The New York Times
Monday, September 20, 1982,
Late City Final Edition
SECTION: Section A;
Page 1, Column 5;
Foreign Desk

U.S. PRESSES ISRAEL TO LET U.N. TROOPS MOVE INTO BEIRUT

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN Special to the New York Times

DATELINE: BEIRUT, Lebanon, Sept. 19

Lebanese Army troops and civil defense volunteers moved into the Shatila refugee camp today to establish order and remove the mounds of rotting corpses, the evidence of a mass killing of Palestinian men, women and children by Lebanese Christian militiamen.

The grisly task of clearing out the bodies from a camp still reeking with death took place as new information emerged about the extent of the massacre of Palestinian civilians and the role played by Israeli forces in the events of the last four days.

(In Jerusalem, the Israeli authorities said they knew in advance that the Phalangists were planning to enter the camps, but never imagined that a massacre would occur.)

It is still not known how many people were gunned down in the Shatila camp and the adjacent Sabra camp or killed in exchanges of fire with Christian militiamen. A Western diplomat who toured Shatila early this morning managed to count 106 bodies.

Killings Began on Thursday

However, there is a wide patch of freshly turned red dirt inside the camp with arms and legs sticking out one end. It appears to be a mass grave containing an undetermined number of corpses. In addition no one has any idea how many bodies were taken off in the scoops of bulldozers, how many were driven away and killed outside of the camp and how many are buried under buildings that were intentionally bulldozed to cover up bullet-riddled men, women and children.

The new information includes the accounts of witnesses who said the killings in Shatila and Sabra did not occur solely on Friday night as originally believed, but began Thursday and continued until early Saturday morning.

Israelis Had View of Camp

It is also clear that the events in Shatila and Sabra took place within the view of one of the main Israeli observation posts in west Beirut, and the Christian militiamen entered the area of the camps and left the area of the camps by passing through Israeli lines.

Also there was no indication, witnesses said, that Israeli forces made any concerted effort to interdict the operations of the Christian militiamen, who rested between forays into the refugee camps side-by-side with Israeli troops.

The makeup of the Christian militia force that went into the camps remains unclear. All reports indicate that members of Maj. Saad Haddad's Israeli-armed and trained militia were on the scene, but it was not known if they joined the Phalangists who went in. Also, it was not known whether the Phalangist militiamen who did go in after arriving from east Beirut had done so on orders from the Phalangist Party or were a breakaway group.

Another matter that appears clear to officials here is that the Israeli decision to let the Christian militiamen into the camps was a violation of the spirit of the agreement worked out by the special American envoy, Philip C. Habib.

Western diplomats who followed the negotiations from beginning to end noted that one of the key points constantly emphasized by the Palestinians to the Americans and ultimately to the Israelis was that they wanted firm guarantees that no Christian militiamen would ever get into the camps for fear that the kind of massacre that took place last week might happen. Israel's surprise at the outcome, the diplomats said, seems disingenuous given the history of Christian-Palestinian relations in Lebanon and the importance placed on the issue during the negotiations.

Events Leading to Massacre

Pieced together from accounts by witnesses and reporters, the events leading up to the massacre appear to have unfolded this way: On Tuesday morning President-elect Bashir Gemayel, the former commander of the Phalangist Christian militia, was assassinated in east Beirut. At 2 A.M. Wednesday morning the Israelis, with tanks, moved into west Beirut with the professed aim of establishing law and order and rooting out what they said were 2,000 Palestine Liberation Organization guerrillas still hiding in the refugee camps.

By Wednesday afternoon Per Maehlumshagen, a Norwegian orthopedic surgeon at the Palestinian Gaza Hospital between the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps, and Eivinu Witsoe, also a Norwegian surgeon at the Gaza Hospital, reported that the area around the camps was surrounded by Israeli troops and under their control. An Israeli checkpoint was set up near the hospital. That evening there were exchanges of gunfire in the camps and some shelling, apparently by Israeli forces against armed elements resisting inside. The two doctors said the number of casualties was slight, with only an estimated 25 people being brought to their hospital.

