Death in the Desert

ATER 25 years of open or undercover warfare, neither Israel nor the Arab states can find much pride or glory any longer in the killing. But Israel last week carried aggression to new heights. Over the occupied Sinai peninsula, Israeli Phantoms scrambled to intercept an unarmed Libyan Arab Airlines Boeing 727 jet that was bound for Cairo and almost certainly had lost its way. The Israelis shot it down, killing 105 of the 111 people on board.

The attack on the airliner, which happened only twelve hours after a daring Israeli raid on Palestinian refugee camps in northern Lebanon, was a new sign that the Middle East is trapped in a siege mentality. Apparently, the conflicting parties are not capable of moving toward peace under present conditions. As it happened, last week's Israeli actions occurred at a time when Egypt and the U.S., after a long period of coolness, were again taking a tentative step toward talks and reconciliation.

The step consisted of a visit to Washington by Hafez Ismail, 57, President Anwar Sadat's national security adviser, who is commonly described as Cairo's Henry Kissinger. Egypt lately has shown unaccustomed signs of willingness to discuss peace, if not to agree to specific terms. After visits to Moscow and London, Ismail sought, and was quickly granted the opportunity to become an American President's first direct Egyptian contact since relations between Washington and Cairo were severed in 1967. Ismail's visit suggested that Egypt is aware that the road to peace with Israel runs through Washington rather than Moscow. But Israel's attack on the Libyan airliner clearly neutralized much of the trip's value. Nonetheless, Secretary of State William Rogers telephoned Ismail, who was in London when the plane was hit, to persuade him that the disaster had made his visit that much more imperative.

The Sinai incident was an unpardonable breach--if not of international law, since Israel claimed that its pilots had followed established procedures before finally opening fire on the plane --at least of international decency. The only crime of the captain--a French pilot named Jacques Bourges, 42, on contract to Libyan Arab Airlines--was that he mistakenly overflew air space claimed by Israel. Even Israel's friends abroad were shocked by the assault on the unarmed passenger plane. President Nixon sent pointed messages of sympathy to Libya and Egypt, whose citizens accounted for most of those killed in the crash. Other Western nations, including France and Britain, made formal protests to Israel. They also mounted additional guards over Israeli embassies as well as Israeli aircraft landing at their airports.

Shock. In Jerusalem, Premier Golda Meir abhorred the loss of life, but also blamed the incident on the French pilot. Not even Israel was totally immune from shock. "I'm not proud of it, and I don't believe it's helpful," said one Israeli diplomat in a guarded comment. With national elections coming up in the fall, government leaders painstakingly dissociated themselves from any responsibility for what was finally described as a "military decision" to shoot down the plane. In fact, the young but experienced Phantom pilots had radioed for instructions before each move. At a weekend press conference in Tel Aviv, Defense Minister Moshe Dayan carefully separated himself from the events in Sinai. He did say, however, that his government would welcome an investigation of the incident and suggested that a "hot line" be set up between Egypt and Israel as a means of preventing such accidents in the future.

The ill-fated jet was Flight 4114, which left Benghazi on the regular run to Cairo. Flying along the Mediterranean coast, the plane turned south at El Alamein, then northeast at El Fayoum for the approach to Cairo. Inexplicably, Captain Bourges missed Cairo by a wide margin; the only reasonable explanation for his error was heavy cloud conditions over the area that afternoon that might have affected his navigational equipment.

The plane crossed the Suez Canal and was over Sinai before the captain sighted what he thought were Egyptian MIGs flying wingtip to wingtip with him. Actually, the planes were Israeli Phantoms alerted by radar. The Israelis were more sensitive than usual to any invasion of their air space that day, for two reasons. One was an odd rumor that Arab fedayeen were planning some sort of kamikaze raid on Israel using a disguised civilian airliner. The other was a more substantial report that a commando of trained Al-Fatah guerrillas was flying from Libya to Cairo en route to camps in Syria and Lebanon.

Israeli pilots who took part in the shooting appeared at a press conference in Tel Aviv; they were identified only as "Y" and "S." They claimed that they had flown to within 15 ft. of the Libyan jet, indicating by thumb signals that Bourges should descend and land at Bir Gifgafa airbase in Sinai. Bourges, they said, made the proper response by lowering his landing gear, and his altitude gradually dropped from 15,000 ft. to 1,500 ft. But he also indicated by hand signals that he was turning west in the direction of Cairo. When he picked up speed and refused to land, the Israelis said, the Phantoms first fired in front of him, then at his wingtips, and only then at the plane itself. Crippled by their cannon, the 727 made a bad wheels-up landing on the Sinai sand. It hit, bounced and burst into flames. "He did a fairly poor job of it," said one of the Phantom pilots.

