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111101 entriesfrom the booksonly where the books disagree
chronologiesallThe road to war 1968–1974The Lebanese war 1975–1990After the war 1991–2005July 2006, as the books tell it 2006Since 2005 2005–2025
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51 entries on 45 dates · the books disagree on 15

January 1970

Tuesday, 27 January 1970

The road to war · From the books

Annexes to the Cairo Agreement are concluded.
Dated 27 January 1970, the Cairo Agreement's annexes, in Picard's summary, let armed fedayeen travel to and from the southern fronts, chiefly the Arqoub, and put the camps outside Lebanese jurisdiction under Palestinian military police.

\_this day in full \_on this day

February 1970

February 1970: day not established

The road to war · From the books

A threatened general strike forces health cover under social security.
Some 250,000 employees were due to gain health cover when the government, facing a general strike called for February 1970, started the National Social Security Fund's medical scheme. To pay less, employers laid off long-serving staff en masse.

\_this day in full

March 1970

Monday, 23 March 1970

The road to war · From the books

A Palestinian funeral convoy is fired on at Kahhale.
Palestinians died when a convoy carrying a guerrilla's coffin to Damascus for burial and the residents of Kahhale, a Maronite village, traded fire. Who shot first, and how many were killed, is disputed. Hanf places the incident among the first serious clashes between Palestinians and armed Christians.

Sources differ: De Clerck & Malsagne: a Kataeb attack, 18 Palestinians dead. Hanf: ten dead; he reports both sides' versions and judges it likeliest that villagers took Palestinian shots into the air for an attack.

\_this day in full \_on this day

Wednesday, 25 March 1970

The road to war · From the books

Bashir Gemayel is kidnapped and held in Tall al-Za'tar.
Kamal Jumblatt's intervention with Yasir Arafat freed Bashir Gemayel, the Kataeb leader's younger son, seized by Palestinians and held in Tall al-Za'tar camp.

Sources differ: Hanf: 25 March 1970, held eight hours. Ménargues: 1969, adding he was beaten. Jumblatt became interior minister after the November 1969 Cairo Agreement (Hanf), which fits late 1969 or 1970.

\_this day in full \_on this day

late March 1970: day not established

The road to war · From the books

A week of fighting between Palestinians and Kataeb around Tall al-Za'tar.
Only the Egyptian foreign minister's intervention ended a week of Palestinian-Kataeb fighting that broke out right after Kahhale, heaviest between Tall al-Za'tar and Dekwaneh, a mainly Maronite suburb beside it.

\_this day in full

May 1970

May 1970: day not established

The road to war · From the books

Israeli forces invade the south after the shelling of Kiryat Shmona.
Lebanese troops suffered heavy losses when Israel sent forces across the border to retaliate for the Palestinian shelling of Kiryat Shmona. Hanf links the rise in guerrilla raids after the Cairo Agreement to more reprisals and a new wave of villagers fleeing north.

The road to war · From the books

New government rules bar PLO rocket fire, minelaying and weapons in towns.
The Popular Front rejected, and Fatah and Saiqa accepted, the rules set by the government in May: no rocket fire from Lebanese soil, no minelaying, no carrying of arms in towns and villages. Jumblatt, as interior minister, had also sought to keep PLO bases at least a kilometre from any town or village and training out of the camps. It did not last.

The road to war · From the books

The government recognises the Shi'i council and releases aid after a national day for the south.
The government recognised the new Higher Shi'i Council and released ten million dollars of aid for the south, steps taken after an official solidarity day for the region.

\_this day in full

August 1970

August or September 1970 (disputed): day not established

The road to war · From the books

Suleiman Frangieh is elected president by one vote.
Kamal Jumblatt's bloc tipped the balance, and Suleiman Frangieh, a Zghorta clan leader backed by the Tripartite Alliance and Saeb Salam, beat the Chehabist Elias Sarkis by a single vote. When the Speaker contested the result, Frangieh's gunmen came armed into the chamber.

Sources differ: August 1970 (Hanf) against September 1970 (Traboulsi twice, Picard). The September date has more citations, but Picard may refer to the political agreement rather than the vote, and Hanf's footnote is the only explicit date for the election itself. Kept open.

