Said Hammami, the Palestine Liberation Organization spokesman in Britain, was killed in his office this afternoon in what appears to be a growing feud inside the PLO leadership. Hammami, 36, married with two young children, was shat in the basement of the Arab League building in Mayfair, a major shopping district. Four young men believed to be Arabs were seen running away and disappeared in the crowds of shoppers. The shooting cause four days after a bomb killed a Syrian diplomat and an embassy driver in their car in the same district.
Hammami, barn in Jaffa, was regarded as a moderate within the PLO and had once hoped to represent the organization in Washington. His death comes at a time of growing disagreement among Palestinians about the PLO’s attitude towards Egypt’s peace initiative.
Although the PLO attended the Tripoli conference of rejectionist Arab states, Yasir Arafat, its leader, is believed to doubt the wisdom of this policy and to be trying to keep open his links with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat. Hammami was known to be close to Arafat.
Even before the Sadat initiative, Hammami had been criticized by Palestinian students in Britain for participating in the conference in London last year attended by Uri Avneri, Gen. Matti Peled and other Israeli supporters of a Palestinian state.
Investigations into his death are being led by Commander James Nevill, head of the antiterrorist squad, who is also investigating the death of the two Syrian officials on New Year’s Eve. Tonight, a special watch was being kept at British airports by plainclothes and uniformed police officers.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
