Syria Expecting Hostages Today : Americans Due by Afternoon, Officials Say

Syria emerged late Friday as the primary focus of negotiations to end the 15-day American hostage crisis, as officials in both Washington and Damascus said they expected the hostages to be transferred to the Syrian capital today.

In Washington, a State Department official who requested anonymity said that the 39 hostages from TWA Flight 847 are expected to travel overland to Damascus today and are expected to be released by the Syrians in a day or two.

He added that officials were trying to be cautious about releasing any details in fears that something might go wrong such as the convoy carrying the hostages being attacked.

“We haven’t brought the champagne out yet,” the unnamed State Department official said.

At the White House, spokesman Larry Speakes responded with a “can’t say,” when asked what, if anything, was going on in the hostage crisis.

President Reagan returned late in the day from Chicago and was said to have remained in the residence quarters of the White House during the evening. Senior foreign policy aides worked in the White House offices, but their windows were dark by midnight.

No Movement in Israel

In Jerusalem, Times correspondent Dan Fisher reported today that a senior defense source said that there would be no immediate release of Lebanese prisoners, the key hijackers’ demand for freeing the 39 hostages.

News agencies quoted an unnamed Syrian government spokesman as saying that the 39 hostages will arrive in Damascus from Beirut, a distance of about 70 miles, sometime this afternoon (early morning Pacific Daylight Time).

ABC News reported that 32 of the hostages were brought together at a hotel on the southern suburbs of Beirut for a farewell dinner before their reported transfer to Syria and had spoken with reporters.

“We were all at the dinner, but we don’t know where we are going now,” hostage Thomas W. Murry of Newbury Park, Calif., shouted at reporters from the back seat of a car outside the Summerland Hotel on West Beirut’s seafront early this morning.

Another hostage, who could not immediately be identified, said as they were leaving the hotel, “All we’ve been told is we’re going to Damascus, we’re getting out.”

Missing from the dinner party were the three TWA crewmen--Capt. John Testrake, First Officer Philip Maresca and Flight Engineer Benjamin Zimmermann-- who were believed to be still aboard the TWA Boeing 727 at Beirut airport.

Also reportedly missing were four passengers--Richard Herzberg, Tony Daniel Watson, Jeffrey Ingalls and Robert Brown. The four are believed to be held jointly by Amal and members of a more radical Shia group, the Hezbollah (Party of God).

The four, however, had been visited by Allyn Conwell, the spokesman for the hostages, who said they were in good health. Sheik Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, leader of the extremist group assured Syrian officials that the four would not be harmed, ABC reported.

Status of 7 Unknown

The status of seven other Americans, kidnaped in Beirut, before the TWA crisis began, was not immediately known.

Speaking to reporters Friday, Shia Muslim leader Nabih Berri tried to distance himself from suggestions that freedom for the American hostages from the June 14 hijacking also include the release of the Americans kidnaped in Beirut during the past 16 months.

“I’m absolutely not involved in those,” Berri said, speaking of 12 Western kidnap victims--the seven Americans plus four Frenchmen and a Briton.

Hopes that the 12 might be included in any deal for the release of the hijack hostages were raised when Berri said at a news conference Wednesday that the never-identified kidnapers of two of the Frenchmen had offered to free them with the Americans. A decision by Reagan to seek release of the seven abducted Americans together with the 39 hijack hostages was announced by Administration officials Thursday.

The release of the 735 Lebanese prisoners still held by Israel remains the primary demand of the hijackers who seized the TWA Boeing 727 on a flight between Athens and Rome and forced the plane on a long odyssey that included two stops in Algiers and three here in Beirut.

The hijackers released some of the passengers and crew and killed one American passenger before handing most of the remaining hostages over to Amal, the Shia Muslim militia headed by Berri in Beirut, after Berri agreed to act as mediator.

Reaction in Jerusalem

In Jerusalem a senior Israeli diplomatic source said this morning:

“The ball is not in our court. No one has informed us as yet that they want us to release the prisoners. However, we are in close contact with the United States on the affair, and the minute a request comes, we will consider it.

“The problem of the release, if a decision is taken to release the Shiite prisoners, is technical and should not take long.”

A senior defense source added today, “There has been no Cabinet meeting, and no prisoners will be released without a Cabinet meeting.”

The next scheduled meeting of the Cabinet is due Sunday but it was considered possible that an emergency session might be arranged for tonight after the conclusion of the Jewish Sabbath.

