Forty-eight persons were felled by a terrorist guns-and-grenades attack this morning on King George Street near Jaffa Road, Jerusalem’s busiest intersection. All were rushed to hospitals but by this evening most had been discharged after treatment for slight wounds.
Of the 14 remaining hospitalized, the condition of one person was described as “very grave” and four others were being treated for serious wounds.
Two terrorists were apprehended at the scene. One of them, shot and severely wounded by armed civilian passersby, died in a hospital. A third terrorist who escaped in a car, was arrested by police at a roadblock on the outskirts of the city.
Premier Yitzhak Shamir pledged in a brief statement tonight that “the assailants and those who sent them will not go unpunished.” Responsibility for the attack was claimed by the Damascus-based Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, headed by Nayef Hawatmeh.
Authorities do not rule out the possibility that the terrorists planned to seize the Ministry of Tourism which is located near the scene of the attack and to take hostages there. Hawatmeh’s organization in Damascus claimed in fact that hostages were taken but this was dismissed as nonsense by the police.
Today’s attack was the third terrorist assault on civilians in Jerusalem in three months. Four persons were killed and 46 wounded when a bomb demolished a city bus last December 6 near the Bayit Vegan suburb. In late February, 21 persons were injured when booby-trapped hand grenades exploded outside a shop on Jaffa Road.
SEQUENCE OF EVENTS
Today’s assailants were described as men who spoke English with Arabic accents. Two of them entered a menswear shop on King George Street shortly before 10 a.m. local time, carrying plastic bags. According to the shopkeeper, they were trying on Jeans when, on a shouted signal from outside, they burst out of the changing cubicles brandishing weapons.
One held a gun to the head of a shop assistant while the other raced into the street hurling hand grenades indiscriminately. The second man then ran out of the shop and opened fire at random on passersby and neighboring shops.
The wounded, lying everywhere on the side-walk, were carried off in ambulances. Most were taken to Bikur Holim, the nearest hospital and others to Hadassah and Shaare Zedek hospitals. Observers said it was remarkable that more people were not hurt and that most of the victims were not seriously wounded.
Mayor Teddy Kollek of Jerusalem linked the attack to the diplomatic attention currently focussed on the city because of legislation before the U.S. Congress that would require President Reagan to move the American Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Kollek, addressing a group of visiting mayors and other municipal officials from the U.S. and other countries, said the Embassy issue had revived speculation about the possibility of peace talks between Israel and Jordan.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
