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In the summer of 2006, General Udi Adam - then Head of Israel's Northern Command - ordered his troops on alert.
He had received warnings that Hezbollah was planning to capture Israeli soldiers to exchange for its own prisoners held in Israel.
On July 12, 2006, the Lebanese group did indeed seize two Israeli troops, Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser.
The cross-border raid provoked a massive Israeli bombardment and incursion.
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| Samir Kuntar, centre, was among the prisoners released by Israel [EPA] |
Despite the death of as many as 1,200 Lebanese and 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers, Israel failed to win the freedom of its soldiers.
The subsequent negotiations and exchanges between Israel and Hezbollah over a possible prisoner exchange, beginning in 2006, reveal a high-stakes game of tough and tortuous bargaining between deadly foes over prisoners and corpses.
The process eventually led to the return of the remains of the two dead Israeli soldiers in exchange for the release of one of Israel's most notorious prisoners, Samir Kuntar, and the bodies of 199 Lebanese and other Arab figters.
In a special programme Al Jazeera documents the secret talks that reveal an intriguing insight into the shadowy world of deals amid conflict.
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