The New York Times · 6 August 1978

CP-1978-020

4 SLAIN IN PAKISTAN IN A RAID ON P.L.O.; IRAQIS SUSPECTED

Terrorists With Submachine Guns and Grenades Hit Islamabad Mission of Palestinians

By Reuters

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Transcribed from the clipping

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Aug. 5 — Four armed men broke into the Palestine Liberation Organization’s office here today and killed four persons, bringing Arab-against-Arab terrorism to this country for the second time in four days. The assailants, carrying submachine guns and grenades, murdered a radio operator for the P.L.O., two Palestinian students and a Pakistani police guard.

Palestinian witnesses said the assailants spoke an Iraqi dialect of Arabic. All four raiders escaped and a police search was started. P.L.O. Aide Accuses Iraqis The chief representative here of the Palestine Liberation Organization, Yousuf Abu Hantash, who was unhurt, declared: “This is the responsibility of the Iraqi regime.”

In Beirut, Lebanon, the P.L.O. headquarters charged that Iraqi intelligence agents had carried out the assault, the latest in a deadly exchange between the P.L.O. leadership and Iraqi-backed radicals that has has brought violence to Beirut, London, Paris, Karachi and now Islamabad.

Iraq, which proclaims a hard line on the issue of Israel, accuses the leaders of the Palestine Liberation Organization of a conciliatory attitude, especially in considering a compromise settlement that would include formation of a Palestinian state in the Israeli-occupied West Bank of the Jordan. 2 P.L.O.

Officials Slain in Paris On Thursday, two P.L.O. aides were killed in Paris when Arabs burst into their office hurling grenades and firing submachine guns. … [JUMP OF THE MATCHED ARTICLE — this is the part that merges into CP-1978-020:] 4 Murdered at P.L.O.

Office in Pakistan in New Round of Arab Feud Continued From Page 1 was killed outside the office when he demanded that the four open bags they were carrying.

A Palestinian described as second secretary of the P.L.O. office, Majed Abu Shama, described the attack: “I was in the reception room downstairs with a Palestinian student when one of the gunmen burst in and fired off a complete magazine, killing the student. I was sitting opposite and I don’t know how the gunman failed to see me.

He went outside to change his magazine.” The other Arabs then killed the radio operator and rushed upstairs to search for the head of the office, Mr. Hantash. He was in another building at the time. As the assailants fled, they threw a grenade that killed another Palestinian student.

First Round Began in January Four senior officials of the P.L.O. have been killed in Arab violence this year. The organizations’s London representative, Said Hammami, was murdered in January. In June, the P.L.O.’s representative in Kuwait, Ali Yasin, was shot to death.

Two days ago, two Arabs attacked the P.L.O. office in Paris and killed its chief representative in France, Ezzedine Kalak, and his deputy, Adnan Hammad. In the Paris attack, the French police charged that Iraqis opened fire on the Arab assailant after he had surrendered and was being taken to a car.

A French detective and an Iraqi guard were killed in the shootout and three Iraqis, who claimed diplomatic immunity, were expelled from France. [END OF THE MATCHED ARTICLE. Below is a SEPARATE Reuters story printed on the same clipping, under its own headline and dateline.

It is closely related — it is the Paris funeral of the two men named above — but it is not part of CP-1978-020 and should not go into its excerpt.] Arabs Cry for Vengeance PARIS, Aug.

5 (Reuters) — Hundreds of mourning Arabs cried for vengeance today when the flag-draped coffins of two slain officials of the Palestine Liberation Organization were bome from a Paris mosque. “With our souls and with our blood, we shall avenge you!” chanted Palestinians and other Arabs.

The coffins, covered with Palestinian flags, were carried out of the mosque to trucks for a procession through the streets of Paris before being flown to the Middle East for burial. Mr. Kalak will be buried in Syria and Mr. Hammad in Beirut.

Iraqi Regime Called Instigator At the funeral service, the top surviving P.L.O. official in Paris accused Iraq of being behind the killings.

Ibrahim Souss, head of the P.L.O. mission at the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, told mourners: “There is no doubt whatsoever that the cover, support and encouragement for this act came from an Arab state that pretends to be a friend of the Palestinian revolution.

We consider that the sole responsibility for the acts of the Abu Nidal gang lies with the Iraqi regime.” The two assailants held in the killing told French investigators their orders had come from a Palestinian extremist leader, Abu Nidal, who broke with the P.L.O. and moved to Baghdad.

Assailants Face Death Penalty The two were charged today with premeditated murder, which carries a possible death sentence. They were identified as Hatem Abdul Kadir, 25 years old, and Kayed Hassad, 21, both Jordanian nationals believed to be of Palestinian origin. Ambassadors of Arab countries attended the funeral service at the mosque in the Latin Quarter of Paris.

The new Iraqi Ambassador, who arrived yesterday, was absent. He declined to speak to reporters on his arrival. Iraq has denied any involvement in the killings. French sympathizers with the Palestinian cause, mainly young leftists, joined Arabs in filing past the coffins. Guerrilla battle songs and cries of “Yahiya Falestin!”

(“Long Live Palestine!”) rang out during the service. [PHOTOGRAPH across the top right of the page, with credit and caption:] United Press International Fists raised, mourners carried coffin of Ezzedine Kalak at Paris funeral for leader of the branch office of the Palestine Liberation Organization, who was slain by two terrorists Thursday along with an aide. [Two further columns on the clipping carry wholly unrelated wire stories — “Crane Begins Presidential Drive With a Visit to New Hampshire” (BEDFORD, N.H., Aug.

5, AP) and “Pentagon Plans 6-Month Review Of Study on Closing of 9 Bases” (WASHINGTON, Aug. 5, AP) — plus a “HELP THE FRESH AIR FUND” notice. Not transcribed; nothing to do with Palestine.]

How this transcription was made

Transcribed from a scan of the printed page. NOTHING ON THIS CLIPPING NAMES THE NEWSPAPER - there is no masthead, folio, credit line or subscription box - so the publication rests on the slide label alone and is not confirmed from the page; the three-deck capitalised headline over a subordinate deck is consistent with the Times's 1978 front-page dress, but that is an inference from typography, not evidence. The date likewise is not printed: it is corroborated from inside the article, whose dateline reads 'ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Aug. 5' and whose chain of weekday references - Thursday in Paris, Monday in Paris, Wednesday in Karachi, eight days earlier in London - is internally consistent for a Sunday 6 August 1978 paper. The foot reads 'Continued on Page 10, Column 3'; no page number is printed on the scan. The doubled 'has has' in the fifth paragraph is as printed and has not been repaired. Read from crops magnified to six times page scale. The other part of this article was added on 2 November 2026 from a second clipping (m006_1.png).

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