A 21/2-year-old child and an adult farm worker were killed today when Israeli troops stormed the children’s house in Kibbutz Misgav Am near the Lebanese border to rescue hostages being held there by Palestinian terrorists. According to early reports, five hostages, including four children were wounded. One of those injured died later in the day. The names of the victims were not immediately released.
An army spokesman said later that II soldiers were wounded in the assault which ended a nine-hour siege. Five terrorists, believed to be the entire gang, were killed.
According to a Baghdad radio broadcast today, an Iraqi-sponsored Palestinian terrorist group calling itself the Arab Liberation Front claimed responsibility for the outrage. The incident was the first in 12 months in which terrorists infiltrated an Israeli community to seize hostages. It coincided with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat’s arrival in Washington for meetings with President Carter on the autonomy negotiations. Premier Menachem Begin will go to Washington next week for the same purpose.
An army spokesman reported that the terrorists crossed into Israel, apparently from Lebanon, shortly after midnight and invaded the border kibbutz before down. They seized the children’s house, a communal dormitory, holding its occupants at gunpoint. During the ensuing hours, they issued several demands for release of the hostages, including the freeing of 100 terrorists in Israeli jails and aircraft to carry them to safety.
Early in the ordeal, armed kibbutz members attacked the building and managed to rescue five of the hostages. The terrorists were forced to the second floor where they barricaded themselves and continued to issue demands. Troops surrounded the building. They attacked after several hours of fruitless negotiations with the terrorists.
The last terrorist raid in Israel occurred in April, 1979 when four terrorists from Lebanon landed near the coastal town of Nahariya from rubber boots and went on a pre-down shooting rampage in which four Israelis were killed. Two of the terrorists were killed and the other two were wounded and captured. They are now serving life sentences in Israeli jails.
ELEMENTS IN THE OUTRAGE
As information become more available tonight, at the end of the last night of Passover, the 21/2-year-old child was identified as Eyal Gluska. The other kibbutz member, who was killed during the siege was identified as Sami Shani, 34, the secretary of the kibbutz.
Senior military sources said this evening that the terrorists managed to infiltrate into Israel by slipping through a narrow corridor that is the demarcation line between the Irish and Nigerian units of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL). The army is aware of this gap which is regarded as the best way to penetrate UNIFIL lines.
Chief of Stuff Gen. Raphael Eytan disclosed that the terrorists were armed with heavy machine guns. He said it was the first time terrorists on a hostage-taking mission carried such equipment.
Defense Minister Ezer Weizman praised the precision with which the hoops carried, out the rescue operation. But he said an investigation will be held to find out how the terrorists managed to break through several rows of high barbed wire fences surrounding the kibbutz. Eytan estimated that it took them several hours to cut holes close to the ground just wide enough for a man to crawl through. He noted, however, that they had the advantage of working under cover of darkness and a mist carried by humid easterly winds.
Weizman expressed hope that such an attack will not be repeated but he said he could no promise absolute security. Eytan said later that a terrorist assault during the Passover holidays was expected but “we had no indication as to when, where or how.” He said that matter would also be investigated.
Meanwhile, members of kibbutzim in the northern region converged on Misgav Am this evening to assist in repairing damage in the children’s house. (By Yitzhak Shargil)
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