Three Israeli citizens who have been victimized directly or indirectly over the years by the Palestine Liberation Organization, arrived here to begin a two-week tour of eastern U.S. cities to tell the American public “what the PLO is all about.”
“We feel we have to tell what the PLO is all about,” Ankie Spitzer, whose husband was one of the II Israeli athletes killed at the Munich Olympics in 1972, said. “It is being portrayed here” by the U.S. media “as an organization of freedom fighters and we feel this is not accurate. We think they are one big killing machine.”
At a press conference at the Israel Embassy here yesterday Spitzer was joined by Yossi Hochman, whose wife and two children were killed in a 1978 coastal road terrorist attack and in which he lost the lower part of his legs; and Preeti Sylvia Arroyo, whose two children were killed in a grenade attack in January 1971 in the Gaza Strip.
The three are all members of the Israel-based Organization of Victims of PLO Terror, which claims a membership of around 2,000 people plus many other members who are relatives of PLO victims. The three Israelis stressed that they came here at their own expense to tell their stories to the American people, but not to make political statements.
But Spitzer, while indicating she was not here for political statements, said “we do support the actions of the Israel army in Lebanon against the PLO terrorists.” She expressed “frustration” that “the emphasis is on what is going on now and people seem to forget what these people have done in the past and what initiated” the Israeli action into Lebanon.
Earlier, the three Israelis demonstrated across from the White House for an hour distributing to passersby handouts and a booklet describing PLO atrocities committed in Lebanon. Michael Gale, the White House liaison to the Jewish community, said he would describe the purpose of their mission to President Reagan. They then marched to the PLO’s Washington office on Wisconsin Avenue, but no representative would meet with the Israelis.
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