\_this day in full

September 1970

September 1970: day not established

The road to war · From the books

Black September in Jordan: the PLO leadership and thousands of fighters move to Lebanon.
Lebanon became the Palestinian resistance's chief base after King Hussein's army defeated the PLO in Jordan; thousands of fighters and tens of thousands of civilians came with its leaders, who settled in Beirut. Within months, Hanf judges, the Palestinians held the upper hand.

Sources differ: Figures differ: Hanf gives estimates of 200,000 to 500,000 Palestinians in Lebanon after 1970 and calls them unreliable; Picard cites the PLO Research Center (over 240,000 in 1970, plus over 100,000 from Jordan in two years). Quéméner alone gives a day (12 September) for the start of the Jordanian offensive.

\_this day in full

November 1970

November 1970: day not established

The road to war · From the books

Hafez al-Assad takes power in Syria.
Hafez al-Assad seized power in Damascus in a bloodless coup, his 'corrective movement'. Picard sees the Baath, above all after this, as an unofficial tool of Syrian intervention in Lebanon.

\_this day in full

1970

1970: day not established

The road to war · From the books

Tenant farmers of Maronite convents strike for land.
In 1970 gendarmes intervened at Mayfuq, where, as at Tannurin, convent tenants of the Batrun and Jbeil uplands struck and marched for more of the harvest and a share-out of church land.

The road to war · From the books

The labour confederation unifies; the Organisation of Communist Action is born.
In 1970 Lebanon's licensed unions joined the General Confederation of Workers (CGTL), where moderate and right-wing federations still held sway. That year two new-left groups, Socialist Lebanon and the Organisation of Lebanese Socialists, fused as the Organisation of Communist Action in Lebanon (OCAL), which made the fast-growing industrial workforce central to its project and built workers' committees in the factories.

Sources differ: OCAL founded in 1970 (Tufaro, Picard) or 1969 (de Clerck & Malsagne). Tufaro dates the separation of the Organisation of Lebanese Socialists from the Arab Nationalist Movement to 1968-1969, which may explain the earlier date.

Art and memory
  • testimony In al-Nahar in April 2004, Jocelyne Khueiry and Ahmad al-Jabir (Organisation of Communist Action from 1973) recalled their early-1970s youth as partisans.

\_this day in full

late 1970 (after Frangieh took office): day not established

The road to war · From the books

The Frangieh-Salam government dismantles the army's Deuxième Bureau.
Frangieh and his prime minister, Saeb Salam, swiftly broke up the Chehabist military intelligence: many civil servants were moved; five arrested officers were sentenced to prison and fled to Syria. Hanf argues the state thereby lost control of political groups, which armed as never before.

Sources differ: De Clerck & Malsagne date the trial of the officers to 1973; Hanf and Traboulsi place the purge at the start of the mandate.

\_this day in full

1970, shortly before the presidential election: day not established

The road to war · From the books

Jumblatt legalises the Communist, Arab nationalist, Syrian nationalist and Baath parties.
The Lebanese Communist Party, the Arab Nationalist Movement, the Syrian Social Nationalist Party and the Baath parties were legalised by Kamal Jumblatt in his final act as interior minister.

Sources differ: Traboulsi names the pro-Iraqi Baath; Picard both Baath parties.

\_this day in full

January 2001

Tuesday, 30 January 2001

After the war · From the books

UNIFIL's mandate is renewed and its strength cut to 4,500.

\_this day in full \_on this day

February 2001

February 2001: day not established

After the war · From the books

Christian opposition figures form the Qornet Shehwan Gathering.
Patriarch Sfeir informally led this anti-Syrian Christian gathering of the centre-right, whose members ranged from ex-president Amine Gemayel to Samir Frangieh, formerly of the National Movement.

Sources differ: February 2001 (Haugbolle) or April 2001 (Picard).

\_this day in full

March 2001

March 2001: day not established

After the war · From the books

On a US tour, Patriarch Sfeir demands that Syrian forces leave Lebanon.

\_this day in full

April 2001

April 2001: day not established

After the war · From the books

The 'Memory for the Future' colloquium breaks the silence on the war.
Amal Makarem convened it at the UN building in Beirut: Lebanese journalists, academics and lawyers met transitional-justice specialists from Germany, Rwanda and South Africa. Several organisers later set up the Association Mémoire pour l'Avenir.

Sources differ: April 2001 (Haugbolle) or March 2001 (title cited by Reder).

