Abu Nidal Gets Life Term in Absentia for Massacre

Fugitive Arab terrorist Abu Nidal was convicted of murder Friday and sentenced to life in prison for the 1985 Christmas season massacre at Rome’s Leonardo da Vinci airport.

Abu Nidal, one of the world’s most-wanted men, was found guilty of masterminding the attack, which was carried out by four gunmen. Sixteen persons were killed, including three of the attackers, and 80 others were wounded.

Terrorist lieutenant Rashid Hameida was convicted of planning the attack. He too was sentenced to life in prison. Neither Hameida nor Abu Nidal was present; they were tried and sentenced in absentia.

Gets 30 Year Term

Ibrahim Khaled, the only survivor among the terrorists who carried out the assault and the only defendant in custody, was sentenced to 30 years.

Italian jurists said they believe the trial marks the first time that Abu Nidal has been convicted as a result of evidence presented in court. He is wanted throughout Europe in connection with a wave of terrorism that included a 1982 attack on Rome’s principal synagogue.

In confessing to his role in the airport attack on Dec. 27, 1985, Khaled told Italian investigators that he was one of about three dozen young Palestinians trained for suicide missions by instructors from the Abu Nidal group in a part of Lebanon under Syrian control.

4 Killed in Vienna

Almost simultaneous with the Rome attack, three other Abu Nidal-linked gunman assaulted the Vienna Airport, where four persons, including one of the attackers, were killed. Two Palestinian gunmen are serving life terms in Austria for the Vienna killings.

After six hours of deliberation Friday, the Italian jury of two judges and six civilians appeared to have heeded appeals for leniency for Khaled. The jury rejected a prosecution call for life imprisonment, the harshest sentence it could have imposed. There is no death penalty in Italy. Convicts are usually released after serving about half of their sentences.

Epifanio Ales, the court-appointed lawyer for the 20-year-old Khaled, urged mercy and asked the court to consider the defendant’s youth and the traumatic life he had had in the refugee camp where he was born.

Called ‘A Patriot’

Noting that he had collaborated with the authorities in providing details of his training and of the attack itself, Ales said that Khaled had taken part in the attack as “a patriot who wanted a Palestine free from the Israelis.”

Khaled was not in court for his conviction and sentencing. He appeared for the opening day of the proceedings last December and has since remained in his cell. He told the court in a letter that “my presence will only aggravate suffering” among the families of the victims.

Khaled and the other three gunmen burst into the airport, their weapons blazing, during passenger check-in at adjoining counters of the Israeli airline, El Al, and TWA. Khaled said they had been instructed to attack the greatest concentration of Americans and Israelis at the airport.

Abu Nidal is the pseudonym of Sabri Banna. He heads the Revolutionary Council of Fatah, a faction that broke away several years ago from the dominant Fatah group within the Palestine Liberation Organization.