Israel buries soldiers after swap with Hezbollah

By Yoni Haviv

NAHARIYA, Israel (Reuters) - Thousands attended Israeli funerals on Thursday for two slain soldiers returned in a prisoner swap with Hezbollah and their grief contrasted with Lebanon's joy over guerrillas freed in the deal.

Defence Minister Ehud Barak told the soldiers and civilians gathered at the graveside of Ehud Goldwasser, 31, that Israel was "heartbroken" and had "paid a heavy price" to bring home the bodies by freeing five guerrillas involved in deadly attacks.

He vowed at a funeral held in the northern Israeli town of Nahariya that Israel would make every effort to retrieve other captive soldiers, including Gilad Shalit, who was abducted by militants from the Gaza Strip in a 2006 cross-border raid.

A funeral for Eldad Regev, a second Israeli soldier whose remains were also returned in a black coffin as part of the deal on Wednesday, was under way in the northern city of Haifa.

The funerals were broadcast live on national television and Israelis watched as Goldwasser's widow wept at his grave. The two men were captured in a cross-border Hezbollah raid that sparked a 2006 war.

The Shi'ite group had not commented on the soldiers' condition since capturing them in the war in which some 1,200 Lebanese and 159 Israelis were killed, fuelling hopes that they may have survived.

"I just can't believe it. Udi, we thought it would be otherwise, we hoped you would return home," Daniella Avni, Goldwasser's mother-in-law said before his burial.

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