NEWS ANALYSIS : Release of Two May Mean End of a Nightmare

In the macabre calculus of Middle East kidnaping, Terry Waite and Thomas M. Sutherland were known as “high value hostages.” Their release Monday thus provides the clearest evidence that the decade-long horror is drawing to a close.

There were predictions that all of the captives might be home for Christmas.

Bush Administration officials, kept on the periphery of the negotiations by Washington’s policy of refusing to deal with hostage-holders, welcomed the latest developments but confessed that they were surprised when news of the pending releases began to leak out over the weekend.

“We started hearing news of a possible release Saturday afternoon,” a U.S. counterterrorism official said. “It stunned the hell out of us. We don’t know specifically what’s going on.”

A source familiar with the United Nations negotiations said that Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar’s special representative, Giandomenico Picco, broke the logjam by obtaining new information about the fate of an Israeli air force navigator and three soldiers who were taken prisoner during the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

The source did not reveal the information but said that, if verified, it would seem to satisfy Israel’s demand to know what had become of its service personnel.

This source said that the Israelis are now prepared to release the bulk of about 325 prisoners, mostly Lebanese Shiite Muslims, held in southern Lebanon by an Israeli-backed militia, the South Lebanon Army. This would be followed by the release of additional Western hostages, touching off the release of more Arab prisoners held by Israel.

Assuming that the always delicate and tenuous negotiation process goes forward as planned, the last three to be released, the source said, would be Ron Arad, the Israeli airman, followed by Terry A. Anderson, chief Middle East correspondent of the Associated Press, and, finally, Sheik Abdel Karim Obeid, a militant Shiite religious leader who was kidnaped in 1989 by Israeli commandos to be used as “trading stock” for Israeli hostages.

That scenario, cautiously labeled “plausible” by a U.S. official, demonstrates the relative value assigned to each hostage. Both sides seem determined to hold the best known of their hostages until the final stages to make sure that the other side does not renege.

Waite, 52, had negotiated the release of other hostages on behalf of the Church of England before he himself was seized in 1987. Along with Anderson, Waite was probably the best known of the more than 130 people kidnaped in Lebanon since 1982. Sutherland, 60, had been held for almost 6 1/2 years, longer than any remaining hostage except Anderson.

Six longtime hostages--three Americans and three Britons--have been freed since August. A Frenchman held for three days also was released. With the release of Waite and Sutherland, at least six hostages remain.

Despite the optimism generated by the release of Waite and Sutherland, U.S. and U.N. officials cautioned that the remaining negotiations are delicate and could be disrupted easily. Moreover, the captors may be reluctant to part with their final hostages because they might then be vulnerable to retaliation.

“The hostages have provided the captors with a shield, in the traditional sense of a hostage, against Syrian military pressure or Israeli retaliation,” said Brian Jenkins, a hostage expert for the Los Angeles firm Kroll Associates.

Nevertheless, Jenkins said that the drama seems to be nearing its climax.

“The situation is like a puzzle where you connect the dots to make a picture,” he said. “Enough of the dots have now been connected to show the overall picture. The only question now is how to connect the rest of the dots.”

Iran and Syria seem to have decided to lend their weight to ending the crisis because they have determined that they must improve their long-strained relations with the United States and the West, Jenkins said. With the collapse of the Soviet Union as a world power, he added, “the notion of playing one superpower against the other doesn’t exist anymore.”

The immediate response in Washington seems to have been what Iran and Syria wanted.

“We would thank the United Nations, the Syrians, the Lebanese, the Iranians and all those who had anything to do with facilitating the release,” said State Department spokesman Richard Boucher.

At the White House, Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater declined to predict an early end to the crisis.

“We’ve always been very careful not to try to extrapolate meanings that aren’t there,” he said. But he added: “There have been expressions that we have read from time to time of various Iranian officials and others that they would like to end the hostage situation, they would like to see all the Western hostages released.”

It seems clear that Israel, which has released 66 Arab prisoners since August, must now take the next step. Although U.S. and U.N. sources expressed confidence that the Israelis would act, the Jerusalem government seemed in no hurry to go along.

The Israeli Defense Ministry said in an official statement: “We express our hope the secretary’s (Perez de Cuellar’s) efforts will be fruitful and that all hostages will finally be released as well as captive and missing Israeli soldiers.”

But when asked if Israel wouldrelease any prisoners in response to the release of Waite and Sutherland, the spokesman snapped: “The answer is negative.”