in Lebanon (1985). Weir, who with his wife Carol served as missionaries in Lebanon with the Presbyterian Church (USA) for nearly 30 years, was kidnapped off the streets of Beirut in May 1984. The kidnapping was done by an Islamic fundamentalist group, Islamic Jihad, that later evolved into Hezbollah. He was freed 16 months later in exchange for US anti-tank weapons, as part of the Iran-Contra Affair. Shortly thereafter he was elected moderator of the 1986 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, the highest elected office in"
"Rizq, known as 'Akram', and Abdeh Raji, known as 'Captain', were involved in the abduction, with the latter commanding the checkpoint. According to Lebanese judiciary sources, the abducted individuals were imprisoned under the supervision of Elie Hobeika, then a Phalangist, in Karantina, Beirut for 20 days and were moved to the Adonis prison in Beirut. In the aftermath of the incident, Iran accused Israel of kidnapping and holding the diplomats in their jails, and called on the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to clarify their whereabouts. In November 1994, Iranian ambassador in Lebanon, Homayoun Alizadeh, said that the"
"war. Isaac Sasson, a leader of the Lebanese Jewish community, who was kidnapped at gunpoint March 31, 1985, on his way from the Beirut International Airport, after a trip to Abu Dhabi. Earlier, kidnappers had also seized Eli Hallak, 60-year-old physician; Haim Cohen, a 39-year-old Jew; Isaac Tarrab; Yeheda Benesti; Salim Jammous; and Elie Srour. Cohen, Tarrab, and Srour were killed by their captors, a Shiite Muslim group called The Organization of the Oppressed on Earth, which is believed to have been part of or had links to Hezbollah. The others' fates remain unknown, but they are believed to have"
"with actress Lillie Ericson-Udde (Lillie Christina Ericson, 1892–1981): Folke Bernadotte Folke Bernadotte, Count of Wisborg (2 January 1895 – 17 September 1948) was a Swedish diplomat and nobleman. During World War II, he negotiated the release of about 31,000 prisoners from German concentration camps, including 450 Danish Jews from the Theresienstadt camp. They were released on 14 April 1945. In 1945, he received a German surrender offer from Heinrich Himmler, though the offer was ultimately rejected. After the war, Bernadotte was unanimously chosen to be the United Nations Security Council mediator in the Arab–Israeli conflict of 1947–1948. He was assassinated"
"faith-based charitable work in Appalachia. Lawrence Jenco Servite Father Lawrence Martin Jenco, (27 November 1934 - 19 July 1996), a native of Joliet, Illinois, United States, was an American Catholic priest famous for being held hostage in Beirut, Lebanon by Islamic radicals. He was held for 564 days before being released and allowed to return to the United States. He died in Illinois, of cancer, in 1996. He is buried in The Queen of Heaven Cemetery in Hillside, Illinois. Jenco was taken hostage in Beirut by five armed men on January 8, 1985, while serving as director of Catholic Relief"
"Samir Kuntar Samir Kuntar (, also transcribed ""Sameer"", ""Kantar"", ""Quntar"", ""Qantar""; 20 July 1962 – 19 December 2015) was a Lebanese Druze member of the Palestine Liberation Front and Hezbollah. He was convicted of terrorism and murder by an Israeli court. After his release from prison as part of the 2008 Israel–Hezbollah prisoner exchange, he received Syria's highest medal, honored by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and designated a Specially Designated Global Terrorist by the US government. In Israel, Kuntar is considered the perpetrator of one of the most brutal terrorist attacks in the country's history. On 22 April 1979, at"
"southern suburbs of Beirut by construction workers, and were formally identified after DNA testing. His wife is the Syrian novelist Marie Seurat. Michel Seurat Michel Seurat was a sociologist and researcher at the CNRS, born 14 August 1947 in Tunisia and died in Beirut in 1986. He was kidnapped on May 22, 1985, in Lebanon, by the Islamic Jihad Organization, a Lebanese terrorist organization that was the precursor to Hezbollah. Unlike his cellmate Jean-Paul Kauffmann, also kidnapped the same day, he was not released. On 5 March 1986 Islamic Jihad stated that it had executed Seurat; however, his fellow hostages"
