International Police hunt Arabs after bloody London attack

Press, 22 August 1978, Page 8

International Police hunt Arabs after bloody London attack

NZPA

London

A big police hunt was in progress yesterday for two men of “Arabic appearance” seen in the area of the terrorist attack on Sunday on a coach carrying El Al aircrew outside the Europa Hotel, Grosvenor Square, the Press Association reports.

As six of the victims of the attack underwent operations on Sunday night in Middlesex Hospital, Scotland Yard issued descriptions of the two men they want to find. A third man was helping police inquiries yesterday. Nine people were wounded and two others killed in the attack at lunchtime on Sunday as an El Al coach carrying 21 crew members arrived outside the hotel. A group of terrorists with machine-guns and one with a satchel full of grenades were waiting. Three grenades were thrown at the coach and it is believed a fourth exploded prematurely, killing one of the terrorists. The other person killed was an Israeli air hostess. Scotland Yard said later

they had recovered two submachine guns used in the attack. The El Al coach, cars, and buildings in the area were damaged by the grenade explosions and bursts of mach-ine-gun fire. A spokesman Kt Middlesex Hospital said seven people — four women and three men — had been detained overnight. The spokesman said two Israeli air hostesses were among the injured. The condition of one of the two was “critical.” The other six injured were last night said to be “comfortable.” A Palestinian splinter group has claimed responsibility for the attack. A statement telephoned to a Reuter office abroad said the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine —

Special Operations, which masterminded last October’s hijacking of a Lufthansa airliner to Somalia, had staged the attack.

It said El Al was a military institution used to carry spare parts and volunteers to Israel. “The P.F.L.P.-S.O. considers El Al a military target and will strike at it wherever it can. This attack is a last warning to all passengers against the use of the airline,” the caller said. “It was just like a battleground — there was blood everywhere,” a hotel porter told reporters.

A local tavern manager, Jim Murray, said he had watched one attacker pull grenades from a satchel and hurl them at the bus.

One exploded under a taxi in the hotel forecourt, blow-

ing the driver out of his cab.

"An air hostess was lying on the ground and the terrorists were still firing, and people were running terrified up side streets,” said a chef who rushed from his kitchen.

Another watcher said: “A police car screamed down the wrong way in a one-way street after an Arab who was running away.

“Three men jumped out of the car and pounced on the Arab, who was shouting, screaming, and kicking.”

It was the first attack against Israelis on the streets of London, according to the Israeli Embassy. However, in 1972 an Israeli diplomat, Dr Ami Schachori, an agricultural counsellor, was killed by a letter bomb sent to the Embassy from Amsterdam.