Lt. Col. (Res.) Baruch Barlev, former head of the Israeli military training mission in Uganda, has confirmed that he had received a telephone call from Ugandan President Idi Amin last weekend in the course of which Amin congratulated Israel on its successful rescue of the hostages from Entebbe Airport July 3. Amin also vowed that he was finished with the Palestinian terrorists, and asked Barlev to relay a request to the Israeli government for military spare parts. But he refused to discuss the whereabouts of Mrs. Dora Bloch, a 75-year-old Israeli widow who is the only one of the Air France hostages not accounted for.
Barlev said Amin told him on the phone, “As a military man, not a politician, I have to tell you that your commando was very good, the operation was very good.” He also said Barlev could tell Premier Yitzhak Rabin “I have broken off contact with the terrorists. I don’t want anything to do with them. They have only brought me trouble.”
Amin, who has been denounced by Rabin as a collaborator with the hijackers was apparently serious in his request for spare parts for Israel-made tanks, half tracks and mortars in the Ugandan army, Barlev said. “It is all part of his complex character which is subject to change without notice,” the Israeli officer remarked.
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