President Anwar Sadat of Egypt today strongly condemned the Palestinian terrorist raid on Israel, the first Arab leader to do so since the El Fatah wing of the Palestine Liberation Organization perpetrated the outrage Saturday. According to a Cairo radio broadcast, Sadat described the murder of Israeli civilians as “sad and tragic.”
He said: “Anything against civilians I shall always condemn….Believe me, I describe it as a very sad and tragic incident and when I heard that the Palestine Liberation Organization declared their responsibility about it, I asked myself what will be the result?”
In an apparent appeal to Israeli Premier Menachem Begin for restraint in any planned reprisals, Sadat called for an end to the “vicious circle” of strike and counter-strike that has plagued the Middle East for 30 years. He said he would “have liked action toward the establishment of peace instead of starting revenge again and the vicious circle again.” According to Cairo radio, Sadat made his remarks to reporters at Beni Suef, a Nile valley town south of Cairo.
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