Mother, 2 Children Innocent Victims of Terrorists

By YITZHAK SHARGIL
NAHARIYA (JTA)—Three
seaborne A r a b terrorists
killed a mother and her two
children in an apartment in
this Mediterranean seashore
resort city and were then
killed by Israeli troops in a
15-minute battle early Tues-
day. An Israeli soldier also
was killed.
The victims were Mrs.
Irka Zalenkin, 31, a daugh-
ter, Romit, 10, a son Gilead,
4, and 1st Sgt. Dan Senesh,
21. The father, Mordecai,
and four Israeli soldiers who
gunned down the terrorists,
were wounded.
Civil defense guards on
duty spotted the three killers,
and one of them opened
steady fire at the invaders,
forcing them into the house
in which the Zalenkin apart-
ment is located.
Officials said the alertness
of the civil guards precented
a much greater disaster.
They said it was around mid-
night when the rubber dinghy
bearing the terrorists reach-
ed the Nahariya seashore,
about 10 miles south of
Lebanon.
After landing, the terrorists
crept toward the first houses
along the shoreline. At that
point, two civil defense
guards spotted the guerrillas
and challenged them. The re-
ply was a burst of shooting,
and one of the guards opened
fire on the terrorists. The
invaders jumped a small
fence and ran to the entrance
of one of the houses, firing
sporadically in every direc-
tion. They entered the build-
ing and burst into the Zalen-
kin apartment, killing the
mother and the two children.
Other families in the block
barricaded themselves when
they heard the shooting.
Some hid under beds; some
pushed their heaviest furni-
ture against the entrance
doors.
When the three terrorists
attacked the Zalenkin apart-
ment, the father had time to
write a note for help and
threw it from the window to
a man standing below. The
man started to go for help,
but Zalenkin asked him - to
stay and help rescue the
children. As the children
prepared to jump from the
window, the terrorists burst
into the apartment, firing
and throwing hand grenades.
By that time, Israeli police
and soldiers had cordoned
off the house. When they
called on the terrorists with
loudspeakers to give them-
selves up, the response was
a shower of gunfire and hand
grenades. One of the terror-
ists went to the roof to fire
in every direction. The other
two joined him shortly after-
wards. The three fired into
windows and entrances of the
apartments.
Neighbors and residents of
the target building were
evacuated. Senior army of-
ficers decided to storm the
building, and the residents
were instructed by loud-
speakers and by telephone to
stay in maximum shelter.
One of the two soldiers made
his way to the roof and be-
gan shooting at the terrorists.
One of the terrorists either
activated ammunition tied
around his waist or the am-
munition was detonated by
an Israeli soldier's bullet,

killing him. The other two
terrorists raced downstairs,
ran into other soldiers and
were killed.
Prime Minister Yitzhak
Rabin, accompanied by Po-
lice Minister Shiomo Hillel
and Information Minister
Aharon Yariv, and Chief of
Staff Mordecai Gur, arrived
at the scene at dawn. Rabin
said he was "shocked at the
murder of innocent civi-
lians."
He added, "We will do
everything we can to prevent
„such attacks and punish
those who try to hit us. The
terrorists tame by sea,"
which he called "a new way
of terror." He added "the
continued terror requires a
constant and continued re-
action."
Security forces combed the
area, and the resort city re-
turned to normal life as
schools were reopened, along
with the cafes and res-
taurants of the many hotels.
Medical efforts for the vic-
tims began as soon as the
terrorists were killed. A
team of three doctors dg
cided to perform surgery on
Mrs. Zalenkin on the spot,
but their efforts failed and
she died.
Damage to the apartments
in the building was heavy,
officials said. Doors were
smashed, furniture wrecked
and the walls pockmarked by
bullets.
The attack was the fourth
by terrorists in northern Is-
rael during the past three
months, the other being at
Kiryat Shemona, Ma'alot and
Kibutz Shamir. The death
toll of Israelis, and a volun-
teer, stands at 50, including
two soldiers.
Officials in Tel Aviv said
the decision of the three Arab
killers to use a sea route for
their penetration appeared to
indicate that land routes
from Lebanon to Israel were
becoming too dangerous. Is-
rael is completing • a barbed
wire fence along the Leb-
anese border, along with
other unpublicized devices,
to make it still more dan-
gerous.
The cabinet met twice
Tuesday in special sessions
on the Nahariya attack, one
at 1 a.m. local time and then
later in the morning after
Premier Rabin and other of
ficials returned from a visit
to the site of the attack.
Hillel said on Israel Radio
after the cabinet meetings,
that the Nahariya raid out-
come indicated the high de-
gree of alertness of the pub-
lic. He said if it had not been
for the spotting of the ter-
rorists by the civil defense
men, "the tragedy could
have been worse. This is
war," he added, "and just
like any war, we have to
wage it in a way that will
bring total victory."
He said there was no way
to close the border totally,
but the security forces were
doing their best to annihilate
as quickly as possible the
terrorists who do manage to
penetrate Israel. He said the
government was studying
ways to increase the number
of persons in the civil de-
fense forces.
Israel Premier Yitzhak
Rabin declared Tuesday in
a special statement to the
Knesset, that Israel would