Captain Bourges, who was killed in the crash, apparently never realized what was happening. Egypt's Minister of Information, Abdel Kader Hatem, played for newsmen a nine-minute recording of the last conversation between the captain and the Cairo control tower. According to the tape, corroborated by an Israeli inspection of the plane's flight recorder, Bourges at first thought that he was over Egyptian territory and that the jets tailing him were Egyptian MIGs. "I have some rockets here," said Bourges' copilot. There was the sound of cannon fire. "What's happening now?" asked Bourges. "They've got us," said a voice. Then Bourges radioed: "Cairo control, this is Libyan 114. I guess we have serious trouble with one heading compass." Suddenly he cried, "We are now shot! We are now shot by your fighter twice!" The copilot shouted, "It's an Israeli fighter!" Those were their last words.

Israeli authorities quickly dispatched helicopters and ground forces to the scene and rushed survivors to a hospital at Beersheba. But they were also uncharacteristically defensive about the incident. No public reports were released for three hours. Air Force Chief of Staff Mordechai Hod insisted later at a press conference that the Libyan plane had overflown "one of the most sensitive security areas" in Sinai. Perhaps so, but the area is routinely visited by even civilian representatives of U.S. Jewish organizations on VIP tours.

The shocking end to the Sinai incident overshadowed the surprise Israeli raid into northern Lebanon. As part of the Middle East's war of the spooks (TIME, Feb. 12) Israeli agents who had infiltrated Arab groups in Europe provided Jerusalem with detailed maps and diagrams of Palestinian refugee camps at Baddawi and Nahr al Bared, where terrorists were reportedly being trained. Israeli spies also discovered that George Habash, the leader of the militant Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, was scheduled to meet with his aides at one of the camps in late February for a high-level strategy conference.

Raid. Israeli commandos spent four months planning the attack. Three times it was postponed by Israel's Cabinet, which was worried that the raid might coincide with Mrs. Meir's annual visit to Washington. Last week the go signal was given. The commandos slipped off missile boats that had traveled 130 miles from Haifa and made their way ashore in post-midnight darkness. Arab sentries were silently knifed, and the camps attacked before the raiders were discovered. The Israelis claimed that they had destroyed armed encampments of the fedayeen and killed 62 guerrillas. Next day, Lebanese authorities showed newsmen what they said were schoolrooms and clinics and said that 31 people--mainly civilians --had been killed.

Israeli officers insisted later that the strike had been made to halt fedayeen attacks abroad. Certainly Israel has had little difficulty with Arab guerrillas at home in recent months; the Syrian border has been neutralized by heavy Israeli air and artillery strikes, and the Lebanese have apparently persuaded the fedayeen to move back from positions near Mount Hermon in order to avoid Israeli reprisals in that area.

The Palestinians suspect that the raid had been designed to kill or kidnap Habash and other P.F.L.P. leaders. For once, Israeli intelligence was at fault; unbeknownst to the spies, the scheduled strategy meeting at the camps had been postponed. Rather than return emptyhanded, the raiding party blew up suspected fedayeen installations before they went home.

For the U.S., the week's events in the Middle East could scarcely have come at a worse time. Still, Washington did its best to make its visitor from Egypt feel welcome. A tall, graying onetime ambassador to London, Paris and Rome, Ismail was expansively greeted by Nixon at the White House. "In this very troubled and explosive area of the world," said the President, "our major goal is to move things off dead center." Ismail, who brought a personal message to Nixon from Sadat, emphasized to his hosts the expectable point: Egypt does not intend to give up territory in any settlement with Israel. Beyond that, there were practical hints that a peaceful rapport between Cairo and Washington is feasible only as long as Sadat stays in power; if domestic upheavals overthrow the President, international settlements will be a long time in coming.

Emerging from his Washington talks last week, Ismail told newsmen "there has been progress"--even though neither side had offered any new plans. Far livelier and franker discussions are likely to take place at the White House this week, when Mrs. Meir makes her annual shopping trip. In light of last week's events, the atmosphere may be rather cool.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.