Druze Leader Offers Self in Waite’s Place

Druze militia leader Walid Jumblatt on Saturday offered to trade himself as a hostage in the event that Anglican Church envoy Terry Waite has indeed been taken captive, several Beirut radio stations reported.

Jumblatt, who had personally guaranteed Waite’s safety, conceded he was uncertain about assurances given by Muslim mediators about Waite’s well-being, nor was he sure that promises he had given the Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert A. K. Runcie, about protecting Waite “still stand.”

At the same time, terrorists again threatened to kill four professors--three Americans and an Indian-born U.S. resident kidnaped a week ago in Beirut--demanding this time that Israel free 400 Palestinian prisoners within one week.

Hours earlier, at least 20 Americans heeded warnings by the Reagan Administration and left kidnap-plagued Muslim West Beirut, although two others at the last minute refused to leave.

Last Seen Jan. 20

Waite, who has been working since his arrival here on Jan. 12 to negotiate the release of Western hostages, including Americans Terry A. Anderson and Thomas Sutherland, was last seen Jan. 20 leaving his hotel without his Druze bodyguards--reportedly to meet with members of the Shia Muslim organization Islamic Jihad (Islamic Holy War), which claims to hold the two Americans.

On Friday, diplomatic sources in Washington said Waite was being held by Iran-linked Hezbollah forces in a dispute with Jumblatt, leader of the Progressive Socialist Party.

Anderson, the chief Middle East correspondent for the Associated Press, was kidnaped by gunmen in West Beirut in March, 1985. Sutherland, dean of agriculture at the American University of Beirut, was seized the following June.

‘Do Not Embarrass Me’

The group that claims to hold them, Islamic Jihad, is believed to have ties to both Iran and to the radical group Hezbollah (Party of God).

As for Jumblatt’s offer to serve as a hostage , at least three Beirut radio stations--one Christian, one Muslim and one state-run--quoted him as saying: “I told them, ‘Do not embarrass me. Take me hostage if you want, but I want to take delivery of Terry Waite.’ ”

In London, Runcie sent urgent messages to Lebanon on Saturday to determine the fate of his envoy.

“Terry was determined to complete this mission whatever the advice and no matter what personal risk to himself,” Runcie told reporters in Canterbury, 60 miles southeast of London. “We’re very concerned at all these different reports, many of them conflicting, and I’ve sent an urgent request to a number of key figures with whom we’re in touch to get their reaction to it.”

The terrorist group that claims to hold four professors hostage made its latest threat in a handwritten statement.

“The Islamic Jihad for the Liberation of Palestine announces that it will free the four American hostages in exchange for the release of 400 holy war strugglers held in Zionist Nazi jails in Palestine,” the statement said.

“We set a non-extendable one-week deadline for the exchange to take place after which period keeping the four American hostages alive will not be of use to us and we will execute them and throw their corpses on the garbage cans of Cyprus.”

There was no immediate comment from Israel.

The pro-Iranian Muslim extremist group also invited the United States to attack “so that the American nose can once more be rubbed into the mud of Lebanon.

Accompaying Photographs

The statement was accompanied by photographs of two of the four men--Alann Steen, 48, a journalism professor, and Jesse Turner, 39, an assistant instructor of mathematics and computer sciences.

Steen appeared to be in good health and was smiling in the photograph. Turner, bearded with his eyes closed, looked exhausted.

Gunmen posing as policemen entered the West Beirut campus of Beirut University College on Jan. 24 and kidnaped Steen, Turner, accountant Robert Polhill, 47, and business department chairman Mithileshwar Singh, in his 60s, born in India but a U.S. resident alien.

In a statement Thursday, the group threatened to kill all four professors if the United States or its allies attack Lebanon. That statement included a photograph of Polhill with two automatic rifles pointed at his head.

Meanwhile, three Americans--two men and a woman--left Muslim West Beirut and were escorted by Druze militiamen across the city’s dividing Green Line into Christian East Beirut, police reported.

Met by Embassy Officials

The Americans were met by U.S. Embassy officials, according to police.

“I can’t give you their names. We refuse to even call them evacuees. They are American citizens who expressed desire for assistance in leaving West Beirut,” U.S. Embassy spokesman Christopher English told Associated Press.

“Other American citizens who wish to leave (West Beirut) will be assisted to the extent possible,” English said. He declined to say how many Americans remain in the city’s Muslim sector.

He said the three Americans would leave for Cyprus possibly today.

A Lebanese friend identified one of the Americans as Don de Pasquale, 75, of Santa Cruz, Calif., who taught English in Beirut high schools for 40 years.

The Christian Voice of Lebanon radio station identified the other two Americans as the Rev. James Reglend, in his late 60s, director of the Beirut Baptist School, and his wife.

‘I Don’t Want to Leave’

An American woman due to be taken from West Beirut burst into tears at the last minute and left the old U.S. Embassy in West Beirut, where the Americans had congregated, saying, “I don’t want to leave. I don’t.”

She refused to give her name to reporters as she rode away in a car escorted by Jumblatt’s militia. Druze militia sources said another American woman also changed her mind and refused to leave.

Another 17 Americans arrived by ferry Saturday in the Cypriot port of Larnaca. They left Lebanon from the Christian port of Juniyah, 12 miles northeast of Beirut, state-run Lebanese television said.