1.
GV: Jerusalem streets
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2.
SV: Shutters on shop fronts (2 shots)
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3.
GV: Closed shops
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4.
GV: People outside shops PAN TO deserted streets (2 shots)
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5.
SCU: Director of PLO office, in Damascus Mr. Khaledi presser speaking in arabic.
1.17




Initials RH/





Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: The Palestine Liberation Organisation (P.L.O.) has supported the one-day shop and factory strike which shut down East Jerusalem and the main towns of the Israeli-occupied West Bank on Monday (14 January). The PLO regards the issue which triggered the strike -- the proposed takeover of the East Jerusalem Electricity Company by the Israeli Government -- as an Israeli conspiracy.

SYNOPSIS: The strike was in opposition to Israel's intention to take over the electricity supply concession from the beginning of next year...by compulsory purchase.

The issue if a new source of friction between Arabs and Israelis. But the battle ahead is expected to be legal rather than in the streets. The electricity company is refusing to sell the concession. Indeed, it claims it has no right to sell. Israel says the takeover decision was taken solely on technological and economic grounds -- that the company is inefficient. The Director of the Palestine Liberation Organisation in the Syrian capital of Damascus, Mr. Mahmoud Khaledi, sees the issue differently.

Mr. Khaledi pointed out that the Electricity Company is the largest business organisation in what he described as the occupied homeland. He said the strike demonstrates Arab-Palestinian solidarity and is a unified stand, led by the PLO, against Israel. Mr. Khaledi described the Israeli proposal as a conspiracy and that his people will not hesitate to take further measures...in his words, "using all means of struggle".