Journalist Ashraf Al-Ashari published an article in the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram in which he interviewed the head of the Supreme Shiite Muslim Council in Lebanon, who revealed to him new details about the fate of the Israeli navigator in which he claims was killed and buried outside Lebanon.

In an article published in the Egyptian newspaper Al-Ahram on October 12, Al-Ashari said that in 1999 he interviewed Sheikh Muhammad Mahdi Shams a-Din, head of the Supreme Shiite Muslim Council in Lebanon, while visiting Cairo, who revealed to him that Israeli navigator Ron Arad had been interrogated and has revealed "important details" in his interrogation of the "Israeli enemy". The Israeli navigator was then tried but died in jail and buried in a place known only to him and only two other people in the Shiite leadership.

Ashraf Al-Ashari wrote: The big secret I did not publish is that the navigator Ron Arad was killed in Lebanon and transferred after his death to a place outside Lebanon where he was buried and his case was finally closed. According to him, President Mubarak requested the recording of the interview with Sheikh Muhammad Mahdi Shams a-Din after receiving a request from the Israeli prime minister.

Sheikh Muhammad Mahdi Shams a-Din was the spiritual leader of the Shiites in Lebanon, he died in 2001 of cancer, was 67 at the time of his death.