Lebanese security is conducting investigations under the supervision of Public Prosecutor Judge Jamal Hajjar into the disappearance of retired General Security officer Ahmad Shukr, who has been missing for a week, amid conflicting information about his fate, according to a judicial source quoted by Saudi daily Asharq al Awsat.
The source indicated that Shukr may have been abducted by Israeli agents through an “intelligence-style entrapment,” amid suspicions of his possible link to the disappearance of Israeli pilot Ron Arad in south Lebanon in 1986.
The source told the newspaper that the Information Branch of the Internal Security Forces intensified its investigations after Shukr was reported missing in the Bekaa region.
Investigators have reached preliminary leads indicating that Shukr was lured from his hometown of Nabi Sheet in south Lebanon to a location very close to the east Bekaa city of Zahle where his trail was lost.
The investigation also pointed to the possible involvement of two individuals holding Swedish citizenship—one of them of Lebanese origin—who arrived in Lebanon days before the incident. So far, no material evidence has been found confirming Shukr’s presence inside Lebanese territory, strengthening the hypothesis that he was taken out of the country.
The source believes that Shukr’s disappearance may represent a new link in a series of Israeli operations connected to the Ron Arad file.
The abducted officer is the brother of Hassan Shukr, who was killed along with eight others in the Meidoun battle (West Bekaa) in 1988. Hassan Shukr was a fighter within the group led by Mustafa Dirani, which took part in the capture of Arad in 1986.
Arad was captured on October 16, 1986, after his F-4 Phantom jet was hit by a bomb explosion during a mission over southern Lebanon. Both Arad and his pilot, Yishai Aviram, ejected from the aircraft. Aviram was quickly rescued by an Israeli helicopter, but Arad was captured by members of the Shiite Amal militia.
His fate remains a mystery and a long-standing national concern in Israel. He was officially declared missing in action and is widely presumed dead. Despite numerous operations and negotiations, neither his body nor his burial site has ever been recovered, and no conclusive evidence of his fate has been provided.
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