MOSCOW, July 20 (RIA Novosti) - Israel is hoping for Russian assistance to secure the release of two soldiers seized by Lebanon-based radical group Hizbollah, the Israeli ambassador in Russia said Wednesday.
The two servicemen were abducted in a cross-border raid July 12, which sparked eight days of missile and air strikes from Israel and Hizbollah rocket attacks on northern Israel.
"I hope that Russia and other countries will apply every effort to release our soldiers as soon as possible," Arkady Mil-Man said.
Russian presidential aide Sergei Prikhodko said Monday that Russia will use at Israel's request its positions in the Middle East to influence forces linked with the kidnappers of Israeli hostages in Lebanon.
"We have engaged all the possibilities that we considered acceptable [and] have informed Israel about them," Prikhodko said.
Mil-Man said Israel did not have any accurate information on the current situation with the hostages. "This is a very delicate and complicated issue," he said.
But he went to great lengths to say his country was fighting terrorists not Lebanon.
"We are fighting for our existence and for our security against a terrorist organization that interferes with the Lebanese themselves," the ambassador said.
Mil-Man said the fight would end only after Hizbollah was totally destroyed.
"We will not allow Hizbollah to remain on our northern borders," the diplomat said. "We will continue this fight, which is why we have not specified the terms of our [military] operation."
The envoy said it would be continued because Israel needed time to eliminate terrorist infrastructure.
