What About Our Hostages in Lebanon?

When Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, on the very date on which Iran released the American hostages that it had held for 444 days, he proclaimed, “No more American hostages.” His Administration later added, “No negotiation with terrorists and kidnapers.”

But, despite President Reagan’s bluster and denials, there have been plenty of Americans taken hostage during his Administration, and the President has done lots of negotiating for their release. Given the right type of pressure, Reagan will do whatever is necessary to set Americans free. But without such pressure, almost always in the form of the publicity surrounding the hijacking last year of TWA Flight 847 or the arrest of journalist Nicholas S. Daniloff, there is no dealing.

Take the case of Terry A. Anderson, David P. Jacobsen and Thomas Sutherland--all Americans being held by a Shia Muslim faction in Lebanon. (Two other Americans, Frank Herbert Reed and Joseph J. Cicippio, also have been captured but presumably by different groups. William Buckley, another American, is believed to have been killed by his captors.)

No matter how hard Reagan and Secretary of State George P. Shultz have tried to escape the comparison between these hostages and the Daniloff case, the families of these men are applying pressure on the President to win their release.

The tragedy, however, is that even if the President ultimately does own up to his neglect of those unfortunate people, it may be too late. Reagan and his handlers have simply burned too many bridges in the Arab world to be able to find help for them.

I learned something of this bitterness that we have created during a trip to Damascus in August.

When I asked Syrian President Hafez Assad about Reagan’s “quiet diplomacy,” he told me it is so quiet that he has been unable to hear it. In short, no one in the U.S. government is talking to him about the American hostages.

He volunteered that he and his government would continue to try to put pressure on Hezbollah (Party of God) to release the Americans, but he saw no advantage in getting more excited about them than is Reagan.

Beyond what Assad said, there is a feeling among people throughout the Syrian government that no matter how much they have helped in the past, with the TWA hijacking or the release of Father Lawrence M. Jenco and Benjamin Weir, they get little thanks and a great deal of “Syria bashing” from the American press and the American government.

Our delegation also met with Nabih Berri, the Lebanese minister of justice and the head of Amal--the largest Shia grouping there. When I asked if he could help with the American hostages, he said, “Yes, but I won’t.”

Shortly after the hijacking of TWA Flight 847 in June, 1985, he was called by Robert McFarlane, then the national-security director, and asked to help free the hostages. Although it would place him in a perilous political position in Lebanon, Berri agreed to do so without condition.

Even so, McFarlane asked what Berri would like in return. Berri responded, “The release of the Lebanese hostages being held by Israel in Atlit prison, and the end of the Israeli military occupation in southern Lebanon.” There is a large Shia population in the south, and the Israeli occupation there is particularly brutal. Lebanese villagers are routinely kidnaped by the Israeli military and taken into Israel in violation of international law. Entire villages have been destroyed by the Israelis, with dozens of civilians being killed and wounded. It is an occupation much like the one in the West Bank and the Gaza--forgotten by the rest of the world but very much on the minds of people in Lebanon, and particularly the Shias.

McFarlane promised to work to accomplish both goals.

Berri then directly intervened in the TWA hostage affair, eventually securing the release of all passengers being held.

The Reagan Administration was well aware of the danger in which it had placed Berri. But, once all the hostages were freed, McFarlane denied to the press that he had made any promises to the Amal leader, and never called Berri again.

“Then I was made out to be the hijacker, and nobody in the American government, including McFarlane, raised their voice to correct the lie,” Berri said.

As Syrian Vice President Abdul Halim Khaddam said to us, “After the years of anti-Arab policies by the American government, the luck of those known as friends of America is not good.”

Nor is it likely to get better. Despite its support for Israel, America was once viewed by people in the Arab world as a highly respected superpower. But since the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, America has become the target of militant groups seeking to eradicate U.S. influence in the Middle East. The continued assaults on innocent American civilians in Lebanon is a painful part of this strategy.