"Sayyed Bozorg Mahmoody Sayyed Bozorg ""Moody"" Mahmoody, PhD (Persian: دكتر سيد بزرگ محمودى c. 1939 - August 23, 2009) was an Iranian anesthesiologist known for taking his American wife Betty and their daughter Mahtob to his native country of Iran and keeping them hostage there for a period of eighteen months during the mid-1980s. Mahmoody was born to a prominent family in Shustar, Iran. Mahmoody’s father, a doctor, died when Mahmoody was a toddler, and he had no memories of him. His mother, also a doctor, died when he was eight years old, and he was raised by his older"
"a French prosecutor closed a 2012 French inquiry, stating that French experts had determined Arafat's death was of natural causes, and that the polonium and lead traces found were environmental. Yasser Arafat Mohammed Yasser Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini (; ; 24 August 1929 – 11 November 2004), popularly known as Yasser Arafat ( , ') or by his kunya Abu Ammar ( , '), was a Palestinian political leader. He was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from 1969 to 2004 and President of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) from 1994 to 2004. Ideologically an Arab"
"Françoise Claustre Françoise Claustre (8 February 1937 – 3 September 2006), was a French archeologist who was taken hostage by a group of Chadian rebels, led by Hissène Habré, on 20 April 1974, at Bardaï, in the Tibesti Mountains of northern Chad. At the same time, the rebels also seized a German doctor, Christophe Staewen, and Marc Combe, who was an assistant of Mrs. Claustre's husband, Pierre. Marc Combe managed to escape and Dr. Staewan was released on 11 June 1974, after a ransom had been paid by the German government. An emissary, Captain Pierre Galopin was sent to negotiate"
"Folke Bernadotte Folke Bernadotte, Count of Wisborg (2 January 1895 – 17 September 1948) was a Swedish diplomat and nobleman. During World War II, he negotiated the release of about 31,000 prisoners from German concentration camps, including 450 Danish Jews from the Theresienstadt camp. They were released on 14 April 1945. In 1945, he received a German surrender offer from Heinrich Himmler, though the offer was ultimately rejected. After the war, Bernadotte was unanimously chosen to be the United Nations Security Council mediator in the Arab–Israeli conflict of 1947–1948. He was assassinated in Jerusalem in 1948 by the paramilitary Zionist"
"exchange for Kuntar and four Hezbollah members taken prisoner during the 2006 Lebanon War. Upon Kuntar's arrival at Beirut Airport, along with four other freed Lebanese prisoners, he was officially received by the Lebanese President Michel Sleiman, Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, Speaker of the Parliament of Lebanon Nabih Berri, some Lebanese members of Parliament, and Muslim and Christian clerics. Hezbollah arranged a public celebration in Dahieh (their stronghold in Beirut), where Hassan Nasrallah gave a welcoming speech to Kuntar. On 17 July 2008, Kuntar visited the tomb of Imad Mughniyeh. Later that day, a homecoming function was organized in Kuntar's"
"for more than six years as all-round-doctor for Africans in Niger, Congo-Brazzaville and Chad, where he continued his research on African psychology. On 21 April 1974, he and two other Europeans were taken hostage by Hissène Habré, the later leader of Chad from 1982 until 1990. The other captives were two French citizens, Françoise Claustre, an archeologist, and Marc Combe, a development worker. Marc Combe escaped in 1975 but, despite the intervention of the French Government, Madame Claustre (whose husband was a senior French government official) was not released until 1 February 1977. Staewen (whose wife Elfriede was killed in"
"less than three years after the agreement. The agreement with the PFLP-GC reportedly took nearly a year to negotiate. The nickname for the agreement came about as a reference to Palestinian militant leader Ahmed Jibril. On 30 June 1985, 39 foreigners seized on a TWA Flight 847 en route from Athens to Rome, hijacked to Beirut, were released. On July 1 1985, Israel announced that it was ready to release Shia detainees from its prisons. Over the next several weeks, Israel released over 700 Shia prisoners, but Israel denied that the prisoners' release was related to the hijacking. In July"
"Gilad Shalit Gilad Shalit (, ""Gilˁad Šaliṭ"", born 28 August 1986) is a former MIA soldier of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) who on 25 June 2006, was captured by Hamas militants in a cross-border raid via underground tunnels near the Israeli border. Hamas held him captive for over five years, until his release on 18 October 2011 as part of a prisoner exchange deal. During his captivity, Hamas turned down requests from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to be allowed to visit Shalit, claiming that any such visit could betray his location. Multiple human rights organizations"