Trucks of Militiamen Seen

Also on Wednesday afternoon residents at the junction city of Shuweifat, just south of Beirut International Airport, said they saw the first trucks bearing Christian militiamen heading into Beirut through the Israeli lines. The militiamen apparently gathered at the airport, which was used as a staging area.

There is an intersection at the main street of Shuweifat that links east Beirut and south Lebanon with the road leading into the airport. By Thursday, the residents said trucks were coming from south Lebanon, where the Israeli-armed and trained militia of Major Haddad is located, heading through the intersection to the airport.

Residents of Shuweifat said that on Saturday, they saw two columns of 10 trucks each bearing Christian militiamen coming up from the airport areas and through Shuweifat and heading toward south Lebanon, and these appeared to be at least some of those men involved in the operation.

Reporters who visited the intersection today found the Phalangist signal - a circle with a triangle in the middle - painted on makeshift signs and buildings leading from Shuweifat, into the airport, from the airport across the Ouzai area and all the way up to the Kuwaiti Embassy traffic circle, which overlooks the Shatila refugee camp and served as a command post for both the Israelis and Phalangists in the area. The signs were apparently to direct the militiamen so they did not get lost in west Beirut.

There are believed to have been roughly 1,200 to 1,400 of these Christian militiamen gathered together at the Israeli-controlled Beirut airport by Thursday afternoon. But their identities and where they came from is not clear.

Amin Gemayel, now head of the Phalangist Party since his brother's death, told a diplomat Saturday that some Phalangist soldiers were involved in the operation but were ordered out. Today Mr. Gemayel, a candidate for the presidency, told Tamaam Salam, a representative of the Sunni Moslem leadership from west Beirut, that his men had nothing to do with the massacre.

It is considered highly possible here that either a breakaway faction of Phalangist militiamen joined the battle on their own volition or at Israeli urging, or that the Phalangist commander, Fadi Ephram, who is regarded as not nearly as loyal to Amin as to his brother Bashir, ordered the involvement on his own.

Israel Tries to Blame Phalangists

There is a highly trained group of Phalangist soldiers, known as the Damuri Brigade, which has been in Damur, just south of Beirut, ever since the Israelis took the town. The brigade is made up of many of the sons of Christian families massacred by Palestinians in Damur in February 1976 in retaliation for the Christian massacre of Palestinian civilians at the Tel Zaatar refugee camp. The Damuri Brigade has long vowed to be at the forefront of any effort to rid Lebanon of Palestinians and there are some here who believe that its members may have been the Phalangists who took part, wearing Phalangist uniforms.

As for the others, the evidence points to their being members of the Christian militia of Major Haddad. All of the residents and doctors in the camps spoken to by reporters said that Haddad men, in their uniforms, and Phalangists joined in the operation. Officials here said that it appears that the Israelis have sought to place blame solely on the Phalangists since Major Haddad's militia is virtually integrated into the Israeli Army and operates entirely under its command.

The Israeli Chief of Staff, Rafael Eytan said at a news conference in west Beirut today: ''We do not give the Phalangists orders and we are not responsible for them. The Phalangists are Lebanese and Lebanon is theirs and they act as they see fit.''

Report of Haddad at Airport

As for Major Haddad, a group of reporters visited Beirut International Airport today and were told by a member of the Lebanese internal security force there - before he was cut off by a superior - that Major Haddad had been in the airport on Saturday.

In any event it was late on Thursday that militiamen apparently began to enter the camps. Doctors Maehlumshagen and Witsoe, and several of their nurses, told reporters that from Gaza Hospital they heard constant shooting and shelling coming from Shatila beginning Thursday. They said people were being brought in with shrapnel wounds and gunshot wounds in the head, chest and stomach. As there were no ambulances working, only those living near the hospital could bring casualties.

''It was Thursday evening,'' said Dr. Maehlumshagen, ''that patients first started coming in saying 'Kataib, Kataib,' and then they would draw a line across their neck like someone was chopping it off.'' Kataib is the Arabic name for the Phalangists.

It was at 5 P.M. on Thursday that reporters saw the first Phalangist checkpoint being set up near the Lebanese University School of Business Administration at the Kuwaiti Embassy traffic circle.