Art and memory
  • testimony Haugbolle's notes cite the 111101.net artist page and 111101.com: the artist Naji Zahar, he writes, started a war-memory discussion group in the late 1990s and later created 111101, an award-winning online memory database.

After the war · From the books

Rival demonstrations over Syria revive fears of war around 13 April.
Haugbolle notes that in April 2001 several newspapers wondered whether war could return: they reported ex-militiamen stirring in both East and West Beirut after rival rallies, some against Syria, some for the government.

\_this day in full

May 2001

Thursday, 24 May 2001

After the war · From the books

A national holiday marks one year since the 'liberation' of the south.

Sources differ: Abirached dates the anniversary 24 May; de Clerck and Malsagne date the withdrawal itself to 25 May (see the withdrawal entry).

\_this day in full \_on this day

June 2001

June 2001: day not established

After the war · From the books

Syrian troops partly withdraw from Beirut.
In June 2001, a year after Bashar al-Assad took power, some Syrian units moved from Beirut and its eastern suburbs to the north and east, while the bulk of the army stayed. Reported troop numbers: 25,000 after 2000, 21,000 in 2001, 17,000 in 2004.

\_this day in full

August 2001

Saturday, 4 August 2001

After the war · From the books

Patriarch Sfeir's visit to the Chouf seals a Maronite-Druze reconciliation.
Patriarch Sfeir toured the Chouf and called on Walid Jumblatt, eighteen years after the Mountain war; thousands of villagers applauded. Yet most displaced Christians still did not return.

\_this day in full \_on this day

August 2001: day not established

After the war · From the books

Hundreds of Lebanese Forces and Aoun supporters are arrested.
Reacting to the Maronite–Druze reconciliation, the security services detained anti-Syrian activists for allegedly plotting against the state, and plainclothes police forcibly broke up a protest outside Beirut's Palace of Justice. The cabinet and parliament approved the crackdown.

Sources differ: Hundreds (Picard) or 200 (Quéméner).

\_this day in full

October 2001

Monday, 22 October 2001

After the war · From the books

After Hezbollah strikes Israeli posts at Shebaa, Israel hits back with raids in the south.

\_this day in full \_on this day

2001

late 2001 (after 11 September): day not established

After the war · From the books

The United States lists Hezbollah as a terrorist group; Beirut refuses to act.
Washington asked Lebanon to freeze Hezbollah's assets and disarm it; the government refused, citing the unfinished Israeli withdrawal.

\_this day in full

January 2002

January 2002: day not established

After the war · From the books

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.

\_this day in full

February 2002

Thursday, 14 February 2002

After the war · From the books range

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.

\_this day in full \_on this day

March 2002

Sunday, 31 March 2002

After the war · From the books

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.

\_this day in full \_on this day

April 2002

Wednesday, 3 April 2002

After the war · From the books

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

\_this day in full \_on this day

Friday, 12 April 2002

After the war · From the books

Iran's foreign minister urges Hezbollah not to provoke a war.

\_this day in full \_on this day

May 2002

Saturday, 25 May 2002

After the war · From the books

On Liberation Day Nasrallah declares Hezbollah's support for the Palestinian intifada.

\_this day in full \_on this day

August 2002

August 2002: day not established

After the war · From the books

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.

\_this day in full

November 2002

November 2002: day not established

After the war · From the books

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.

\_this day in full

December 2002

December 2002: day not established

After the war · From the books

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.

Sources differ: Farewell ceremony 9 October 2002 versus replacement in December 2002.

\_this day in full

2002

summer 2002: day not established

After the war · From the books

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.

\_this day in full

February 2003

Friday, 28 February 2003

After the war · From the books

Israel bombs the south and reinforces its positions at Shebaa.

\_this day in full \_on this day

April 2003

Sunday, 13 April 2003

After the war · From the books

'Remember, so as not to return': a campaign for a national day of memory.
In al-Safir leading politicians openly backed remembering the war for the first time. On 13 April hundreds gathered in Martyrs' Square, handing out flowers and collecting signatures for a national memory day and a memorial; earlier, the Association Mémoire pour l'Avenir and the families' Committee had screened war documentaries unseen in Lebanon at Masrah al-Medina.
Art and memory
  • place Architect Mona El-Hallak came upon the Barakat building, above the old demarcation line at Sodeco, in 1996, and from 1997 led APSAD's campaign to save it. In 2003 the municipality expropriated it for $3 million for Beit Beirut.
  • film Films Haugbolle cites on postwar amnesia include Ghassan Salhab's Beyrouth Fantôme (1999) and Terra Incognita (2002); the novel Ya Salam (1999) by Najwa Barakat follows former militiamen in peacetime.