Reagan, Syrian in Touch

Berri on Friday said that he understood that there has been a lot of communication between Reagan and Syrian President Hafez Assad, adding that “I have concluded that the Syrians are getting much more involved in the matter.” In Washington, national security adviser Robert C. McFarlane confirmed that Reagan is in close touch with Assad.

Berri told a group of reporters on his way to Friday evening prayers that Switzerland had offered to receive the 39 hijack hostages at its Beirut embassy but that he had turned down the offer because the Swiss had imposed a time limit of 48 hours.

That rejection ended any hope Berri might have had of carrying through a proposal he raised at his Wednesday press conference that the hostages be transferred to a Western embassy for safekeeping until the Lebanese prisoners in Israel are freed. A suggestion that France might undertake such a role was apparently ruled out by statements here and in Paris on Thursday.

Berri said that he rejected an offer he received Thursday proposing that the Israelis release the Shia Muslims among the 735 prisoners Israel is holding in Atlit prison near Haifa but not the other Lebanese. Israeli Defense Ministry sources in Tel Aviv said earlier this week that the 735 include 544 Shias, 147 Palestinians and 44 Christians, Sunni Muslims and Druze, the latter members of an offshoot sect of Islam.

Berri, speaking in Arabic, said he rejected the offer because he has demanded freedom for “all 735 Lebanese prisoners at Atlit.”

Asked who had made the offer, Berri replied, “It was an American offer.” But he gave no further details, and in Washington, no available Administration source was willing to comment on Berri’s statement.

Not Just Shias

Berri clearly wished to leave the impression with the Lebanese that he is as interested in the prisoners belonging to other religious groups as he is in his own co-religionists, the Shias.

At one point, he mentioned a Christian who is believed to be among the prisoners, Tony Abi Ghanem, a resident of Beirut’s mostly Shia southern suburbs who disappeared on a visit to southern Lebanon.

“Maybe Tony Abi Ghanem is better than 100 Shias,” Berri said.

Berri said that Syrian Vice President Abdel-Halim Khaddam had contacted him Friday to ask for information on the proportions of each religious group among the 735 prisoners held by Israel. Berri cited this as evidence of the depth of Syrian involvement in the finer points of negotiations for an agreement to free the hijack hostages in exchange for release of the Lebanese prisoners in Israel.

Three hostages appeared for television interviews at Berri’s home Friday, as the Shia leader apparently hoped to keep up pressure on the Reagan Administration to reach a compromise for the prisoner exchange.

Hostage spokesman Conwell, of Houston, said he believes Israel should release its Lebanese prisoners “because there’s got to be one hell of a strong cry from the American people for justice.”

Conwell said later that he was distressed to learn that the United States is now demanding the release of seven Americans kidnaped earlier in Lebanon as well as freedom for the airline hostages.

‘That Distresses Me’

In a taped CBS News interview, Conwell said, “That distresses me because they are certainly requesting an entity--(Berri’s) Amal movement--to make concessions that they have absolutely either no control over or would appear to not even have adequate channels of communications to that other group.”

Islamic Jihad (Islamic Holy War), a shadowy group believed to have ties with Iran, has claimed responsibility for abducting the seven Americans.

During an interview with ABC-TV’s “Good Morning America,” Conwell was asked if he were willing to be held in custody of a foreign embassy for “days or weeks” until Israel releases its Lebanese prisoners as the hijackers have demanded.

“Yes,” Conwell replied. “I say this with very deep and sincerre concern that this be resolved nonviolently, and I think (the other hostages) would concur with that. They would almost very willingly become self-imposed hostages if Mr. Berri would release us on our own recognizance, you would find the majority of the people willig to do that.”

Also interviewed at Berri’s home were hostages Simon Grossmayer, 57, of Algonquin Ill., and Father James W. McLoughlin, 45, of Geneva, Ill. Grossmayer, who had a lung removed several years ago, said the visit was to give Berri a chance to check his health.

“I’m OK,” Grossmayer said, adding that he has been examined by doctors during his captivity. “I certainly hope to go home soon.”

When Berri said that, in the absence of any arrangement to transfer the hostages to a Western embassy in Beirut, he was prepared to send them to Syria, he stressed that Syria must agree not to free the hostages until Israel has freed the Lebanese in Atlit prison.