(newspaper unidentified) · 18 October 1972

CP-1972-043

Al Fatah Agent Killed in Rome

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Transcribed from the clipping

ROME (UPI) — Police ordered a nation-wide manhunt for the killers of Adel Zuaiter, a 38-year-old Palestinian employe of the Libyan embassy in Rome, identified yesterday by the Al Fatah guerrilla organization as its representative in Italy. Zuaiter was ambushed and shot eight times by two men as he was about to enter the elevator in his apartment building Monday night.

A Libyan embassy spokesman said Zuaiter, who had a Jordanian passport, worked as an “interpreter” there. Police said they were investigating all possible connections Zuaiter might have had but refused to comment further. The Roman newspaper Il Messaggero said he was distantly related to Al Fatah leader Yasser Arafat and was well known in Palestinian circles in Italy.

In Beirut, Al Fatah said Zuaiter was the representative of the Palestinian organization in Italy and a “martyr assassinated by Zionist intelligence.” In a statement issued by the Palestinian news agency WAFA, Fatah said Zuaiter was among the first men who had been able to take the “Voice of Palestine” to the European public.

“This assassination is part of a Zionist terrorist campaign which is being carried out all over the world and which condemns the real terrorists,” Fatah said. Police said at least two men waited for Zuaiter, opening fire when he reached for the elevator door. He stumbled back into the courtyard where he was fired upon again and where he dropped and died, they said.

Twelve empty pistol shells littered the lobby and courtyard of Zuaiter’s apartment building near the center of Rome. Police said they found a Rome University identification card dated 1962-63 on his blood-soaked body.

Il Messaggero quoted witnesses as saying they had seen a light blue Fiat sedan with two men and one woman parked outside Zuaiter’s house before the shooting began. Zuaiter was born in 1934 in Nablus, now occupied Jordan, and came to Rome in the early 1960s, ostensibly to study engineering at Rome University.

How this transcription was made

Masthead not readable on the scan. The label on the slide read: [masthead not on clipping] — No masthead or folio line on the cut. The body gives internal evidence only: the killing happened “Monday night” and Al Fatah identified him “yesterday.” Wael Zwaiter was shot on Monday 16 October 1972, which makes a Wednesday 18 October printing consistent with the text, but that is inference from the day-name, not a date read off the page. Paper and date are Maria’s label only. — Complete story, four columns, ending above a rule and a display advertisement (“Are YOU Smarter than HARMON?”), which is excluded.

Cite this clipping

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