continue to take action to •
protect its citizens from at-
tacks.
Information Minister Aha-
ron Yariv told a press con-
ference after the Knesset
meeting that Israel had no
doubt that Lebanon could, if
it wished, take effective steps
to curb infiltrations by ter-
rorists. If it could not, then
let it abdicate its rights and
duties, and Israel will take
over the country, Yariv said.
But, he said, Lebanon could
act, especially if Arab states,
particularly Egypt and Syria
supported Beirut in cracking
down on terrorists.
The Nahariya raid proved
Israel's thesis that there was
no essential difference be-
tween the so-called "mod-
erate" faction led by Yassir
Arafat and the "extremists"
led by Dr. George Habash,
Jibril and others, Yariv
maintained. All were in fact
extremists aimed at elimi-
nating the state of Israel,
disagreeing only over tactics.
As a result of the ongoing
terrorist raids, Yariv said,
Israel has" to ask whether the
Arab states which signed un-
dertakings to seek a just and
durable peace through nego-
tiations were sincere in their
intentions and whether Israel
should believe their signa-
tures or the threats made in
Cairo and' Damascus against
Israel following the Israeli
raids on the terrorist bases
in Lebanon.
Meanwhile, some Israeli
sources viewed the Nahariya
attack, as well as the shell-
ing of Kiryat Shemona, as an
attempt by the Palestinian
'terrorist organization to drag
Israel and the Arab states
into an escalation of fighting,
sabotaging the peace efforts.
Israel told the Security
Council Tuesday night that
it holds the Lebanese govern-
ment responsible for the at-
tack in Nahariya.
In a sharply worded letter
to the president of the Secur-
ity Council, Moulaye el Has-
sen, Yosef Tekoah, Israeli
ambassador to the United
Nations, pointed out as Is-
rael did in previous com-
plaints to the Security Coun-
cil that Lebanon continues to
permit the terrorists to "op-
erate in complete freedom
on Lebanese soil" and that
"It is from Lebanon that the
terrorists set out on their
nefarious murder missions in
Israel and elsewhere."
Tekoah noted that at the
same night in which the
murder took place in Na-
hariya, Katyusha rockets
were fired from Lebanon
against the town of Kiryat
Shemona.
In Washington, press re-
ports from Lebanon that Is-
rael has been intensifying its
attacks on Palestinian ter-
rorists because President
*Nixon gave the Israelis a
"green light" were angrily
denounced by the State De-
partment.
The question was raised
by a newsman following Is-
raeli raids on terrorist camps
in southern Lebanon. The
State Department, however,
deplored the continuing viol-
lence in the Middle East in
the wake of the Israeli raids.
A group of American resi-
dents in Lebanon charged
the U. S. government with
condoning "official state ter-

rorism" waged by Israel
against the refugee camps.
The group, which called
itself Americans for Justice
in the Middle East, appealed
to American citizens to in-
fluence their government to
force Israel to end its air at-
tacks on refugee camps.
The Palestinian news
agency WAFA reported in
Beirut that Syria has agreed
to supply Palestinian camps
in Lebanon with missile de-
fenses against Israeli air at-
tacks. The report said Syria
agreed to provide the PLO
with the "defensive means
for protecting the camps in
Lebanon."
The pro-Palestinian Beirut
newspaper Al Moharrer said
Arafat warned five Arab am-
bassadors in Beirut that the
guerrillas would launch a
"scorched earth" policy
against Arab governments
that remained inactive in the
face of the Israeli air attacks
against refugee camps in
Lebanon.
The Neue Zuricher Zeitung
of Zurish reports that the
U. S. is still squarely back-
ing UN Resolution 242 and
favors Arafat's participation
at the Geneva Peace Confer-
ence.
According to the news
paper, certain high-ranking
American representatives al-
ready have established a
secret contact with Arafat.
The U. S. State Department
is persuaded that in any final
solution of the Arab-Israel
conflict, the legitimate rights
of the Palestinians will have
to be taken into account, ac-
cording to the paper.
Spokesmen for Arabs liv-
ing in Venezuela and the
Libyan ambassador to Vene-
zuela were reported publicly
at odds over Arab terrorism,
according to the Latin Amer-
ican affairs department of
the Anti-Defamation League
of Bnai Brith.
One of the spokesmen, Ali
Abu Shetaia, said that Arabs
in Venezuela "repudiate ter-
rorist actions which leave
many innocent victims of
both factions," according to
an interview in the Vene-
zuelan magazine, "Momen-
to."
The magazine also inter-
v i e wed Ali Munstasser,
Libya's ambassador, who
said his government and the
people of Libya gave total
support to the Palestinian
guerrillas.
Asked what type of sup-
port, he said, "moral, with
money, arms, everything."
Also in Caracas, at a meet-
ing to put together a global
treaty for use of the earth's
oceans, Arab diplomats said
they planned to ask the third
UN Conference on the Law
of the Sea to admit Arafat's
PLO as an official observer
to the 10-week-long meeting.
A spokesman for the Is-
raeli delegation said his
group would contest any such
attempt. He said it is "incon-
ceivable" that "a terrorism
movement which throughout
its existence has used the
weapons of indiscriminate
murder, atrocity and sabo-
tage in pursuit of its objec-
tives shouk be permitted to
take part in the conference."
Israel's UN ambassador on
Tuesday criticized Secretary
General Kurt Waldheim for
meeting with members of

