Beirut Seeks Allies to Fight U.S. Effort to Close Airport

BEIRUT — Lebanon stepped up its campaign against President Reagan’s plan to isolate Beirut airport today, seeking diplomatic support from 21 nations.

In Christian East Beirut, U.S. Ambassador Reginald Bartholomew gave President Amin Gemayel a letter from Reagan that outlined the reasons behind the U.S. effort to close Beirut airport.

“Reliable sources described the meeting as cool,” said state-run television, adding that Gemayel told Bartholomew that the Reagan Administration was acting arbitrarily and unfairly and in violation of international law.

The moves came as three Arab ambassadors called on the State Department in Washington to protest the attempt to close the Beirut airport as “unfair, unjustified and unwarranted.”

Ambassador Clovis Maksoud, head of the Washington office of the Arab League, said the meeting with Assistant Secretary of State Richard Murphy “didn’t go bad and it didn’t go well.”

Joining Maksoud at the meeting were Ambassador Sheik Saud Nasir al Sabah of Kuwait, the acting dean of the Arab diplomatic corps, and Lebanese Ambassador Abdullah Bouhabib.

Murphy said the measures were “justified, not punitive,” and “temporary,” Maksoud said.

But, Maksoud said, “We tried to focus on the fact that it is unfair to signal to the Lebanese that their institutions are being penalized for factional violations.”

Furthermore, he said the measures “are unwarranted, especially since the Lebanese government is now taking measures toward greater security of the airport and roads leading to it.”

Maksoud quoted Murphy as saying that the United States “might have energized the Lebanese government to bring about greater security at the airport.”

He said he told Murphy, “We hope you will energize Israel to withdraw from Lebanon.”

In Beirut, Lebanon asked European nations, among others, to hold off joining the U.S. effort to shut down the Beirut airport to international travel. The Beirut leftist newspaper As-Safir said France, Italy, Greece and Switzerland have given assurances they will not back the U.S. position.

The United States and Britain have agreed to ask other countries to suspend air service to and from Beirut airport, used in seven hijackings this year.