| Submit your comments on this article |
| Middle East |
| Do we see a pattern in Lebanon? |
| 2002-05-21 |
| The murder on January 24 of former Christian warlord Elie Hobeika already sparked fears of renewed inter-confessional strife and revived the nightmare of the 1975-1990 civil war in Lebanon, where religious and political tensions still run high. Hobeika, leader of the Lebanese Forces militia and a former minister who switched his allegiance to Syria towards the end of the war, was killed together with his three bodyguards in a car bomb in a Christian neighbourhood of Beirut. The Lebanese government, the Syrian press, officials from Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah and Hobeika's allies all accused Israel of assassinating the former warlord to prevent him from revealing his "secrets" on the role of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacres of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon's capital. The Jewish state denied the allegations, pointing out that Hobeika was hated in Lebanon by Muslims and Christians alike, and the assassination has yet to be solved. Damn them Jews. Nobody in Lebanon would do such a thing... The case presents many similarities with the assassination early Monday in mainly Muslim west Beirut of Jihad Jibril, the son and heir apparent of the leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC), Ahmad Jibril. The Mossad, Israel's intelligence service, was immediately accused of eliminating Jibril, whose movement has been fiercely opposed to the Jewish state for more than three decades. Israel again denied the allegations. Musta been them daggone Jews that done him in, too, even though somebody else has taken credit for it. A few hours later, the decomposed body of Ramzi Irani was discovered in the trunk of his car after the Lebanese Forces activist who worked for the French oil giant TotalFinaElf went missing for almost two weeks. Lebanese authorities denied any implication in his disappearance, but the press expressed surprise that the anti-Syrian militant could have been abducted without the knowledge of Lebanese or Syrian intelligence. Interesting... No idea whodunnit, huh? On January 1, former MP Jean Ghanem, who was close to Hobeika, died in a car crash which at the time was put down to a heart attack. But Hobeika saw the circumstances as suspicious, according to L'Orient Le Jour newspaper. Uhuh. The old unexpected heart attack trick. A big shot of insulin administered someplace inconspicuous... Uh, never mind. Never heard of it. As-Safir, a daily close to Syria, the main power-broker in Lebanon, warned after Hobeika's assassination that a return to car-bombs and assassinations in Beirut would prove that "dormant cells are ready to carry out Israel's intentions" in the country. Also the intentions of whomever's blowing up people in their cars and administering heart attacks to pols... |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |