After the war, 2002

Assaad Shaftari's war confessions appear in al-Hayat.
In three interviews with Hazim al-Amin, Hobeika's former aide described his militia years, including orders to execute captives, and called for the truth to be told so that the next generation might forgive.

Israel threatens to strike Syria over its support for Hezbollah.
On 14 April, two weeks after that threat, Ariel Sharon charged Syria and Iran with supporting Hezbollah's attacks.

The government announces Syrian troop withdrawals from parts of Mount Lebanon.
The move was presented as an application of the Taif Agreement.

Much of rebuilt downtown Beirut is inaugurated as 'Beirut reborn'.
Posters ('Le Liban vit'), full-page press advertisements and television spots hailed the completion, with no reference to the war.

Elie Hobeika is killed by a car bomb near Beirut.
The former Lebanese Forces intelligence chief, widely held responsible for Sabra and Shatila and a minister after the war, died shortly before he was to testify in the Belgian case against Ariel Sharon.

Sharon calls a Lebanese water pump on the Wazzani a cause for war.
A war over the Council of the South's plan to supply some fifty villages from the Wazzani, a Hasbani tributary, was averted by American, Russian and European mediation.

Before-and-after photographs of downtown go on show in Place de l'Étoile.
Haugbolle calls the book version, 'Beirut's Memory', propaganda: a Solidere-linked bank published it in the name of Hariri's photographer Ayman Traoui. On site, paired 1990 and 2002 views ringed the clock tower.

Rustom Ghazaleh replaces Ghazi Kanaan as Syria's intelligence chief in Lebanon.
Kanaan had ruled from Anjar since 1982, vetting candidates and shaping the 2000 electoral map; his recall signalled Bashar al-Assad's tighter grip on Lebanon. Ghazaleh, his replacement, was implicated in Al-Madina bank's 2003 collapse.