Three foreigners, taken hostage by Palestinian militants on
Tuesday following an Israeli army raid on a West Bank prison, were
released in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, sources said.
Six other foreign hostages had been released on Tuesday. The
sources said that two French nationals and a South Korea national,
all journalists, had been released and handed over to the
Palestinian police.
Nine foreigners-- two Australians, one American, four French
nationals, one Swiss and one Korean-- were abducted in the Gaza
Strip and northern West Bank on Tuesday by Palestinian militants of
the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
(PFLP).
The PFLP claimed that the spree of abductions was a protest
against the Israeli military operation at a major prison in the
West Bank town of Jericho.
Israeli troops tore through the Jericho prison and snatched six
prominent Palestinian militants jailed there including the PFLP
chief Ahmed Saadat who has been accused of ordering the 2001
assassination of an Israeli minister.
Palestinian Interior Ministry spokesman Tawfiq Abu Khousa told
reporters that the crisis of the kidnapping of the nine foreigners
was over with all the hostages released.
Condemning both the Israeli prison raid and the series of
abductions, Abu Khousa urged the Palestinian people, angered by the
Israeli move, to exercise restraint and not to attack foreigners on
the Palestinian territories.
Two Palestinians were killed during the Israeli raid on the
Jericho prison, which led to widespread protests across the
Palestinian territories.
The Palestinian National Authority rebuked Britain and the
United States for withdrawing monitors from the Jericho prison
shortly before the Israeli raid.
Palestinian protestors stormed properties of the European Union
countries and the United States and set fire to the British
cultural center in Gaza City on Tuesday.
(Xinhua News Agency March 16, 2006)
