Iran’s deputy foreign minister has promised that his country would help in locating captured Israeli air navigator Ron Arad.
Speaking in Paris over the weekend, the minister said the matter was humanitarian, not political.
Arad’s fighter plane was shot down over Lebanon in 1986. Israeli officials have repeatedly said Iran is holding him.
The promise from Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Mahmoud Waize came against the backdrop of talks he held in France on a large economic deal that included the purchase from France of 10 Airbus planes, a $500 million purchase of communications satellites and cooperation in the area of oil production.
Israeli observers said the promise to help locate Arad was a precondition for the economic deal Iran concluded with France.
But commentator Aluf Ben wrote in the Israeli daily Ha’aretz that the promise of help might have resulted from changes in the Israeli-Iranian relationship since the May election of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Ben wrote that Israel had toned down its criticism of Tehran since the election.
Former Prime Ministers Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres had frequently referred to Iran as the primary threat to Israel in the Middle East.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
