Leader of Amal Assails Threat to Harm Hostages

Shia Muslim leader Nabih Berri said Saturday that kidnapers holding foreign hostages and threatening to hurt the American ones are committing an “unforgivable crime.”

Berri, who heads the mainstream Amal militia, made the comments after Islamic Jihad, a pro-Iranian fundamentalist faction, threatened late Friday to punish American hostages it is holding in retaliation for Friday’s Israeli air raid on Lebanon, in which 21 people were killed and 34 injured.

Israeli planes also flew over the pro-Iranian extremist stronghold of Baalbek in East Lebanon on Saturday, police said, but no attacks were reported.

Berri’s Syrian-backed militia has been locked in a fierce struggle with pro-Iranian fundamentalists for mastery of the Shia community.

Berri praised a suicide car bombing Wednesday that killed eight Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon, prompting the Israeli air raid on guerrilla bases. But Berri said that U.S. support for Israel should not lead to punishing the hostages.

“We are against America’s policy, against America’s support of Israel and against the American Administration. But we are not at all against the American citizens,” he said.

‘Unforgivable Crime’

He called the kidnapings “an unjustified, unforgivable crime.”

In an indirect reference to Iran, which is believed to be their main backer, Berri added that the kidnapers have “inflicted the most severe damage to their goals and the goals of their allies.”

In its statement Friday, Islamic Jihad (Islamic Holy War) accused the United States of giving Israel advance approval of the air attack.

The group holds at least two American hostages: Terry A. Anderson, chief Middle East correspondent for the Associated Press, and Thomas Sutherland, acting dean of agriculture at the American University of Beirut.

Anderson is the longest-held foreign hostage in Lebanon. He was kidnaped March 16, 1985. Sutherland, of Fort Collins, Colo., was seized three months later.

Anderson and Sutherland are among nine Americans believed held by pro-Iranian extremist factions linked to Hezbollah (Party of God), the main militia challenging Berri’s Amal among Lebanon’s Shias.

Asked if he believes that the foreign hostages will be released soon, Berri said that would happen “only if deals were struck between the kidnapers and the hostages’ governments.”

“No deal, no release,” Berri said.