‘God Bless You,’ Reagan Tells Her : Klinghoffer’s Widow Spit in Killers’ Faces

The widow of the partially paralyzed American killed and thrown overboard by hijackers told President Reagan on Saturday that she identified and stared down the four Palestinian terrorists accused of her husband’s murder and spit in their faces in an Italian jail.

The President, who telephoned Marilyn Klinghoffer at her family’s Manhattan apartment, reportedly replied: “You did? God bless you.”

The conversation was described to reporters after the slain man’s widow and 10 other passengers held captive aboard the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro returned to the United States on a military transport plane.

Soon after Mrs. Klinghoffer reached her Greenwich Village apartment house, Letty Simon, a spokeswoman for the family, met with reporters in front of the building. She said Marilyn Klinghoffer and President Reagan had talked. According to Simon, the 58-year-old widow told the President:

“Last night, I had the opportunity in Italy to face every one of them. I spit in their faces and told them what I thought of them.”

She also told Reagan that “I will do anything I can” to see that the killers of her husband are brought to justice.

The widow and three other passengers faced the terrorists in a lineup at an Italian prison in Syracuse, Sicily, so that Italian authorities could strengthen their case.

Determined to Testify

Jerry Arbittier, Klinghoffer’s son-in-law, appeared at the sidewalk news conference with Simon. He said that his mother-in-law was determined to testify against the men charged with killing and pushing overboard her 69-year-old husband, who had been confined to a wheelchair.

“Marilyn said, ‘I want to get them! I want to get them. I want to do anything to get them!’ ” Arbittier related.

According to other passengers, the hijackers told Marilyn Klinghoffer that her husband had suffered a stroke and had been taken to the ship’s infirmary. But they refused to let her visit the hospital and it was not until the Palestinian captors had been removed from the vessel that the captain told her what had happened to her husband.

The military transport carrying the former hostages arrived from Europe at Newark Airport to tears of consolation and relief from their families. At a hotel near the airport, 33 FBI agents took detailed statements from the travelers to use in extradition proceedings and in support of the Italian government’s case charging murder and piracy.

Marilyn Klinghoffer did not speak with reporters at the airport or at her apartment. She was the first off the plane and, dressed in black, was escorted to a limousine by Sen. Alfonse D’Amato (R-N.Y.) and Rep. Ted Weiss (D-N.Y.). The other passengers walked to a chartered bus, which took them to the hotel.

D’Amato said Klinghoffer’s widow told him that she hopes the four terrorists will be tried in the United States. She pledged to return to Italy to see that justice is done.

“She held up magnificently and participated in their identification,” he said.

As the plane approached Newark Airport, Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg (D-N.J.) conferred with Klinghoffer’s two daughters. “They hope his death will make a difference in the way people respond to terrorism,” he said. “We’re saying to terrorists all over the world, don’t do it again.”

Lautenberg later said the hijackers singled out Jewish passengers, asking which ones were Jewish. One passenger, who was an artist had the presence of mind to sketch the hijackers on napkins. When her sketches were shown to Italian police they matched the terrorists in the lineup.

The military charter left Cairo on Friday, stopped in Sicily where the former hostages viewed the hijackers, then flew to the U.S. Rhein-Main Air Base near Frankfurt, West Germany, before departing for the United States.

Heavy Security on Arrival

When the plane landed in a remote area of Newark Airport, security was intense. Vernon A. Walters, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, was the first to board. He greeted the passengers who then emerged, many carrying their own luggage.

Police provided an escort to the Marriott Hotel at the airport, where reunions took place behind closed doors in a banquet room. Klinghoffer’s widow was helped into the hotel by Walters, D’Amato and the family lawyer. She appeared dazed and stared almost in shock at dozens of reporters outside.

“There was relief, there were tears--tears of joy and tears of sadness,” said D’Amato, describing the Klinghoffer family’s reunion. “You know, after all, a daddy has been lost, too. And Mrs. Klinghoffer is an exceptional, extraordinary woman.”

“We are enormously happy to see these hostages home,” Walters said, “but that happiness is tinged with sorrow at the loss of Leon Klinghoffer, barbarically killed by these thugs.”

“They identified the hijackers, and that took real courage to face these people again,” the U.N. representative, a former general and high-ranking CIA official, added.

Each of the hostages was interviewed by a team of three FBI agents in hotel rooms upstairs. “They have been helpful and cooperative in restating their ordeal,” said John C. McGinley, the special agent in charge of the FBI office in Newark. He said that the lineup in Sicily included policemen who appeared for identification with the terrorists, adding that some of the passengers identified the terrorists and “some didn’t.”

“Some were not able to identify all (the hijackers),” he said. “Some were able to identify some.” Marilyn Klinghoffer was “very helpful, very cooperative,” the agent added.

After the FBI debriefing was completed, several family members met with the press. But most, eager to return home, quickly left the hotel.

Earlier Account Corrected

Frank Hodes added a postscript to the ordeal of his wife Mildred, who was held captive while he was ashore. He said that earlier impressions that the hijackers had held a gun to his wife’s head were false and that she had never actually pleaded for her life.

But he said that the captain of the Achille Lauro later told her that the captors had shuffled the passports of Americans and because hers came up on top, she was the next person they contemplated killing.

Hodes called the hijackers “animals.”

He was asked what it was like to return to the United States.

“I requested they come to Newark,” Hodes said with a smile. “It’s closer to home. This is the greatest.”

Meanwhile, the Reuters news agency reported from Israel that passengers who had left the Achille Lauro before it was hijacked have finally given up hope of re-starting their cruise and are flying to Rome to board other flights home.