The 38 Hours: Trial by Terror

The heart of the capital was under siege. Everywhere, it seemed, was the wail of sirens, snarled traffic, milling crowds, police marksmen poised on rooftops, swarms of reporters interviewing one another in the glare of floodlights. Extra guards were posted at Government buildings; on the Hill each member of Congress was offered an armed police escort. The Washington Monument was temporarily closed to visitors: it was within the range of snipers. Affairs of state moved forward—cautiously. At the end of his visit with President Carter, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin left quietly with no farewell ceremony; incoming British Prime Minister James Callaghan did not receive the traditional 19-gun salute, for fear it might trigger a slaughter. All this was the work of a mere dozen men who held 132 hostages in three Washington buildings for a chilling 38 hours. The terrorists made dramatically clear what has become all too obvious: anybody with a cause and a gun, be he mad or madcap, fanatic or eccentric, can seize and hold national attention by kidnaping and threatening to kill innocent victims.

The Washington assault was the culminating event of a spate of terrorist acts that have bedeviled the country. It proved again how vulnerable the society is to such attacks. Given the circumstances, it was wondrous that the drama ended with so little blood spilled: one dead and four wounded by gunfire, a dozen others cut and beaten. That the toll was not higher was in part a tribute to the primary tactic U.S. law enforcement officials are now using to thwart terrorists—patience (see box). But most of all, perhaps, it was due to the courageous intervention of three Muslim ambassadors, Egypt's Ashraf Ghorbal. Pakistan's Sahabzada Yaqub-Khan and Iran's Ardeshir Zahedi.

The Washington siege was an explosive mixture of gangsterism, revenge, racial hostility and religious bickering elevated, as the participants proclaimed, to the level of a holy war. The terrorists were members of a sliver-sized religious organization called the Hanafi—a rival of the much larger Black Muslims, a group that has been plagued with violence over the years but has recently become more subdued (TIME, March 14).

Grisly Deed. The Black Muslim religion strongly appealed to some blacks because of its denunciation of the evils of white society and its promise of a better life for individuals who strictly follow its commands. The Hanafis consider themselves more orthodox than the Black Muslims, now called Bilalians, whom they dismiss as political exploiters. The most famous Hanafi convert is Los Angeles Laker Basketball Star Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who financed the purchase of a Washington house as Hanafi headquarters.

In 1973 the Black Muslim-Hanafi dispute boiled over into an appallingly grisly deed. Seven killers who were Black Muslims broke into the Washington home of Hanafi Leader Khalifa Hamaas Abdul Khaalis. They brutally murdered five of Khaalis' children, his nine-day-old grandson and a devoted follower. (Black Muslim officials have denied that their organization was in any way involved.) Khaalis swore revenge.

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