On Thursday evening, the doctors said, the first signal that a massacre might be taking place came when an 11-year-old boy, Milad Farouk, was brought into the hospital with three gunshot wounds. He told the doctors that Christian militiamen had burst into his home in Shatila and shot his mother, father, and three siblings, one of them a baby, before his eyes. The doctors at Gaza Hospital worked through the night trying to deal with the wounded flooding into a hospital desperately short of supplies and filled with Palestinians saying, ''We're going to die, we're going to die.''

Israelis Lit Camps With Flares

Throughout the night, witnesses said, the Israelis provided light from flares over the refugee camps while the Christian militiamen were inside.

All night Thursday and into Friday morning Palestinians from the Sabra and Shatila camps flocked to the Gaza Hospital hoping to find protection from the militiamen combing the camps. The doctors and nurses estimate that anywhere from 1,000 to 2,000 desperate and terrified people were gathered in and around their hospital.

Exactly what happened next is not clear. Reporters have only been able to collect fragmentary accounts. On Friday morning, according to residents of Shatila, Christian militiamen made a sweep through the camp and brought out roughly 100 men to the southern gate. They were divided into two groups, Lebanese on one side, Palestinians on the other. A 15-year-old Palestinian boy, who declined to be identified, said he saw that many of the Palestinian men had been cut across their cheeks and were bleeding. There is no other independent confirmation of this, nor for that matter any information on what ultimately happened to these men.

At 1 P.M. Friday, a few hours after these men had been gathered, Flint Pederson, a reporter for Danish television, stood at the southern gate of Shatila and watched as a cattle truck was loaded with women and children from the camp by Christian militiamen, two of whom were very agitated and were firing into the ground. Three Lebanese Army soldiers who happened onto the scene in a jeep were arrested by the Christian militiamen, he said. What happened to these women and children is not known.

Israelis Wanted Areas 'Purified'

At roughly 4 P.M., Gunnar Flakstadt, a Norwegian diplomat, came to the camp to check reports of fighting and told reporters he saw a bulldozer with its scoop full of bodies being taken off.

At roughly the same time two reporters were visiting the Israeli and Phalangist command posts near the Kuwaiti traffic circle. The Israelis had taken control of two nearby apartment blocks used as residences for Lebanese Army officers. From the rooftop of these apartment houses, where the Israelis established an observation post, one can look down into the Shatila camp.

A Reuters correspondent, Paul Eedle, spoke to an Israeli colonel on the scene, who declined to be identified, and asked him about the operation taking place around the camp. The colonel told Mr. Eedle that his men were working on the basis of two principles: that the Israeli Army should not get involved but that the area should be ''purified.''

Nearby, another reporter spoke to a Phalangist in gold-rimmed glasses who identified himself as an officer. He told the reporter that he and his men had been in the Shatila camp all day, that only a few cornered people were still resisting and that they would go back in as soon as they ''rested up.''

According to witnesses, his men were taking food and water while nearby, Israeli soldiers also lounged about the Kuwaiti traffic circle, reading magazines and listening to Simon and Garfunkel music. It is not clear whether the Israelis had any inkling of what was happening in the camps, although from their observation posts it would not have been difficult to ascertain not only by sight but from the sounds of gunfire and the screams coming from the camp. In addition to providing some provisions for the Christian militiamen, the Israelis had tanks stationed on the hilltop, apparently to provide cover for them if the militiamen encountered fiercer resistance than had been anticipated.

Nurse Killed by Sniper Fire

Meanwhile, at the Gaza Hospital and the nearby Akka Palestinian Hospital, the contagion of fear was sweeping from ward to ward, according to the Norwegian doctors.

They said Palestinian nurses were breaking down in tears in the middle of the Gaza operating room because of their fear that Christian militiamen would burst in. On the eighth floor at Gaza Hospital one nurse was shot and killed by sniper fire. By Friday afternoon it was clear to everyone in the hospital that they were in danger of being caught up in a massacre. The director of the hospital called the staff and patients together and told those who wanted to go to run for their lives. The International Committee of the Red Cross took away six babies, while some of the staff, most of the refugees and at least 82 patients who were still ambulatory, scattered.

At the Akka Hospital, Christian militiamen had already burst in and according to Western medical sources a variety of violent acts were committed there Friday: a 19-year-old Palestinian nurse, Intisar Ismail, was repeatedly raped and shot. Two Palestinian doctors, one of them Sami Katib, and a patient were taken off by the militiamen to an unknown destination and fate.

