Palestinian Guerrilla Leaders Agree to Coordinate Activities in Occupied Areas

The London Times reported from Cairo today that Palestinian guerilla leaders meeting there agreed to coordinate their operations in Israel-occupied territories. The group, numbering about 100 leaders of El Fatah and other Arab terrorist and sabotage groups, also decided to establish a “coordinating council” with military experts from each organization represented. The council will meet secretly to plan future armed operations in the occupied territories, the Times said.

Cairo has been the scene in recent days of meetings of the Palestine National Council, reportedly chosen by a committee of Palestine exile organizations which claim to represent more than two million Palestinian Arabs living inside and outside of Israel and the territories it controls. The delegates to the meetings represent businessmen in addition to professors and other elements of Arab society.

The Palestinians received a message from Peking’s Afro-Asian Committee for Solidarity urging “armed struggle” against Israel “as the main form of their (Arab) liberation struggle.” The message said that, “guided by chairman Mao’s thought, the 700 million Chinese people consistently give unswerving support to the Palestinian people and other Arab peoples in their Just struggle against U.S. — Israeli aggression and resolutely support the Palestinian Arabs’ just struggle to return to their homeland.”

In a related development, three mortar shells exploded near the Yardena settlement in the Beisan Valley today without causing damage or casualties, a military spokesman reported. The shells were fired from the East Bank of the Jordan River. Jordanian units fired on Israeli positions in the Umm Sidra pass north of the Damiyah Bridge yesterday and the fire was returned. There were no casualties but crops were damaged by fires touched off by the shells.