Other date in the books: Tuesday, 8 April 2003

\_this day in full \_on this day

April 2003: day not established

After the war · From the books

A replica of the 1975 bus becomes a memory installation in Beirut.
Hassan Saouli deliberately kept graphic images out: to mark 28 years since 13 April, he parked a bus of the 1975 model on a central Beirut street, with videos and texts on guilt and forgiveness inside.

\_this day in full

May 2003

Tuesday, 27 May 2003

After the war · From the books

Ghassan Tueni answers a Syrian general's threats against the Lebanese.
In al-Nahar Ghassan Tueni addressed Bashar al-Assad as an equal, protesting at threats against the Lebanese by General Bahjat Sleiman, Syria's intelligence chief.

\_this day in full \_on this day

June 2003

June 2003: day not established

After the war · From the books

Nada Sahnaoui's installation 'Atadhakkar' (I remember) opens in Martyrs' Square.
Sahnaoui set readers' memories of prewar downtown on 360 newspaper stacks, leaving a few stacks bare for what had been erased.

Sources differ: Opening in June 2003 (p. 132); the photograph is dated July 2003.

Art and memory
  • artwork Nada Sahnaoui's earlier work 'Statistics' listed war casualty figures from the press; Haugbolle's note points to 111101's Artworks section.

After the war · From the books

A Kataeb memorial in Ashrafieh is pulled down for luxury flats.
A 1986 site for local fighters, it had lost its point once many of their families left in 1989-90, the mukhtar said.

\_this day in full

September 2003

September 2003: day not established

After the war · From the books

Soldiers fire on Hezbollah members in a poster fight at Jiba.
In Jiba, Hezbollah members objected to Amal's pictures of Imam Musa Sadr; in the ensuing brawl the army fired on Hezbollah, a first in over ten years: one dead, two wounded.

After the war · From the books

A by-election sets off a poster war in Gemmayzeh.
In Jummayza's September 2003 by-election, posters of Aoun's Hikmat Dib, the jailed Geagea and Bashir Gemayel were torn or mocked daily: Christian memory, divided.

\_this day in full

October 2003

Monday, 27 October 2003

After the war · From the books

Hezbollah attacks Israeli positions at Shebaa; Israel raids near villages.

\_this day in full \_on this day

November 2003

November 2003: day not established

After the war · From the books

A public hearing on 'understanding the war' turns into a shouting match.
Two women broke into the Association Mémoire pour l'Avenir's hearing for students and war witnesses: one abused Samir Kassir for attacking Syria; a mother blamed a former Kataeb editor for her son's killing.

\_this day in full

December 2003

December 2003: day not established

After the war · From the books

The US Congress passes the Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act.
It demanded a Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon and allowed for sanctions, partly applied from spring 2004.

Sources differ: Passed in November (Haugbolle) or December 2003 (Picard, 33 jours); sanctions from April (Picard) or May 2004 (33 jours).

\_this day in full

February 2012

February 2012: day not established

Since 2005 · From the books

Fighting in Tripoli between Bab al-Tabbaneh and Jabal Mohsen (February-December 2012).
From February to December, Tripoli's pro-regime Alawite quarter of Jabal Mohsen and its Sunni quarter of Bab al-Tebbaneh, which backed the Syrian opposition, clashed.

\_this day in full

June 2012

Monday, 11 June 2012

Since 2005 · From the books

The Baabda Declaration commits Lebanon to 'dissociation' from regional conflicts.
The declaration, agreed at President Sleiman's National Dialogue, pledged 'dissociation' from regional conflicts and border control, mainly towards Syria; Picard considers the promise empty from the outset.

\_this day in full \_on this day

October 2012

Friday, 19 October 2012

Since 2005 · From the books

Intelligence chief Wissam al-Hassan is assassinated.
Seven people died along with Wissam al-Hassan, head of ISF intelligence and an investigator of Hariri's assassination, in a Beirut car bombing.

\_this day in full \_on this day

2012

2012: day not established

Since 2005 · From the books

Former minister Michel Samaha is arrested.
Picard treats the arrest as evidence that Syrian-paid agents took part in the unrest after the 2005 withdrawal.

\_this day in full