Israel Jets Blast Iraqi Military Position in Jordan; Artillery Exchange Continues

Israeli jets struck positions in Jordan Wednesday as artillery battles raged along the cease-fire demarcation line. The jets’ target was the Iraqi force, estimated at 10,000 strong, stationed in northwest Jordan, whose heavy artillery and rockets have been bombarding Israeli settlements in the Jordan and Beisan Valleys for the past four days. Jordanian radio reported six “military deaths” and 14 injuries.

Israel announced that one of its planes – a French-built Super Mystery Jet-crashed in Jordan but its pilot bailed out over Israeli territory and was hospitalized for his injuries. An Israeli spokesman said all other planes returned safely to their bases. He listed their targets as Iraqi troop concentrations and concentrations of armored and other vehicles, radar stations and other installations west of Irbid and in the vicinity of Mafraq. Irbid is Jordan’s second largest city. Mafraq is a major road junction 30 miles northeast of Amman, the capital. An Israeli General Staff officer defined the strike as a “strong air attack” intended to “teach the Iraqis a lesson that their attacks on Israeli settlements will not go unpunished.” Jordan claimed that these other towns were hit Wednesday: Sahan, about seven miles northwest of Irbid; Zamaliya, eight miles west or Irbid; Taiyba, two miles from Zamaliya and Mafraq. Jordanian military reports heard here on Amman Radio claimed that three Israeli planes were shot down by anti-aircraft fire. Amman had a 30-minute air raid alert as Israeli planes reportedly buzzed the capital. Amman reports said the Israeli planes inflicted little damage in their attacks because of heavy ground fire and a low cloud cover. An Israeli communique said today that the jet attacks were ordered because “Iraqi forces have taken into their hands an increasing role in the offensive against Israel.” It said that “Iraqi artillery, without any valid cause, has been carrying the weight of attacks against Israeli settlements in the Beisan and Jordan Valleys, particularly on the night of Dec. 2-3.”

According to Israeli intelligence reports, half the 10,000-man Iraqi force, based in Jordan since the Six-Day War was equipped with heavy Soviet-supplied rockets and long-range artillery. The Iraqis and Palestinian commando groups were reportedly operating independently of the Jordanian Government. On the ground today, according to an Israeli spokesman, Jordanians used 81-millimeter mortars to bombard an Israeli tractor station south of the Damiya Bridge. No casualties were reported. Small arms fire was reported yesterday near the Allenby Bridge. Saboteurs from Jordan blew up a civilian tractor near the Dead Sea potash works.

According to Israeli eye-witness accounts, panic-stricken residents of Irbid, a town of nearly 100,000. started evacuating it yesterday despite appeals from Amman to stay. Irbid was heavily damaged by Israeli long range artillery Sunday and Monday in retaliation for heavy Jordanian attacks on Israeli settlements. Some 50 houses were reportedly damaged. Long lines of cars, horses, donkeys and carts were seen leaving the city. The Jordanian village of Kfar Assad on the slopes of the Gilead Mountains was also reportedly wrecked by Israeli fire, with 14 dead and 18 wounded. Assad was a Jordanian Army base and was also used as a base by E1 Fatah marauders.

The battles since Sunday along the Israel-Jordan front, the worst and most serious since the June, 1967 Arab-Israel war, followed an Israeli commando raid Sunday that destroyed two key bridges 37 miles inside Jordanian territory. According to Israel’s announcement of the action, it was intended as a warning following King Hussein’s Nov. 16 agreement with the terrorists that apparently gave Palestinian commando groups a free hand for raids and sabotage against Israel. Israel reported 51 incidents since then along the cease-fire line and inside Israel-held territory. Israeli sources said the current fighting has not changed the military balance in the region which they consider heavily in their favor.

(In Cairo, Egyptian Government spokesman Mohammed H. el-Zayyat said President Gamal Abdel Nasser hoped that the forthcoming visit of William W. Scranton, President-elect Richard M. Nixon’s fact-finding envoy, will prompt the new Administration to seek a “peaceful solution with justice” to the Middle East dispute.)

(In Washington, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee made public a letter to President-elect Richard M. Nixon urging the incoming Administration to reaffirm and reinforce the U.S. commitment to Israel. It called on Mr. Nixon to “make it clear beyond any doubt to the Soviet Union and to the Arab States that the U.S. will take firm action to resist any aggression against Israel.” In New York, Rep. Jonathan B. Bingham, New York Democrat, said today in a letter to The New York Times that Israel should be proposed as a member of NATO by the United States.)