Terrorism: Essential Primary Sources | "Abu Abbas Captured after Two Hours of Fighting"

PLF Leader Captured in Baghdad

News article

Date: April 16, 2003

Source: The Associated Press.

About the Author: The Associated Press is an international newswire service with regional offices and staff reporters positioned throughout the world.

INTRODUCTION

In October 1985, the Italian passenger ship Achille Lauro, carrying 680 passengers and 350 crew, was on a twelve-day cruise in the Mediterranean Sea. On Monday, October 7, the ship docked at Alexandria, Egypt, where most of the passengers disembarked for a sightseeing tour. Sixty to eighty people were still aboard when four armed Palestinian terrorists seized control of the ship to begin a fifty-two-hour hostage crisis. The terrorists sent a radio message in which they identified themselves as members of the Palestinian Liberation Front...