On at least two occasions in December, French planes rained napalm and phosphorous bombs on guerrilla units of the Polisario Front, a group that is fighting for the independence of Western Sahara. According to Polisario sources, scores of persons have been killed in the French attacks.

Although the French government now admits that its planes participated in two clashes with Polisario, it denies that it used napalm or phosphorous bombs.

However, Polisario was able to present several Mauritanian prisoners who survived the December 14–15 attack to French reporters. "The planes dived toward us very quickly, dropped their missiles, and reascended," one of them explained. "What kind of missiles? Sometimes a plane released a liquid, oil I think. Another followed and fired at the liquid, which burst into flames immediately. Other planes dropped bombs. They exploded on the ground and burned. I think they were napalm."

Two of the Mauritanian survivors carried visible evidence of the kind of bombs used by the French: Their arms and backs were burned.

Besides the French bombing raids against the Saharans, there were two similar cases of direct French military intervention in Africa in 1977. In April, [French president Valery] Giscard provided pilots and planes to airlift 1,500 Moroccan troops to Zaire, to help the Mobutu Sese Seko regime put down a rebellion in the province of Shaba. And in July Paris announced that it had provided "logistical support" to the regime in Chad in its war against Toubou rebels in the northern part of that country.  
 
January 19, 1953
NEWARK--No court action has been taken so far by either side in the Newark fight over the federal housing "loyalty" oath. Newark is the first city whose officials have actually begun to enforce the new witchhunt measure instituted by a congressional amendment adopted last July.

Originally, the Newark Housing Authority gave tenants at the local federal projects a three-day deadline ending Dec. 26, by which they were supposed to sign a statement certifying that no one in their families belonged to any of the 203 organizations arbitrarily included on the so-called "subversive" list issued by the Attorney General.

Apparently the results were not as favorable as the NHA officials expected. On Jan. 7 they reported that 328 out of the 3,008 families had failed to comply.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which will represent some of the non-complying tenants in a challenge to the oath is apparently waiting for the housing officials to make the first court move.

Among those represented by the ACLU will be James Kutcher, legless veteran and one of the first victims of the federal "loyalty" purge in 1948. Kutcher’s father wants to sign the housing oath but cannot do so because his son is a member of the Socialist Workers Party, one of the groups on the Attorney General’s list.  
 
 
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