Editing Abu Nidal (section)

===Rome and Vienna===
{{main|Rome and Vienna airport attacks}}
Abu Nidal's most infamous operation was the 1985 attack on the Rome and Vienna airports.<ref name=Seale1992p246>Seale 1992, 246.</ref> On 27 December, at 08:15 [[Greenwich Mean Time|GMT]], four gunmen opened fire on the [[El Al]] ticket counter at the [[Rome Fiumicino Airport|Leonardo Da Vinci International Airport]] in Rome, killing 16 and wounding 99. In the [[Vienna International Airport]] a few minutes later, three men threw hand grenades at passengers who were waiting to check into a flight to Tel Aviv, killing 4 and wounding 39.<ref name="Suro132Feb1988">{{cite web |author=Suro, Roberto |date=13 February 1988 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/02/13/world/palestinian-gets-30-years-for-rome-airport-attack.html |title=Palestinian Gets 30 Years for Rome Airport Attack |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231101131800/https://www.nytimes.com/1988/02/13/world/palestinian-gets-30-years-for-rome-airport-attack.html|archive-date=1 November 2023 |work=The New York Times |url-status=live |access-date=7 July 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/december/27/newsid_2545000/2545949.stm |title=Gunmen kill 16 at two European airports |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081230054242/http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/december/27/newsid_2545000/2545949.stm |archive-date=30 December 2008 |work=BBC News |date=27 December 1985 |url-status=live |access-date=7 July 2024}}</ref> The gunmen had been told the people in civilian clothes at the check-in counter were Israeli pilots returning from a training mission.<ref name=Seale1992p244>{{harvnb|Seale|1992|p=244}}</ref>

Austria and Italy had both been involved in trying to arrange peace talks. Sources close to Abu Nidal told Seale that Libyan intelligence had supplied the weapons. The damage to the PLO was enormous, according to [[Salah Khalaf|Abu Iyad]], Arafat's deputy. Most people in the West, and even many Arabs, could not distinguish between the ANO and Fatah, he said. "When such horrible things take place, ordinary people are left thinking that all Palestinians are criminals."<ref name=Seale1992p245>{{harvnb|Seale|1992|p=245}}</ref>

[[Patrick Seale]], Abu Nidal's biographer, wrote of the shootings that their "random cruelty marked them as typical Abu Nidal operations".<ref>{{harvnb|Seale|1992|p=243}}</ref><ref name="Suro132Feb1988" />