Middle East Negotiations on a Smaller Scale

Lebanese children Sunday captured an Israeli cow that had wandered over the tense international border and said they wished to exchange it for Lebanese goats in Israel.

Witnesses said four children chased and captured the cow near the village of Kfar Shouba on the volatile frontier.

Later, they told U.N. peacekeepers who came to try to coax them to hand over the cow that they would exchange it only for the dozens of goats they had lost, having apparently gotten the idea from the swaps of human prisoners demanded by Lebanese guerrillas.

Lebanon’s Hezbollah guerrillas captured three Israeli soldiers and an army reservist colonel on the border last month. The guerrilla group said it would swap the four captives for Arab prisoners held in Israel.