Postscript to Terror

Only a few top officials knew the mission of the Royal Air Force Comet that took off from a base in England last week and streaked through the night toward the Continent. Aboard the plane was Leila Khaled, 24, the Palestinian guerrilla who attempted to skyjack an El Al airliner over Britain last month. Her mission failed and a male companion was killed, but three other planes were skyjacked by guerrillas that day and their crews and passengers taken hostage. Now, in a strange postscript to terror, the last of those hostages were being exchanged for Leila and six other Palestinian guerrillas.

In Jordan, where civil war between King Hussein's army and the Palestinian guerrillas was petering out, the last six hostages (of 54) had already been released by the fedayeen. In exchange, the R.A.F. Comet landed in Munich to pick up three fedayeen who had been held by the West Germans. Then it stopped in Zurich for three who had been in Swiss custody. Its passenger list complete, the British plane delivered all seven to Cairo.

Fighting in the North. As the bizarre skyjacking affair was ending, Jordan's civil war also seemed to be moving toward conclusion after ten days of savage fighting. A truce team of officers from six other Arab nations arrived to supervise a cease-fire under the terms of a 14-point agreement negotiated earlier in Cairo. There was still sporadic fighting in the northern sector of Jordan, however, and 20 people were killed in an army-guerrilla clash.

In Amman, where the heaviest fighting of the war had taken place, shooting had already stopped. Under the peace plan, both guerrillas and army personnel were leaving. Joint teams of truce officials, guerrillas and Jordanian army officers ranged through the city supervising the evacuation.

Suffocating Stench. As the military left, Amman slowly revived. The city had suffered massive destruction as the army routed the guerrillas. Burned-out automobiles and tanks were dragged from the streets. With electricity still out in many areas, street-corner hawkers selling kerosene lanterns did a brisker business than did peddlers offering pictures of Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser. Shattered water mains were mended, but there were no pumps working to carry water to the top of Amman's hills. Over whole sections of the city hung the suffocating stench of death. A mass grave dug in the Ashrafiryeh section by the Jordanian army was discovered; it contained 45 bodies.

Law and Order. In a press conference at Al-Hummar Palace last week, King Hussein insisted that casualties in the twelve days of fighting had actually been light. The guerrillas claimed that 25,000 people were killed. Hussein said his army had lost 200 men, while in Amman his government put civilian casualties at 541. U.S. estimates place the dead at perhaps 2,000--a terrible toll in a country of 2,200,000.

The King seemed sad but not apologetic about the slaughter. "We tolerated a great deal in the hope that we could avert such a disaster," he said. "There was an explosion and it could not be averted." Most significant, Hussein appears ready to risk yet another explosion if the fedayeen challenge his authority again. Said the beleaguered King, who has outlawed guerrilla leaders George Habash of the radical Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and Nayef Hawatmeh of the even more extreme Popular Democratic Front: "There will be law and order in this country. Jordan will never tolerate a state of chaos." Brave words--but can the King make them stick?

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