Middle East

The messenger dropped off sealed envelopes at the offices of two West Beirut newspapers before he disappeared into the lawless night. The news: one of the American hostages in Lebanon, Father Lawrence Martin Jenco, 51, a Roman Catholic priest from Joliet, Ill., was about to be released by Islamic Jihad, the shadowy Shi'ite Muslim terrorist group that had abducted him in January 1985. His captors claimed that Jenco, who suffers from a heart condition, was being freed because of "deteriorating health" and released photos of the haggard priest in a red shirt. But their hostage seemed reasonably fit when found by Lebanese police the next morning in the Bekaa Valley.

On reaching Damascus 2 1/2 hours later, Jenco demanded, "Where's Terry Anderson's sister?" He was thereupon greeted by Peggy Say, who was in Syria seeking the release of her brother, another hostage. The two embraced and wept.

Apparently under pressure from Syrian President Hafez Assad, Jihad last year freed another American, the Rev. Benjamin Weir, but claimed that William Buckley, a U.S. diplomat, had been killed to avenge an Israeli air raid on Palestine Liberation Organization headquarters in Tunisia. Buckley's death remains unconfirmed. In April another American captive, Librarian Peter Kilburn, and two Britons were killed in retaliation for the U.S. air attack on Libya. That leaves three American hostages: Anderson, 38, an Associated Press correspondent; David Jacobsen, 55, director of the American University Hospital in Beirut; and Thomas Sutherland, 55, the university's acting dean of agriculture. Jihad's chief objective seems to be the release of 17 people jailed in Kuwait for bombing the French and American embassies in 1983.

In Joliet, Jenco's relatives greeted his call from Damascus with tears of joy. Earlier, the family had posted a sign outside that read FATHER MARTIN JENCO, AMERICAN HELD HOSTAGE IN LEBANON. Last Saturday the sign was changed to read RELEASED AFTER 564 DAYS. AMEN.