The World - News from Feb. 10, 1988

More than 100 Palestinians deported by Israel prepared to set sail from Athens today on a voyage back home, a journey that Israeli officials have vowed to block. “We have chosen to go back with no guns, no explosives, not even any stones,” said Palestine Liberation Organization Executive Committee member Mohammed Milhem, a former mayor of the West Bank town of Halhoul. He called the voyage “a trip of peace, a ship of return.” But Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir called the plan “a declaration of war.” Without being specific, Shamir vowed to block the ship, which he described as a boat being loaded with “terrorists and those who want to kill us.”