Memory and Creation / Lebanon
Chronology / 1978
69 events in 1978
The Israeli Prime Minister Menahem Begin declared : 'Christians in Lebanon are threatened of being annihilated'.
US nationals were evacuated and this was worrying for the Lebanese population.
The bombing intensified in the Eastern suburbs of Beirut.
Lebanese Army units were dispatched to South Lebanon.
They remained there until the end of the year. Christian militias supported by Israel in the South stopped their advance.
While the bombardment of Acharafieh continued, the Arab Strike Force evacuated twelve positions in this district. Christian parties requested the evacuation of the Port and the Karantina and that Saudis and Sudanese soldiers replace the Syrian soldiers.
A bomb destroyed an eight floor building where the offices of the Palestine Liberation Front were located. The explosion killed 150 persons.
Raymond Eddeh called the UN Security Council to hold a meeting. The leader of the National Bloc declared 'My country is like a man that is sinking in a marsh and is being shot.
The situation deteriorated suddenly in the North.
Eight persons were killed and 10 others wounded in an ambush between the Cazas of Koura and Batroun. The situation worsened on August 25. The Arab Strike Force launched a raking operation. Fights resulted in 20 deaths and did not end until August 26. The Arab Strike Force now controls all the region of Batroun while the Phalangists are settled in Jbeil.
A Syrian-Israeli war in Lebanon seemed likely to happen, but the US intervened to moderate the two countries.
Imam Moussa Sadr, a Shiite leader disappeared while visiting Libya. Libyans asserted that he left Tripoli for Rome. Sadr never arrived to Rome, and the Lebanese were worried.
In Lebanon strikes multiplied.
In East Beirut, a strike was organized to protest against the presence of the 'Green Helmets', while in West Beirut protests were against the mysterious disappearance of Imama Moussa Sadr. Christian leaders did not want to renew the Arab Strike Force's mandate unless it was done under new conditions.
After President Sarkis delivered a speech underlining the necessity to maintain the Arab Strike Force and guarantee the forthcoming withdrawal of Syrian forces, about 200 shells hit Achrafieh. The population panicked.
President Alfred Naccache was dead from pneumonia. He was 91 years old. He was President of the Republic between 1941 and 1943, under the French mandate. After the independence, he was given several ministerial functions, before he retired from politics. He was born in Beirut in 1887 and studied law at Saint Joseph University. He became advisor for the supreme court of appeal, and then headed the appeal court. In 1941, he became President of the Republic until March 18, 1943. He was titular of several honorific distinctions such as the great cordon of the cedar order.
It is the famous ' Black Thursday ' where hundreds of shells hit Achrafieh in a murderous frenzy that did not spare anyone. The Arab Strike Force and the Lebanese Front accused each other of being responsible of this nightmare, while women, children and elderly persons were dying.
Artillery duels extended. Achrafieh was turned into hell; more than 100 persons died and 300 were injured in this district of Beirut as a result of bombardments.
France took the initiative of a cease-fire in Beirut and suggested the repositioning of the Arab Strike Force, as well as the interposition of a Lebanese Force between the belligerents.
The bombardments reached Bikfaya and Beit-Mery while in East Beirut there was a shortage of food and medications. The Security Council called for the urgent ending of the combats.
Residents of Achrafieh stepped out of their shelters only to realize the magnitude of the damages. Despite the respect of the cease-fire agreed upon by Presidents Elias Sarkis and Hafez Assad, the region was still under blockade.
At Kornet Chehwane, a detachment of the army's intervention squad encircled the residence of Captain Sami Achkar accused of creating a dissident organization within the army. The officer was killed in the assault. The next day, Fouad Boutros, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Defense, was attacked in Achrafieh and his bodyguards were kidnapped.
While the situation improved on the ground, Damascus liberated Ahmed Khatib, previously chief of the Army of Arab Lebanon.
The residence of General Victor Khoury in Amchit was dynamited.
According to a study done by the national federation of syndicates, the cost of living had increased by 90% in four years.
President Sarkis called for an understanding.
The President concluded his visit to Paris with disappointment. France took a moderate position while thousands of Lebanese who fled to Paris exhorted the French government to react. However, politics has its own reasons.
The Arab tripartite committee including Saudi and Kuwaiti ambassadors and a Syrian general, met in Baabda in presence of the chief of State. The committee excluded any immediate resort to the army.
A serious incident was reported in Jounieh.
A Phalangist leader, Elie Hobeika, was arrested at an army checkpoint in Nahr el Kalb. The incident degenerated into fights and the entire region flared up. A helicopter transporting Saudi and Kuwaiti ambassadors and flying over the region was hit by submachine-gun shots. The Saudi ambassador was injured.