Hesham Mohammed Radjeh, 21, and Marwan Hasan, 25, members of a Palestinian terrorist organization, were sentenced to life imprisonment for the attack last August on the Jewish community center and synagogue here in which two persons were killed and 18 wounded. The sentence was pronounced last Thursday after a Vienna court found the two men guilty of firing submachine guns and throwing hand grenades at worshippers leaving the premises.
Radjeh was acquitted of the murder of Vienna city councilman Heinz Nittel who was gunned down last May 1 but was found guilty of complicity in that murder. He had been charged with the murder on the basis of a confession he made under interrogation but later retracted.
The two terrorists had confessed to membership in an extremist Palestinian group called Al Asifa, headed by a lawyer, Abu Nidal. The group, operating out of Syria and Iraq, has targeted Jewish institutions in Western Europe and is also suspected of assassinating Palestine Liberation Organization officials in European cities.
Belgium Wants Radjeh Extradited
The Belgian police have applied for the extradition of Radjeh to stand trial for the murder of the PLO European representative, Naim Khadar, in Brussels last June 1. If the Austrian authorities agree, he would be tried in Belgium but serve his sentence in Austria.
Another Al Asifa terrorist, Bahij Younis, will go on trial here later this year for allegedly masterminding the attack on the community center. The gun used to assassinate both Nittel and Khadar was found in his apartment. Younis testified at the trial of Radjeh and Hassan that he knew neither of them.
Meanwhile, representatives of the Jewish community center said the center would not demand reparations payments for the attack but would ask for 30,000 Schillings to repair the damage to the synagogue.