A nine-hour Israeli siege on a Jericho prison complex ended after dark on Tuesday with the surrender of Ahmed Saadat, the PFLP secretary general, and five other activists. The six were transferred to prison in Israel, officials said.
It all started when Israeli occupation forces Tuesday morning cordoned off the Jericho prison after laying tight siege to the city itself and fired intensively at guards and wards, killing a PA policeman and one of the prisoners, a member of the Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, the armed wing of Fatah. At least eight other Palestinians were wounded.
Sa'dat and his comrades are accused of masterminding the killing of former Israeli tourism minister Rahbv'am Ze'evi in addition. The PFLP declared that it killed Ze'evi in retaliation to the Israeli assassination of its former secretary general Abu Ali Mustafa in a missile raid on his office.
Before the surrender, Kayed Al-Ghoul, the PFLP politburo member, told the PIC that his organization would adopt necessary measures in accordance with development of events.
News reports indicated that Israeli army bulldozers succeeded in tearing down part of the prison wall and that a number of PA policemen as well as Sa'dat were forced to surrender to the Israeli troops. Israel humiliated the prisoners by asking them to stay just in their underwear.
Earlier, Sa'dat told Al-Jazeera TV in a telephone interview that he would resist his arrest and would not give up to the invading forces, saying "I will face my fate courageously."
In the early hours of the morning, Israeli forces asked all prisoners through loudspeakers to give themselves in but none responded to the call and vowed to fight till the end.
Until Tuesday morning, the jail had been under the supervision of American and British security personnel based on agreement signed with the PA. Thus, angry Palestinians attacked offices of the British Council in Gaza to protest what they viewed as Britain's connivance with Israel.
Hamas condemned the raid on the Jericho prison, calling it a criminal act befitting gangsters. "This is the behavior of a murderous gang, not the behavior of a state," said the Palestinian Prime Minister designate Ismaeel Haniya. PA official Sa'eb Ureikat said PA President Mahmoud Abbas was making urgent contacts with the Quartet (UN, US, EU, and Russia) in an effort to get Israel to terminate the raid.
