HOSTAGES IN LEBANON: On Second Thoughts; THE QUANDARY FOR ISRAEL
By Thomas L. Friedman, Special To the New York Times
Israel finds itself in a quandary over how to respond in the Beirut hostage crisis, and Israeli experts on terrorism say they believe it is an indirect result of the Government's decision last month to trade 1,150 prisoners, most of them Palestinians, for 3 Israeli prisoners of war. The experts say that by giving in to the demands of a Palestinian guerrilla leader, Ahmed Jabril, last month -a move widely viewed here as a blunder - Israel helped to create the atmosphere in which the Beirut hijacking took place. Now, the experts argue, Israel is trying to compensate for this by refusing to concede to the hijackers' demands for the release of 766 detainees unless the United States formally appeals to the Israeli Government to, in effect, ''cave in'' to the demands. Friction Between Allies This has created a great deal of strain between Jerusalem and Washingtion, and officials here acknowledge that coordination between the two Governments has been inconsistent. The result, said Zeev Schiff, the military editor of the daily newspaper Haaretz, is that the hijackers have already won a major victory: Israel and America, instead of fighting the hijackers jointly, are at odds with each other.