"It is not easy to see this, although there was not much surprise to it. But . confronting this reality was difficult, yes," Shlomo Goldwasser told Israel radio.
Zvi Regev said on Army Radio: "It was a terrible thing to see, really terrible. I was always optimistic, and I hoped all the time that I would meet Eldad and hug him."
Goldwasser's father-in-law, Omri Avni, said of Qantar, who was 17 at the time of the raid: "The despicable murderer who killed the children 30 years ago has gone home, and finally, for the first time in his life has done a good deed by leaving this place and bringing about the return of Ehud and Eldad."
Under the deal, mediated by a U.N.-appointed German intelligence officer, Israel also handed over the bodies of eight Hezbollah fighters slain in the 2006 war, and those of four Palestinians, including Dalal Mughrabi, a woman guerrilla who led a 1978 raid on Israel.
The four were among the nearly 200 Arabs killed trying to attack Israel whose bodies are to be sent to Lebanon. Hezbollah returned the remains of other Israeli soldiers killed in the south.
Israel is also to free scores of Palestinian prisoners at a later date as a gesture to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
Hezbollah has dubbed the exchange "Operation Radwan", in honour of "Hajj Radwan", or Imad Moughniyah, the group's military commander who was assassinated in Syria in February.
Yellow Hezbollah flags fluttered across south Lebanon and on the coastal highway from Naqoura to Beirut. "Liberation of the captives: a new dawn for Lebanon and Palestine," a banner read.
Israel denounced the planned festivities.
"Samir Qantar is a brutal murderer of children and anybody celebrating him as a hero is trampling on basic human decency," said Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's spokesman Mark Regev.
For some Lebanese, the swap showed the futility of the conflict with Israel two summers ago. "There shouldn't have been a war in 2006. A lot of lives were lost," said Rami Nasereddine, 18, lamenting Israel's refusal to trade captives at the time.
The European Union hailed the prisoner deal as a positive step by both sides that would contribute to regional stability.
The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas said the swap strengthened its own hand in demanding freedom for hundreds of prisoners in exchange for captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas offered congratulations to Qantar's family, the Palestinian news agency WAFA reported.
