Former Underground Fighters Ask Approval for Retaliation Raids Against Terrorists in Arab States

A coalition of former members of Jewish underground organizations that fought the British during the pre-Statehood period, called on the government today to allow them to take retaliatory measures against Arab terrorists in the countries that shelter them. Eliyahu Saadon, a town councilman of Or Yehuda who is spokesman for the group of former members of Haganah, the Irgun Zvai Leumi and the Stern Group, made the request in the aftermath of the Lydda Airport massacre, Saadon claimed there was only one way to teach the terrorists a lesson and that was to employ their own methods against them. Otherwise, he said, they sit in Arab and other foreign capitals confident that the Israeli Army will not pursue them in the streets of Beirut, Cairo or European cities, The group has asked for permission to carry arms. There has been no comment on their request from the Israeli authorities.

Israel Galili, a Labor Minister-Without – Portfolio who often speaks for the Government, vowed here Friday that the Lydda Airport massacre will be avenged but not hastily or in response to calls for revenge from the public. Addressing the weekly luncheon of the Commerce and Industry Club, Galili said that retaliation would be carried out within the political and moral framework of Israel’s defense and methods of reaction. Galili said he was confident that Israel would find the means to deal with the most ingenious methods the terrorists could employ. He deplored statements by Arab leaders lauding the massacre. He said there was a direct link between the massacre and the May 1 statement by President Sadat of Egypt, that he was prepared to sacrifice a million Egyptians in war with Israel in order to inflict the same number of casualties on Israel.

Foreign Minister Abba Eban, who left for Scandinavia today to attend a United Nations environmental convention, said before his departure that Lebanon bears responsibility for the Lydda massacre because it shelters the organizations that plan and carry out such outrages, Eban said a very peculiar situation exists in Lebanon when in one street of Beirut there could be the offices of airlines and adjacent to them those offices which plan air piracy.” He urged the international aviation community to force the Lebanese authorities to decide whether they encourage air transportation or air piracy, About 100 high school students demonstrated outside the Air France office here Friday demanding that the airline introduce rigorous security measures. Most of the students were classmates of 18-year-old Adam Zamir who was killed in the Lydda massacre, They were received by Robert Dilhac, European director of Air France who came to Israel in connection with the Lydda massacre.