Palestinians 'will return to homeland’

Press, 13 April 1988, Page 10

Palestinians 'will return to homeland’

NZPA-Reuter Rashaya Eight Palestinians! expelled i from Israelioccupied territory have vowed to use all means to return to their homeland to lead an uprising in which at least: 136 Palestinians have died, i Israeli deported i the group to Lebanon yesterday after accusing them of inciting violence on the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip. “They expelled us just because we are Palestinians,” said Jamal Shatti Hindi, one of- the deportees.

“They want to empty the country from its people. They ; banned us from contacting our families before deporting us.” Besides Mr (Hindi,, aged 30, the eight comprised Abdel Aziz Odeh, aged 38, Furya Ahmed Khayri, aged 39, Adil Bashir Nafa Hamad, aged ; | 27, Muhammed Abu Samara,

aged 26, Khalil Kuka, aged 39, i Hasan Ghanim Muhammed Abu Shakra, aged 27, and Adel Nasser Abu Aziz jAfu, aged 31. They spent their first night at j an old) brick house used as a barracks by the pro-Syrianj Druse Progressive Socialist Party in Rashaya in eastern Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley. . , , lAn Israeli helicopter dropped (them earlier on the northern edge of Israel’s i self-declared “security zone” near Zemraya. Zemraya is one of five crossings linking the 15km deep zone with the Bekaa Valley.

; “We will use all means to return to our country to lead the uprising from there; Our deportation is like oil on fire which will incite our action,” said Mr Odeh, the spiritual leader of the Muslim extremist Islamic Jihad Palestinian guerrilla movement, i