2 Jailed Jordanians Suspected in Bombing of West Berlin Disco

Two Jordanian-born men who admitted taking part in a March 29 bombing in West Berlin are also suspected in the April 5 discotheque bombing here that led to retaliatory U.S. air strikes on Libya, police said Tuesday.

Farouk Salameh, 39, and Fayez Sahawneh, 34, were arrested May 1 on suspicion of taking part in the bombing of the German-Arab Friendship Society office in West Berlin, in which seven Arabs were injured, two of them seriously, said Manfred Ganschow. He heads the police team investigating the La Belle disco bombing, which killed a U.S. soldier and a Turkish woman and injured more than 200 others, including 63 Americans.

Police said that Ahmed Nawaf Mansour Hasi, 35, a Palestinian arrested April 18 in connection with the La Belle attack, led authorities to Salameh and Sahawneh.

Hasi and Salameh claimed they got the explosives for the March 29 attack from the Syrian Embassy in East Berlin, police said.

Bombings Were Similar

“Since the arrested perpetrators now in jail have admitted to one attack (in March), then they must come in question for the other,” Ganschow said. “In both cases, the bombs were made from like explosives and caused almost identically sized holes in the ground and no traces of the explosives were found after the blasts,” he said.

West Berlin Justice Ministry spokesman Volker Kaehne would only say that an “Arab office” in East Berlin was suspected of providing the explosives used in the bombing of the friendship society, but he declined to identify the country.

Hasi and Salameh acknowledged smuggling the explosives from East Berlin some time in late February or early March, Kaehne said. Sahawneh is being held on suspicion he helped transport the explosives, the spokesman said. They have not been formally charged.

Kaehne said Salameh and Sahawneh were born in Jordan but have been living in West Berlin for many years. Sahawneh became a naturalized West German after marrying a German woman.

Nezar Hindawi, 31, a man identified as Hasi’s brother, has been charged in London with attempting to blow up an Israeli jetliner on April 18. Hindawi’s arrest in London led police to Hasi in West Berlin.

Hindawi is suspected of playing a major role in planning the bombing of the German-Arab Society, Kaehne said.

Police are looking for witnesses who may have seen Hasi, Salameh and Sahawneh, alone or together, near the disco on the night of the attack. A $75,000 reward has been posted.