Word: shying
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Stung by such signs of opprobrium, Syrian President Hafez Assad evidently embarked on a damage-control campaign by addressing the one issue that could restore some of Syria's image in the West: the 20 foreigners held hostage by Shi'ite extremists in Lebanon. As he has in the past when it served his purposes, notably in the release of TWA passengers hijacked to Beirut in 1985, Assad asserted his authority with the Shi'ite groups and apparently arranged for at least a token hostage release. Waite, whose patient efforts to end the hostage crisis were well known to Syria...
...Israeli source, Assad was attempting a "multinational swap," a kind of coordinated release involving not just U.S. hostages but possibly those from Britain, France and Italy, and even an Israeli airman held in Lebanon. In Israel, the counterpart would presumably be the freeing of some or all of 108 Shi'ites being held in southern Lebanon by the Israeli-backed South Lebanon Army militia. It was not clear whether a grand swap would also involve other Arab prisoners held in the West. According to one report circulating in Beirut, France would turn loose Georges Ibrahim Abdallah. French officials promptly denied...
...embassy personnel have been evacuated for security reasons. Waite had ample reason, moreover, for not wanting to spend any more time than necessary in Beirut. Last November he was trapped for several hours in a building there that came under withering cross fire in a street battle between Shi'ite and Druze militiamen...
...unusual target. Edward Austin Tracy, 55, a writer of erotic love poetry, was kidnaped last week in Muslim West Beirut by a pro-Iranian Shi'ite group calling itself the Revolutionary Justice Organization. Tracy, who was accused of being a U.S. spy, became the seventh American and 20th foreign hostage in Lebanon...
...Prime Minister this week, the country was suddenly caught up in a looming military crisis. After Israeli air and naval forces attacked Palestinian positions near the Lebanese coastal city of Sidon in retaliation for a terrorist attack near Jerusalem's Western Wall, an Israeli pilot was captured by the Shi'ite Amal militia. At week's end, as Israeli troop strength was beefed up on the Lebanese border, the fragile national unity government in Jerusalem hastily closed ranks and angrily demanded the captive flyer's return. "We must remain alert," declared Shamir. "There must be no wavering...