"Arab murder organizations"
while he was in Africa.
Waldheim, in a UN press
conference Tuesday, said that
while . attending the recent
conference of the Organiza-
tion of African States he had
met with Zuher Muhsen, head
of the operations unit of the
Palestinian Liberation Or-
ganization (PLO), Farouk el
Khadduni and Abu Latif, of
the PLO's political depart-
ment, and Khaled el Fahoum,
of the PLO's national council.
Tekoah declared "these
murder organizations are en-
gaged in the assassination of
innocent civilians and open-
ly propagate the destruction
of a member state of the
United Nations. Contacts
with them encourage these
terror bands and are harmful
to the cause of peace in the
Middle East."
In Khartoum, Sudan, a
court sentenced eight Pales-
tinian guerrillas to life im-
prisonment Monday for kill-
ing two U. S. diplomats and
a Belgian envoy in March
1973. But the sentence was
quickly reduced to seven
years, and the eight were
flown out of the Sudan and
turned over to the Palestine
Liberation Organization.
In protest against the

Sudanese action, the U. S.
recalled its ambassador to
Sudan for consultations in
Washington.
Sudan's president, Jaafer
el Numairi, ordered the PLO
to carry out the sentences in
its capacity as sole repre-
sentative of the Palestinian
people.
There was nothing unusual
in the "sentence." Most
Palestinian terrorists who
survived their missions have
never been brought to justice.
In the attack on the Olym-
pic Village in Munich in
September 1972, in which 11
Israelis died in a gun battle
with the German police and
three others were freed sev-
eral weeks later when ter-
rorists hijacked a Lufthansa
airliner. The hijackers were
never tried.
Five terrorists killed 31
people at Rome airport last
December, commandeered
an airliner, killed another
victim in Athens and flew on
to Kuwait.
The government there
agreed later to hand them
over for trial by a Pales-
tinian "revolutionary court,"
but disagreement arose
among the Palestinian com-
mando groups on - how to pro-
ceed against them.

Is Legal Action Ahead
for Guides at Ma'alot?

JERUSALEM fJTA)—The
cabinet has asked State's At-
torney Meir Sbamgar to ex-
amine the possibility of legal
action against teachers and
guides who fled the school-
house at Ma'alot last May 15,
leaving their young -charges
to the mercies of three
armed terrorists who took
them hostage and later mur-
dered 25.
It . was learned from reli-
able sources Wednesday that
the report of the special com-
mittee set up by the govern-
ment to investigate t h e
Ma'alot tragedy is believed
sharply critical of those who
fled. But legal observers
here believe that no action
is likely to be taken against
them.
The report of the three-mem-
ber Ma'alot inquiry commit-
tee, headed by Res. Gen.
Amos Horev, was submitted
to the cabinet Sunday, and
portions of its contents not
affecting security were to be
made public and debated in
the Knesset Thursday. But
some sections of the report
had been leaked to the press
earlier.
According to sources, the
report completely clears
Shiomo Ben Lulu, the head-
master of the Safed High
School, whose pupils made up
the majority of the Ma'alot
victims. Ben Lulu was as-
sailed by bereaved parents
and others for permitting the
youngsters to go on the In-
dependence Day' hike and
camping trip May 14-15, a
time when terrorist activity
was anticipated.
But the Ma'alot commit-
tee's report found that he
took all required precautions,
consulted all relevant secur-
ity authorities and followed
the education ministry's
standing orders in permitting

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

the hike, the sources said.
• The report also cleared the
army and police of blame for
the deaths of the students
when they. stormed the Ma'-
alot school building late on
the afternoon of May 15 in
an attempt to rescue the
hostages.
But, according to knowIl-
edgeable sources, the Horev
committee c i t e d deficient
communications between se-
curity forces at Ma'alot arid
the cabinet room in Jeru-
salem during the May 15
ordeal.
It reportedly found that
the cabinet's decision during
the day were made without
the ministers being in pos-
sessien of all the facts, and
it recommended that future
emergencies of this kind be
handled by a small ad hoc
group of ministers r a t her
than by the full cabinet.
In addition to Gen. Horev,
who is president of the Haifa
Technion, other members of
the Ma'alot committee were
Moshe Una, a former NRP
Knesset member and former
State's Attorney Erwin
Shimron.

Rehovot Identifies
Gems by Light Rays

REHOVOT—Weizmann In-
stitute scientists have devel-
oped a device to identify
precious gems by a "finger-
printing" process.
The gems, diamonds, em-
eralds or sapphires can be
identified by their reflections
and refractions of light. P _ at-
terns are formed from 'the
light rays and these can be
photographed.
Scientists can match the
photo with other records of
the stone, and by comparing
them can make a positive
identification.

Friday, June 28, 1974-11