"summit between Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and al-Zaim. The talks reached advanced levels and Israeli Foreign Minister Moshe Sharett contacted al-Barazi on 6 August 1949 to discuss a date for formal peace talks. Al-Barazi was also credited with mediating an agreement between al-Zaim and Lebanese Prime Minister Riad as-Solh which extradited Antun Saadeh, founder of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP), to Lebanon where he would be executed. In return, Lebanon gave vocal support to the al-Zaim regime and agreed to several long-term economic treaties at a July 1949 summit between both leaders. The execution of Saadeh, and al-Zaim's"
"Fawaz Younis Fawaz Younis (born 1959), also called Fawaz Yunis and Nazeeh, is a Lebanese hijacker who was abducted and imprisoned by the United States. He was later deported after serving sixteen years of his sentence. He was born in Lebanon and became an Amal Movement militiaman and then a part of Hezbollah. On June 11, 1985, he led a team that hijacked Royal Jordanian Flight 402 with four American nationals on board. The Jordanian airliner was sitting on the tarmac at Beirut International Airport when it was stormed by Younis' team. After a 13-hour siege, the hijackers released the"
"Lebanese prisoner Nissim Nasser, in exchange for which Hezbollah handed over a box containing the remains of Israeli soldiers killed during the 2006 war. In October 2007 Israel and Hezbollah agreed to exchange a civilian Hezbollah member kidnapped in 2006 and the remains of two Hezbollah fighters killed in this war and brought to Israel for the remains of Gabriel Dwait, an Israeli resident who drowned and was washed ashore in Lebanon. The released prisoner was described as 50-year-old Hassan Naim Aqil, a former Hezbollah guerrilla who did not fight in the Second Lebanon War. News of Kuntar's release was"
"an Arabic-speaking caller in Beirut claiming to represent the ""Organization of the Oppressed"" in response to Ronald Reagan having threatened to strike at terrorists following the recent hijacking of TWA Flight 847 (claimed by a similarly named Hezbollah-linked front), and linked to Reagan's intervention on 30 June to have the remaining 39 American hostages released. The attack was also linked to the recent sentencing in Spain of two Shiites to 23 years in prison for the attack on a Libyan diplomat the previous year. The attacks have been attributed by several sources to the Abu Nidal Organization. 1985 Madrid airline"
"of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). The aircraft, El Al Flight 426, which was en route from Rome to Tel Aviv, was diverted to Algiers by the hijackers. Negotiations with the hijackers lasted for 40 days. Both the hijackers and the passengers, including 21 Israeli hostages, were eventually freed. The hijackers were said to have believed Israeli General Ariel Sharon was on the flight. According to Sarah Levy, it was the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson who saved Sharon's life, by advising him the night before to take a different flight. On 26 December of"
"killed more than 500 Palestinians in the Jenin refugee camp. After the incident was over, however, and the Palestinian death toll was recorded at actually be between 53 and 56 casualties, mostly combatants, Erekat faced strong criticism in the US. Saeb Erekat Saeb Muhammad Salih Erekat (also ""Erikat"" or ""Erakat"" or ""Arekat""; ""Ṣāʼib ʻUrayqāt"" or ""ʻRēqāt""; born 28 April 1955) is a Palestinian diplomat who served as chief of the PLO Steering and Monitoring Committee until 12 February 2011. He negotiated the Oslo Accords with Israel and remained chief negotiator from 1995 until May 2003, when he resigned in protest"
"under heavy enemy fire, but Arad was captured by the Lebanese Amal. Arad was brought to Beirut where he was held by then-head of security of Amal, Mustafa Dirani. Amal head Nabih Berri announced that he was holding Arad, and proposed an exchange for Shiite and Lebanese prisoners held in Israel. In 1987, three letters in Arad's handwriting and two photos of a bearded Arad were received, proving Arad was alive. The Israeli government negotiated for his release, but talks failed in 1988. After this time, credible information about Arad has been hard to obtain, though unsubstantiated claims of new"
