Jerusalem ( CNN ) -- Israel harvested organs from bodies in the 1990s without permission of family members , the former head of a state-run forensic laboratory said in a newly released interview . Government officials acknowledge that the practice happened , but emphasize that it ended years ago . In an interview in 2000 , which was released to an Israeli TV channel and broadcast over the weekend , Dr. Yehuda Hiss -- who was once head of the Abu Kabir forensic institute -- discussed the practice . `` We started to harvest corneas for various hospitals in Israel , '' Hiss said in the interview on Israel 's Channel 2 network . `` Whatever was done was highly informal . No permission was asked from the families , '' he said . Hiss said the harvesting also included heart valves , skin and bones . He was speaking to an American researcher , who recently gave the tape to the Israeli network . An Israeli Ministry of Health spokeswoman , Einav Shimron-Grinboim , issued a statement saying the practice discussed in the report was `` an old story that ended years ago '' and that in the vast majority of cases , the actions were done to Israelis , including soldiers . Procedures were not clear at the time and have since been clarified , she said . None of the practices led to charges , she said . The report said organs were at times also harvested from Palestinians and foreign workers . In the interview , Hiss was asked about the legality of such practices . `` It was n't clear , '' he said , adding that he thought families were supposed to be asked for permission . After getting permission from family members to perform an autopsy , `` we felt free '' to harvest organs , he said . Organs were not harvested if it was believed relatives might discover it , he said , adding that in some cases glue was used to close eyelids to hide missing corneas . The report included a statement from the military , the Israel Defense Forces , saying the activity ceased a decade ago . The report also described how for years the Abu Kabir institute , `` supplied not just tragic passing announcements but also news about organs donated for transplants which saved the lives of hundreds of patients . '' The report comes four months after a different allegation about organ harvesting in Israel . An opinion piece published in a Swedish newspaper in August suggested the Israeli army kidnapped and killed young Palestinians to harvest their organs in the 1990s . The writer , Donald Bostrom , told CNN he had no proof that Israeli soldiers were stealing organs , and that the purpose of his piece was to call for an investigation . The article triggered a dispute between Sweden and Israel . While the Swedish Embassy distanced itself from the report , the country 's foreign ministry refused to condemn it , saying Sweden has a free press . Israeli Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz called it `` an anti-Semitic blood libel against the Jewish people and the Jewish state . '' It was after hearing about that uproar that American anthropologist Nancy Scheper-Hughes , a professor at the University of California at Berkeley , decided to release the tape of the interview she conducted with Hiss in 2000 , Israel 's Channel 2 reported . Scheper-Hughes told the network that she does not believe Israel murdered Palestinians for organs . But the admission of harvesting organs , including skin , at times from Palestinians , struck her , she said . `` The symbolism of taking skin out of a population that is considered to be the enemy and using it for skin for the military , that 's something that -- just in terms of symbolic weight -- has to be reconsidered , '' she told Channel 2 . The forensic institute at Abu Kabir , where Hiss still works , received complaints about improper practices regarding organ harvesting that culminated in an investigation and a change of management . The current manager , Assaf Harofe Hospital , issued a statement saying , `` The committee which examined the said matters have determined that there were purely managerial malfunctions , but as a result of their findings Professor Hiss lost his position as the manager of the institute . '' Managerial responsibility was changed and new procedures were put in place , the statement said . Hiss could not be reached for comment . Earlier this year , there was another unrelated controversy involving Israel and organs . In July , U.S. authorities charged a New York man with trying to arrange the private sale of a kidney from a donor in Israel . CNN 's Kevin Flower and Guy Azriel contributed to this report .
Scheper-Hughes is `` an old story that ended years ago '' Kevin Flower was used to close eyelids to hide missing corneas , doctor says . Corneas , heart valves , skin , bones were taken from bodies . Palestinians journalist accuses New York of harvesting organs from Swedish .