American Hostage Polhill Freed by Beirut Kidnapers : Lebanon: He is whisked off to Damascus and turned over to the U.S. ambassador. ‘I am a very happy man,’ he says. The professor was held for more than three years.

Pro-Iranian militants Sunday freed Robert Polhill, an American hostage held captive in Beirut for nearly 3 1/2 years. The 55-year-old college professor, pale and drawn, said here five hours later that “I hope this will be just the beginning.”

“I still have friends there (in Beirut),” the New York-born Polhill told a packed meeting with reporters at the Syrian Foreign Ministry here. “I am eager to see them released and see this chapter of history closed.”

Though smiling weakly, Polhill, a professor of business studies and accounting, appeared near tears as he spoke in a scratchy voice.

“I am sorry, this is as high as my voice can go,” he said, apologizing to journalists who said they could not hear him. “During our captivity, we were prevented from speaking loudly, and I am unable to adjust my voice to normal.”

Polhill, who wore a blue double-breasted suit that appeared baggy on his thin frame, said in a short statement:

“I am a very happy man. I’m very thankful to the Syrian government for all their help in securing my release. . . .

“I want to rest,” the balding, bespectacled professor continued. “I’m very, very tired.”

He declined to say whether he had seen any other hostages alive.

His release ended a tense, five-day drama and marked the first time in more than three years that an American hostage had been freed by the shadowy kidnap gangs of Beirut. Seven other Americans are still held by militant Islamic fundamentalists in the Lebanese capital, including Polhill’s fellow professors, Alann Steen, who turned 51 on Sunday, and Jesse Turner, 42.

President Bush, on a fishing trip in Florida, thanked Syria and Iran for their roles in freeing Polhill.

But Bush said that all American hostages must be free before the United States will reciprocate with a goodwill gesture.

“I’m not making gestures. I don’t trade for hostages,” he said.

Polhill, whose Lebanese wife, Firyal, came to Damascus from Beirut three days ago in hopes that he would be the one released, was turned over about 5 p.m. Sunday to Syrian authorities in a precision operation near the luxury Summerland Hotel on the Beirut seashore, in the capital’s Muslim western sector.

According to press reports, a witness gave this account:

“A car screeched to a halt about 50 yards from the entrance to the Summerland, the rear left door was open and the hostage climbed out. The rear door of a waiting car on the other side of the street was then open and the hostage walked straight in. It took only a few seconds.”

The professor--abducted in January, 1987, from the campus of Beirut University College along with Steen, Turner and Mithileshwar Singh, an Indian with U.S. resident status who was freed Oct. 3, 1988--was turned over to Brig. Gen. Ghazi Kenaan, Syria’s military intelligence chief in Lebanon, the Beirut press reports said.

Earlier Sunday, the Islamic Jihad for the Liberation of Palestine, the militant Shiite Muslim cell that kidnaped the professors, issued its third statement since declaring Wednesday that it would release an American hostage as a humanitarian gesture. Sunday’s statement demanded that Kenaan be in Beirut to receive him.

The identity of the freed hostage was disclosed in Beirut shortly afterward, as Polhill was being whisked by car over the border into Syria.

U.S. Ambassador Edward P. Djerejian, appearing with Polhill and Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk Shareh in Damascus, declared: “We share the hope that Mr. Polhill’s release will be followed quickly by the release of other hostages.

“We are going to keep on talking. We are going to keep open the lines of communication to all parties who have influence over the hostages.”

Djerejian did not specifically mention Iran, whose influence the kidnapers themselves conceded in announcing that a hostage would be released, but the Syrian foreign minister did speak of that country.

“We in Syria have worked closely with Iran to secure the release (of Polhill),” Shareh said.

He also expressed hope that Polhill’s release would mark the beginning of the end of the hostage crisis.

“I am sure that his (Polhill’s) release will pave the way for the release of the rest,” Shareh said.

In the United States, Cable News Network broadcast an interview with Polhill that was taped in the Syrian vehicle that transported him from Beirut to Damascus.

Polhill said: “I think probably as I am free and suddenly realize that I can go to the toilet when I want to go or go to the refrigerator when I want something to eat, I think I will begin to develop a better sense of freedom.

“But I didn’t spend, and I don’t think that my two colleagues, my two associates, spend a lot of time thinking about that (freedom) either. It’s hard thinking about things that you haven’t got,” he said.

In an interview later with Syrian television, Polhill spoke of his captivity. “We were kept in a way to ensure the secrecy. . . . I would like to thank those young men who guarded us and who tried to help us but had restrictions placed upon them.

“We had something to read, but we were deprived of the material that would let us know where we stood. . . . We had some books and played cards.

“The most difficult assignment was to find things to think about and keep our minds active. I was feeling angry that I was taken away from my wife and children.

“I tried to continue to be angry because if I began to lose that anger, my condition would just be worse,” he said.

Early today, Polhill, accompanied by his wife, boarded a U.S. Air Force plane for a flight to the U.S. military medical center in Wiesbaden, West Germany, where a State Department hostage-reception committee was waiting.

The flight was to land at Rhein-Main Air Base, a U.S. Air Force facility next to Frankfurt International Airport. From there, the Polhills were to be taken to nearby Wiesbaden, where Polhill was to be debriefed and given a medical checkup--and be reunited with family members.

During the day Sunday, U.S. Ambassador Djerejian and Iranian Ambassador Mohammed Hassan Akhtari both called on Shareh at the Foreign Ministry here. All parties kept details of their talks secret, and rumors swirled through Damascus about who would be released and when--or if.

Authorities in Washington repeatedly said last week that the United States would not negotiate with any party to win the release of any hostage. The Bush Administration rejected an original demand of the kidnapers that John Kelly, assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs, come to Damascus to work out details of the release, with State Department spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler saying flatly, “We won’t deal.”

The last American freed before Polhill was David P. Jacobsen, a Beirut hospital director, who was released Nov. 2, 1986, a day before the Iran-Contra scandal broke. That scandal involved the sale of American arms to Iran in return for the release of hostages.

Polhill’s ordeal began when gunmen posing as security police went onto the campus of the college where he had taught for four years.

Polhill, a diabetic, Steen and Turner were swept away into the hidden lives of the hostages, three among at least 87 seized over the years since abduction of foreigners became part of Beirut’s violent scene in 1984. Ten were later found murdered or declared executed by their captors.

The Beirut hostages are believed to be captives of a network of extremists who follow the anti-Western line of Iran’s late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Under various cover names, most of the kidnap cells are factions of the fundamentalist Hezbollah (Party of God) organization of Shiite Muslims set up in the early 1980s by Ali Akbar Mohtashemi, the hard-line Iranian leader who was then Iran’s ambassador to Syria.

While the Syrian army has controlling military power in Lebanon, in the past two years the Damascus government has tried to distance itself from the kidnap groups. In the interest of improving relations with the West, the government of Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani is taking a similar line.

THE ROAD TO FREEDOM Professor Robert Polhill, Alann Steen and Jesse Turner kidnaped June 24, 1987. Polhill released about 5 p.m., Sunday near hotel in Muslim sector of Beirut; picked up by three-car Syrian convoy and driven off at high speed. Taken by car to Damascus, Polhill turned over to U.S. Ambassador Edward Djerejian; later reunited with wife, Firyal. Polhill flown to U.S. Medical facility in Wiesbaden, West Germany, for debriefing, checkup.