Veterans of the Israel Air Force pilots' course in which Ron Arad took part in the early 1980's want to ensure that their colleague is not forgotten. They set off this morning from the Ramat David Air Force Base near Nazareth - from where Arad took off on the ill-fated flight that ended in a crash in Lebanon, where he was taken captive - on a 180-kilometer torch relay march. Different teams will carry the torch from one location to another, until it reaches Jerusalem.

On Thursday at 11 AM, all the participants will join together at Binyanei HaUmah Convention Center in the capital, from where they will march to the President's Residence. They will present President Moshe Katzav with a petition calling for continued efforts to obtain Arad's release, and demanding that Arab prisoners not be released in a deal that does not include him.



"As far as we are concerned," one participant said, "Ron is alive, unless we learn otherwise. He always showed us, despite his small frame, that there's always room for one more under the stretcher to help out his friends [a reference to military marches in which the soldiers carry one of their colleagues on a stretcher for many kilometers]. We now feel that same obligation towards him."