The prisoner exchange with Hezbollah is set to take place Wednesday or Thursday, at the Rosh Hanikra Israel-Lebanon border crossing, barring any last-minute changes.

The German mediator who brokered the deal, Gerhard Konrad, is expected to give Israeli negotiator Ofer Dekel the full report compiled by Hezbollah on missing Israeli airman Ron Arad Saturday, or even Friday, including clarifications requested by Israel. In return, Israel is to release a report on an Iranian journalist and three Iranian diplomats who were arrested during the first Lebanon War and executed following interrogations.

Dekel has been to Europe several times in recent weeks in connection to the report. He is expected to travel to the continent again this weekend.

Next week Israel will issue an official announcement on the plans to release Samir Kuntar and four Hezbollah militants held in Israel, in order to let those opposed to the exchange petition the High Court of Justice.

The report on Arad will be examined by Israeli intelligence officials before it is presented to the cabinet early next week, ahead of Tuesday's final vote on the exchange. Intelligence officials will present their opinions on the report to the cabinet.

One possible obstacle to the cabinet's approval is the terms of the current deal, which go against promises the state made to Arad's family when it redeemed Elhanan Tenenbaum in 2004 - not to release Lebanese terrorist Samir Kuntar without also obtaining substantive information about Arad's fate.

At present, the cabinet seems set to give the deal final approval. One minister said he believes Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is submitting the deal to a second cabinet vote so that all the ministers will be responsible for violating the government's promises to the Arads.

If the cabinet approves the deal, the exchange will take place either Wednesday or Thursday. Israeli officials want the exchange to be a relatively low-key affair, despite the considerable media interest in the event. If the soldiers are dead, they will be given standard military funerals next Friday, not state funerals.

Meanwhile, at the cemetery for enemy combatants at the Galilee kibbutz of Amiad, the military rabbinate is finishing exhuming the remains of some 200 militants from Hezbollah and Palestinian terror organizations. They will be sent to Lebanon as part of the exchange.

"The effort to return the abductees should not be delayed or halted because we are forced to deal with Hezbollah's constant tricks," Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Thursday. "I hope that very soon we shall see the end of the fight to return the soldiers."