Israel Ends 3-Day Closure of West Bank and Gaza; New Leaflet Surfaces

Israeli authorities lifted an unprecedented 3-day closure order covering the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip on schedule early today, even as the appearance of a new underground leaflet signaled that the army’s crackdown has not yet silenced leaders of the continuing Palestinian unrest.

The decision to end the extraordinary restrictions, imposed to forestall violent demonstrations Wednesday, was made at a meeting Thursday of senior security officials, including Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin and army and military intelligence personnel.

It means that most of the 1.4 million Palestinian residents of the occupied territories will again be able to travel freely in the West Bank and Gaza and into Israel proper. Exceptions include residents of several refugee camps and villages still under curfew related to recent disturbances.

Gaza Curfew Retained

In addition, the more than 600,000 residents of Gaza will continue under a 5-hour nightly curfew similar to the one first imposed in mid-March. The curfew, which restricts inhabitants to their homes, had been extended Monday to a full 24 hours daily through 3 a.m. today.

After being barred since Monday night, travel also was restored from the territories across the bridges linking the West Bank to Jordan. Restrictions barring the media from the territories without special permission and a military escort were lifted, the army said.

Despite the unprecedented crackdown, four Palestinians were killed by army gunfire Wednesday and more than 50 were wounded in one of the most violent days since the uprising began last Dec. 9. There were clashes in more than 20 locations on the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the army said.

Could Have Been Much Worse

Still, a senior defense official said the situation would have been much worse had the army not acted. “I think if we hadn’t taken all those precautions we could have gone through almost hell,” he said in an interview Thursday. “We know what was planned for us yesterday. I’m not at liberty to be specific, but a lot was planned.”

Underground Palestinian leaders had called for “huge demonstrations” Wednesday to mark Land Day, a commemoration for six Arabs slain by Israeli troops in 1976 during protests against government confiscations of Arab lands in northern Israel. The day has in recent years become almost a national Palestinian holiday, marked both by those Arabs who live as Israeli citizens inside the “Green Line” defining the country’s pre-1967 borders and by Palestinians in the territories.

The army said scattered disturbances continued Thursday, with another Palestinian shot to death in a clash with troops at the village of Yatta, south of Hebron. A spokeswoman identified the victim as Suleiman Alagdi, 17. Another Palestinian, identified as Mahmoud Zaben, died in a hospital Thursday of wounds received the day before in a clash at the West Bank village of Yamoun. The two deaths brought to at least 119 the total number of Palestinians killed in the unrest. One Israeli soldier also has been slain.

12th Bulletin Issued

The latest underground bulletin, meanwhile, was the 12th in a series dating back to early January and signed by the self-styled Unified National Leadership for the Uprising in the Occupied Territories.

It praised the protesters “who are writing in blood and fire the history of the Arab nation” and called for a series of new protest actions during next week’s scheduled peace shuttle in the region by Secretary of State George P. Shultz, who was en route to the region Thursday.

Israeli security sources said last week they believed that massive arrests during the second half of March had netted most of the key activists who were instigating the Palestinian unrest. Rabin revealed in an Israel Television interview Tuesday night that at least 4,400 Arabs are currently detained in connection with the uprising.

Police Minister Chaim Bar-Lev said specifically that among those arrested were those responsible for producing Leaflet No. 11 of the underground leadership. And both Israeli and Palestinian sources agreed that a major test of the effectiveness of the arrest campaign would be whether Leaflet No. 12 appeared as scheduled.

The fact that it did suggests that even if they have managed to arrest one layer of leadership, another has taken its place, the senior defense source said.

“It signifies the thing we have been saying--that there is no single leadership of this intifada (uprising),” he said, adding that it means the Israeli crackdown “must continue.”

The leaflet accused the authorities of “spreading lies about catching the authors of the Unified Command.” It added: “We are all the unified command.”

The latest leaflets appear to be of poorer quality than earlier ones, suggesting that they are being produced at different premises. Also, more of them are photocopies.

Palestinian sources familiar with all the leaflets in the series also say that the new leaflet contains small errors that suggest it was produced more hastily than earlier numbers.

The latest document called on Arab leaders to “close all doors in front of the Shultz conspiracy, which is aimed at liquidating the uprising.” It said the American initiative must be rejected as long as Washington refuses to deal with the Palestine Liberation Organization as the “sole and legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.”

The leaflet also issued a thinly veiled threat against West Bank and Gaza Strip Palestinians who have so far ignored calls to resign their posts as members of Israeli-appointed municipal and town councils.

“We announce that we are not responsible for the spilling of the blood or the destruction of the properties of those who have refused to resign,” it said. “We tell them that the people of the uprising will step on those who go outside the bounds of the national consensus and on those who refuse to abide by the appeals of the Unified Command and the people of the uprising.”

The leaflet declared next Monday, the first full day of the Shultz visit, as a day for a general strike to protest the mission. It also called for “violent clashes” with the army and Jewish settlers next Thursday and Saturday. “Let the land turn into a volcano under the feet of the occupiers!” it urged.