1.
GV Beirut street scene
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2.
SV Interior P.L.O. official speaking to press in Arabic ZOOM in to close-up
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3.
CU Mohammed Youssef Quassem
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4.
MCU Ramez Younes speaking in Arabic
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5.
CU Pressman takes notes (English translation begins:
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6.
CU Press tape recorder
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7.
GV Younes speaking
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8.
MCU English translator
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QUASSEM: "The first barbed wire line was give metres away. After that there was an alley ... another barbed wire and an alley and another barbed wire and then after that there was a wall of fortified cement five metres high."



YOUNES: "In the alley there was a patrol of two check points that we had to cross. At the same time, there were guards around the area going around and it was difficult for us really to cross without being noticed. Under the window we left from, there was some grass which I covered myself with and took my position. So by covering myself up with this grass and the darkness that was coming over the area it would be a bit difficult for them to identify we that easy."




Initials SC/321 SC/342



Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: Two Palestinian Commandos, who claimed to have escaped from an Israeli jail on 3 March, held a news conference in Beirut today (14 March) to describe how they escaped. They also accused the Israeli authorities of torturing detained guerrillas.

They charged the Israelis with using electric shocks, suspending prisoners by their feet and forcing them to walk over nails. On one occasion, they said, commandos had been forced to admit to staging a certain operation 'although they had nothing to do with it.'
The two men were Hamza Younes and Mohammed Youssef Quassem. Younes said he was arrested in October 1971 after a clash with Israeli forces. He was sentenced to life imprisonment. Quassem, who was serving a life sentence, said he was arrested in January 1970.

The statements of Hamza Younes and Youssaf Quassem are translated on film by an English speaker. A transcript of the English translation follows.

SYNOPSIS: At the offices of Falastin Al-Thawra -- the weekly newspaper of the palestine Liberation Organisation -- in Beirut today, two Palestinian commandos held a press conference to describe how they had escaped from an Israeli prison earlier this month. The two men, Hamza Younes and Mohammed Youssef Quassem, charged the Isreali authorities with using electric shock and other torture techniques on detained prisoners.

Quassem -- on the right -- claimed to have been arrested in January ninteen seventy. Younes said he was arrested after a clash with Israeli forces in October nineteen seventy. He told of the obstacles that barred their escape.

Quassem was serving twenty five years and Younes had served three years of a life sentence when they escaped.