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After the war, 2004

by year · by dates · timeline · 1991–2005
199119921993199419951996199719981999200020012002200320042005

24 entries, 20 days.

a day with an entry

January
31
February
6
March
1022
April
16
May
June
July
August
26
September
23479
October
1359172021
November
December
115

Saturday, 31 January 2004

From the books

Lebanese prisoners freed from Israeli jails return in a Hezbollah exchange.
Hezbollah ran the welcome alone and barred leftist parties, though thirty of the fifty men who came home were leftists; the left replied by recalling its role in the resistance from 1982.

Friday, 6 February 2004

From the books

Reformist communists announce a 'Democratic Left' movement.
Its founding al-Nahar statement urged the left to reform and unite against the Syrian-backed order, calling it a duty to learn from past mistakes. Members included Elias Khoury, Samir Kassir, Ziad Majed, George Hawi and Elias Atallah.

Wednesday, 10 March 2004

From the books

Student demonstrations against the Syrian presence are suppressed.

Monday, 22 March 2004

From the books

Hezbollah attacks six Israeli positions after the killing of Sheikh Yassin.

Friday, 16 April 2004

From the books

A press campaign reveals how little the young know of the war.
Al-Nahar marked the April 2004 anniversary with interviews of ex-militiamen and a feature on the young: most said they knew only bits of the war, and that parents blamed 'the others'.

Thursday, 26 August 2004

From the books

Hariri is called to Damascus, where Bashar al-Assad insists that Lahoud's term be extended.
Hariri had come to plead against prolonging Lahoud's term. Walid Jumblatt, interviewed by Nicholas Blanford in 2005, related that Assad told Hariri that Lahoud and Assad were one and the same.

Thursday, 2 September 2004

From the books

UN Security Council Resolution 1559 demands the withdrawal of foreign forces.
The Franco-American resolution, passed by nine votes with six abstentions, required every foreign force to leave, every militia to disarm and the presidential election to proceed free of outside interference. Walid Jumblatt sided with the opposition, most of it Christian.

Friday, 3 September 2004

From the books

Parliament extends President Lahoud's term by three years.
Under Syrian pressure the constitutional amendment passed by 96 votes to 29; Jumblatt's deputies voted against.

Saturday, 4 September 2004

From the books

Hassan Nasrallah rejects Resolution 1559.

Tuesday, 7 September 2004

From the books

Four ministers, including Marwan Hamadeh, resign in protest.

Sources differ: Hamadeh is called economy minister (Abirached) or health minister (Khayat).

Thursday, 9 September 2004

From the books

Hariri announces that his government will resign.

Friday, 1 October 2004

From the books

Marwan Hamadeh survives a car bomb.
The car bomb that wounded Marwan Hamadeh, a Jumblatt adviser who had resigned from the cabinet, opened a series of attacks on opponents of Syria (Picard); the Special Tribunal for Lebanon later took on his case as legally linked to Hariri's. Kofi Annan's report on Resolution 1559 came out that day.

Sources differ: Picard (2016) places the attack 'a few days' after 3 September; the others give 1 October.

Sunday, 3 October 2004

From the books

Hariri hands his resignation to Lahoud.
Hariri took the 1 October attack that wounded Marwan Hamadeh as a breach of the assurances he had been given, and resigned two days later. Lahoud waited more than two weeks before accepting.

Sources differ: See 20 October: Abirached dates the resignation then.

Tuesday, 5 October 2004

From the books

Lebanon rejects the UN report criticising the Syrian presence.

Saturday, 9 October 2004

From the books

Bashar al-Assad derides the charge that Syria invaded Lebanon in 1976.
Assad asked Lebanon's Christians, and Resolution 1559's sponsors, the US and France, where they were when Lebanese were massacred. Haugbolle reads him as calling the war internal and Syria its rescuer.

Sunday, 17 October 2004

From the books

The Democratic Left Movement is formally founded.
By December it had joined Christian and Druze parties in signing the Bristol Declaration.

Sources differ: Picard dates a 'Gauche démocratique' to 1997, possibly an earlier group or a slip.

Wednesday, 20 October 2004

From the books

Rafiq Hariri's resignation takes effect.
He then moved openly towards the anti-Syrian opposition.

Sources differ: Presented 3 October (Khayat), effective 20 October (Abirached).

Thursday, 21 October 2004

From the books

Omar Karami is asked to form a pro-Syrian government.
In protest at Lahoud's extended term, one deputy in four stayed away from the consultations.

Wednesday, 1 December 2004

From the books

Thousands demonstrate in Beirut for the Syrian presence and against 1559.

Sources differ: The book chronology extracted to JSON reads this as 'December' only; the PDF shows 1 December.

Wednesday, 15 December 2004

From the books

The opposition unites in the Bristol Declaration.
The Bristol Hotel declaration of Christian and Druze parties, Hariri loyalists and leftists demanded independence and democracy, accepted a Lebanese share in the war, and blamed the postwar crisis on a corrupt state ruling by fear.

Sources differ: 15 December (Haugbolle's text) or 12 December (his own note): the declaration may have been published before the formal meeting, or one date is a slip.

2004: day not established

2004

From the books

The bullet-scarred Martyrs' statue returns to downtown Beirut.
Issam Khairallah, who restored the statue at Kaslik's Holy Spirit University, kept almost half its bullet and shrapnel marks and left the young man's arm missing. It was put back about a hundred metres north, nearer the sea.

2004

From the books

UMAM Documentation and Research starts collecting the war's archives.
Founded by Lokman Slim and Monika Borgmann in Haret Hreik, it built an archive of war memories; their film 'Massaker', interviewing six men who took part in Sabra and Shatila, was shot between 2001 and 2004.

Sources differ: Founded 2004 (Ismail-Allouche) or active since 2002 (Haugbolle).

September 2004

From the books

Riots shake Majdel Anjar after the arrest of an Islamist leader.
Rioting broke out in the Sunni Bekaa town the day after a presumed al-Qaeda-linked Islamist leader was detained in Beirut.

December 2004

From the books

Students, women's groups and lawyers take to the streets.
Civic protest against Syrian tutelage grew, and reprisals followed.