Newspaper Page Text
Friday, fDp#. It, 1970
• 4961 Peachtree Ind. Blvd
e 5825 Roswell Road, N.E.
e 2431 Bolton Road, N.W.
e 8435 Roswell Road, N.E,
N r
Guerrillas
on Other Hostages
LONDON (JTA)—The late of
between 39 and 54 hostages hos
tages still held by Arab tenor-/:,
feta somewhere in Jordan hung
id the balance after the com4
ntapdoes released 255 hijacked
passengers and crew members
add ‘then destroyed the three
al^raft they seized and forced
tb 'fly to a deserted desert air-
strip near Amman. The guerril
las, members of the Marxiit-
oHented Popular Front for the
LUagration of Palestine, said they
l wfre holding 40 persons hostage
but later they released a Dutch
edglheer. The engineer reported
that there were a number of
American Jews among the re
maining captives but he did not
make it clear whether they were
persons, holding dual U. S. and
Israeli,citizenship. The guerrillas
■aid that the remaining hos
tages were all males, except for
"about five” Israeli women al
leged to belong to the Israeli
army.
1 A* has been true throughout
the week since the hijackings,
reports on the number and na
tionalities of the hijack victims
pontinued to be confuted and
contradictory. A Popular Front
spokesman said the remaining
hostages included 23 Israelis and
Americans with dual citizenship,
six'"Swiss, six West German and
six British nationals, a total of
41. But other sources said the
total still held “somewhere in
Jordan”'was 54. In addition, 18
passengers released in Amman,
presumably women and chil
dren, remained there because
they had relatives among the
final detainees and wanted to
awqit the outcome of negotia
tions for their release. The re
being
iterranean points foi- transfer
to planes of their respective
countries. Several flights with
released Americans aboard ar
rived at Kennedy airport and
more were scheduled to arrive
for tearful re-unions with rel
atives, some of whom had wait
ed for many hours.
Negotiations that had been
going on most of the week be
tween tbe terrorists and an In
ternational Red Cross team
headed by Andre Rochet appar
ently broke down over the
weekend. It was not clear
whether this happened before or
after the terrorists blew up the
three jetliners 13 hours before
, their deadline for the release of
the hostages was to expire.
There was some confusion as to
the status of negotiations. The
guerrillas said they were hold
ing the remaining hostages in
exchange for seven Palestinian
oommandoes jailed in West Ger
many, Switzerland and Britain
dnd~.for an unspecified number
of prisoners in Israel. The three
European governments are ap
parently prepared to free the
Arabs, all of whom were jailed
for previous attacks on airliners,
but are reportedly standing
firm on their demand that all
the hostages be released sim
ultaneously without regard to
their nationality or religion.
That demand was the basis of
the negotiations conducted by
the lied Cross. According to un
confirmed reports, Israel was
prepared to release an unspec
ified number of guerrillas in its
custody. A demand on Israel
ffom the terrorists was supposed
to have been handed to the Red
Cross but was not made public
Hie British Government skid
that it was willing to release
Leila Khaled, the 24-year-old
girl commando taken into cus
tody after an abortive attempt
to hijack ah E A1 airliner off
the British coast But Britain has
hot, withdrawn from the posi
tion «f the United States, Swit
zerland and West Germany
which is opposed to a piecemeal
ransom deal.
Authorities here were puzzled
by the destruction of the three
aircraft—a TWA 707, a Swissair
DC-88 and a BOAC VC-10
valued together at $25 million—
a half day before the terrorists’
own deadline expired. The
J*FLP claimed that the aircraft
were destroyed because of “a
conspiracy by various imperial
ist powers to abort this opera
tion." The reference was to
It Means Gall
We have heard many ex
amples of the meaning of
chutxpa, but the following,
which appeared in a New
York Times news story, has
got to be tops. The Item,
which pertained to toe foil
ed hijacking pf an El A1
plane, read as. follows:
“A guerrilla spokesman in
Beirut protested toe pres
ence of armed security
guards aboard El A1 flights
as a gross violation of in
ternational law'."
Now that is chutxpa!!
—Cleveland Jewish News
broadcast reports of large U. S.
naval and air movements in the
Eastern Mediterranean. The
Nixon Administration, sought to
allay the terrorists’ fears of
American military intervention.
White House press secretary
Ronald Ziegler characterized the
Fleet as “routine precautions in
movements of the U. S. Sixth
such situations' for evacuation
purposes.” The Swiss Govern
ment met in emergency session
in Berne. Chancellor Karl Huber
said afterward that the destruc
tion of the planes had not
changed the demand of the four
Western nations for the release
of all the hostages regardless of
nationality. Reports here said
the P!FLP blew up the planes
in advance of their deadline be
cause Of growing dissension with
other Arab guerrilla groups. Hie
Palestine Liberation Organiza
tion, the umbrella group rep
resenting nearly a dozen Pal
estinian commando organiza
tions, suspended the PFLF from
membership for the'hijadc and
hostage operation which has
aroused a storm of world opin
ion against the Arabs.
ORT Carnival
For Children
Women’s American ORT will
sponsor a carnival r for~children
of all ages from 12 to 0 p. m*
Sunday, Sept. 20, at the Atlanta
Jewish Community Center. A
puppet show, games, prizes and
food wil^ be on tap.
FARRIS for FULTON
PAID POLITICAL AO
MUON FARRIS
flUDNOXJNTYCOMMBSIONEE
ONE MAN... ONE JOB.