"another four Lebanese men detained in Israeli custody, and the remains of 190 persons captured or killed during the 2006 Lebanon War In 2011, he coordinated the negotiations between Israel and Hamas resulting in the Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange involving 1,027 Palestinian prisoners and the Israeli prisoner Gilad Shalit. On December 13, 2015 he was announced as the Head of European Union Intelligence and Situation Centre. Gerhard Conrad (intelligence officer) Gerhard Conrad (born 1954) is an officer of the Federal Intelligence Service (BND), the foreign intelligence agency of Germany, and one its foremost experts on the Arab world. A fluent"
"Avraham Tiar Avraham Tiar (‎, 29 January 1924 – 25 April 2011) was an Israeli politician who served as a member of the Knesset for Herut, Gahal and the Free Centre between 1961 and 1969. Born in Gabès in Tunisia, Tiar joined Betar at the age of 13, and by 1942 was head of the Gabès branch. In 1946 he became general secretary of the Tunisian Betar movement, as well as being deputy chairman of Revisionist Party in the country. He made aliyah to Mandatory Palestine on the S.S. Ben Hecht ship in 1947, but was intercepted by the British,"
"his statement. Israel then agreed to release Samir Kuntar on condition that Hezbollah provided ""solid evidence"" as to the fate of Ron Arad, an air force navigator missing in Lebanon since 1986. Inspired by the prisoner swap, Hamas vowed, a few days later, that they would also abduct Israeli soldiers to secure the release of Palestinian prisoners. Hassan Nasrallah simultaneously told his supporters that Hezbollah would continue to kidnap Israelis until ""not a single prisoner"" remained inside Israeli jails. In 2006, Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora and UN envoy Terje Rød-Larsen proposed a deal in which Kuntar and all other"
"an Honorary D.Litt from his ""alma mater"", the University of Hull where a students' union bar (now an ice cream ‘parlour’) is named after him. He was appointed a CBE in 1992. John McCarthy (journalist) John Patrick McCarthy (born 27 November 1956) is a British journalist, writer and broadcaster, and one of the hostages in the Lebanon hostage crisis. McCarthy was the United Kingdom's longest-held hostage in Lebanon, where he was a prisoner for more than five years. He attended Lochinver House School, then Haileybury College, Hertfordshire, and read American Studies at the University of Hull. McCarthy was a journalist"
"Noach Flug Eliyahu Noach Flug (; 1 January 1925 – 11 August 2011) was an Israeli economist, diplomat and advocate for the rights of Holocaust survivors. Flug was born in Łódź, Poland to Rywka (""née"" Gliksman) and Icek Flug. During the Second World War he was a resident of the Łódź ghetto, from which he was transferred in 1944 to Auschwitz. In the last months of the war he was also sent to Gross-Rosen concentration camp and was rescued by the Allied forces while on a death march to Mauthausen. In 1958, he made aliyah to Israel. An economist, Flug"
"Camille Chamoun Camille Nimr Chamoun (, ""Kamīl Sham'ūn"") (3 April 1900 – 7 August 1987) was President of Lebanon from 1952 to 1958, and one of the country's main Christian leaders during most of the Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990). Camille Nimr Chamoun was born at Deir el-Qamar on 3 April 1900 into a prominent Maronite family. He received a law degree from St. Joseph University. He was first elected to the Lebanese parliament in 1934, and was reelected in 1937 and 1943. A champion of independence from France, he was arrested on 11 November 1943, and was imprisoned in Rashaïa"
"Nayla Moawad Nayla Moawad () (born 3 July 1940) is a Lebanese politician. Outside of Lebanon, she is best known as the widow of former President René Moawad, who was assassinated on 22 November 1989. Within Lebanon, she is a high-profile politician in her own right, having served as a member of the National Assembly since 1991. Following her reelection in June 2005, she was appointed to the Cabinet on 19 July as Minister for Social Affairs. Born in Bsharri, Lebanon, as the daughter of Nagib Issa El-Khouri and Evelyne Roch. Her father was the scion of a prominent Maronite"
"Mehdi Karroubi Mehdi Karroubi (, born 26 September 1937) is an Iranian Shia cleric and reformist politician leading the National Trust Party. He was the speaker of the parliament from 1989 to 1992 and 2000 to 2004, and a presidential candidate in the 2005 and 2009 presidential elections. Following 2009–2010 Iranian election protests, Karroubi was put under house arrest in February 2011 – reportedly ordered by the Supreme Leader of Iran – without officially being charged, although he is accused of being a ""seditionist"" and ""traitor"". As of 2018, he is still confined to his house. He has been described"