Thousands of Colombian soldiers, aided by military helicopters, are searching in the Sierra Nevada mountains for eight hikers - four Israelis and four Europeans - who were kidnapped on Friday while touring the "Lost City" on the northwestern tip of South America. Two other Israelis who were released by the kidnappers hiked for two days until finding a place from where they could inform the authorities. The Israeli Foreign Ministry, which learned of the kidnapping yesterday morning, calls upon the Colombian government and police to act with all possible haste to return the hostages "healthy and whole."
The kidnappers are members of the FARC - the Armed Revolutionary Forces of Colombia - which averages 3,000 kidnappings a year. They hold their hostages for ransom, which they use to finance their 40-year-old armed struggle against the local government.