Also two doctors and two nurses who left the hospital under a white flag to pick up wounded had a grenade thrown at them, killing three of them.

Civilians Marched Off at Gunpoint

On Friday evening a reporter who visited the main street of the Shatila refugee camp found most of the houses in the area still intact, but fires were burning in the distance. A Phalangist officer, a gold crucifix dangling from his neck, told the reporter that there was still shooting going on,''otherwise what would I be doing here?''

On Saturday morning, according to Dr. Maehlumshagen, who served in south Lebanon during the Israeli invasion of 1978 and is familiar with the distinction between Phalangists and Haddad men, members of Major Haddad's militia arrived at the Gaza Hospital and ordered everyone out sometime between 7 A.M. And 8 A.M. The staff and Palestinians who been seeking shelter around the hospital were divided up. The foreign staff members were put in one area and the Palestinian staff and refugees in another. The Palestinian civilians, estimated by the doctors to have been between 500 and 600 people, were marched off at gunpoint down the mainstreet of Shatila.

After the Palestinians had marched off, the foreign staff was ordered to follow them. Along the way the Haddad men accused the doctors of being a ''Baader Meinhoff gang,'' the doctors said. A Palestinian male operating nurse tried to blend in with the group of some 20 foreign doctors, but as they were being marched off into Shatila one of the Haddad men quickly identified him as a Palestinian and yanked him out of line.

''We asked them what they were going to do with him,'' said Doctors Maehlumshagen and Witsoe. ''The militiaman said, 'You do your job and I will do mine.' They then took the man around a corner and we heard shots. That's all we know.''

Berated for Treating 'Terrorists'

When the foreign doctors arrived on the Shatila mainstreet they found the 500 to 600 Palestinians sitting down lining both sides of the road. The foreign medical workers were then taken to the Kuwaiti traffic circle and interrogated and berated by the Christian militiamen, for treating ''terrorists.'' At one point, said the doctors, a militiaman grabbed one of the most attractive Scandanavian nurses and tried to take her off, but an Israeli soldier intervened and forced him to return her to the rest of the group. After being interrogated, they were all released.

It is not known what happened to those 500 to 600 Palestinians. About 10 A.M., shortly after the doctors were marched out, the first foreign reporters entered the camp and there was no sign of these Palestinian civilians, possibly some were among those lined up against walls and executed or gunned down inside houses and thrown onto garbage piles. Others may have been taken off by the Christian militiamen to east Beirut or elsewhere and others may simply have been released. There is what appears to be a mass grave off of a side street and many bodies may be unearthed there. If the Israelis made any attempt to halt the actions of the Christian militiamen it is not at all apparent when this was done. The massacre clearly ended Saturday morning and reporters entered the camp long before any Israeli soldiers. Every person interviewed by this reporter said he never saw any Israelis in the camp. It appeared that they were entering at 2:15 P.M. Saturday, but instead they just went up to the front gate and later pulled back without going inside.

This morning the Lebanese Army moved into the camps, greeted by cheers from many people, along with Red Cross workers. The medical teams, wearing gas masks to fend off the sickly stench that hung over the area, and plastic gloves, went about the horrible task of unlocking the bodies that had been lined up against walls and executed. Their arms and legs had become frozen in grotesque attitudes of death that could not be masked by the thin blankets thrown over them.

One family started digging through a mound of red dirt and found their father, his head blown apart. The Christian militiamen had tried to cover their tracks by such hasty burials and also by piling cinder blocks and corrugated metal from rooftops on bodies, or simply bulldozing whole buildings over people. One woman in a brown dress, clearly out of her mind in grief, stood over a rotting body waving a scarf in one hand and letters in another, shrieking: ''Yi, yi are you my husband? My God help me. All my sons are gone. My husband is gone. What am I going to do? Oh God, oh God.''

Across the street another old woman emerged from the death scene in her house holding a faded color photograph of her son, Abu Fadi, and a wooden birdcage with a live yellow parakeet inside.

''Where is Abu Fadi,'' she wailed. ''Who will bring me my loved one?''