75 news for the 11th, 13th of every month
with the bookspage 1 of 2 next
The 70th Maronite patriarch of Antioch and the Middle East died of a hart attack. He was 81 years old.
\_this day in full the books also date it 3 February 1975 \_on this day
These people were on board of a bus bringing back from Tell El Zaatar members of Palestinian Organizations who had just participated in a Resistance meeting. Because of the incident, tension rose in the Palestinian camp and in many surrounding towns. Authorities and mediators were trying to calm the waters and ask the Phalange Party leader, Pierre Gemayel, to hand over those responsible of the incident to the Lebanese Justice.
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The day began with shootings near the church in Ain al-Rummaneh, where Pierre Gemayel was attending a consecration; his bodyguard Joseph Bou Assi was killed. In the early afternoon Kataeb militiamen fired on a bus returning to Tal al-Za'tar from a rally of the Arab Liberation Front. Most historians count 27 dead (Hanf, Fisk, de Clerck and Malsagne: 27 of 35 passengers); Traboulsi gives 21 and Ménargues 31. According to de Clerck and Malsagne the bus carried Palestinians and Lebanese in equal numbers, all men. Fighting spread that evening across the suburbs of Beirut.
\_this day in full the books also date it 15 March 1976 \_on this day
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On 11 March Brigadier-General Aziz al-Ahdab, Beirut garrison commander (retired, says Traboulsi), seized the television station, named himself interim military governor and called for Frangieh's resignation and an early election. Few troops stood behind him and Syria opposed him: on 15 March PLA and Saiqa units under Syrian control blocked his men and Khatib's Lebanese Arab Army on their way to Baabda. Backed by Chamoun, Gemayel and President Assad, Frangieh refused to go.
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Ménargues has William Hawi shot by a Palestinian sniper in June 1976, at the end of the Tal al-Za'tar siege; Traboulsi places it during the siege. Bashir Gemayel succeeded him as Kataeb militia chief.
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De Clerck and Malsagne report that Eddé went into exile in Paris after surviving three attempts on his life, one of them outside his home.
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Sami al-Khatib took over the ADF from Ahmad al-Hajj, who never won Syria's trust, and led it until 1983.
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By now Syria was fighting on the Palestinians' side. Hanf says the clashes ended once the Arab Deterrent Force's Saudi and Sudanese contingents deployed between Chiyah and Ain el-Remmaneh.
\_this day in full the books also date it 14 June 1978 \_on this day
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Historians date the Ehden killings to 13 June (de Clerck and Malsagne) or 14 June (Hanf). A unit of some 200 men (Traboulsi) led by Samir Geagea attacked the Frangieh residence; besides Tony Frangieh, his wife and their three-year-old daughter, about thirty relatives and supporters were killed. The Phalange presented the raid as retaliation for the killing of their local leader Jud al-Bayeh in early June; Bashir Gemayel denied ordering the killing of the family. The raid also turned on control of the Chekka cement works. Syrian troops then occupied Ehden and much of the north.
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Hanf: early in 1980 Amal fought the Iraqi-backed Arab Liberation Front in Beirut's suburbs while Fatah tried to mediate, as relations between Shi'is and Palestinians grew worse; the fighting later reached the south.
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Hanf: Dany Chamoun left politics, but his father Camille, badly shaken by the loss of his party's militia, put the Lebanese Front's political unity first and remained its chairman.
\_this day in full the books also date it 12 September 1981 \_on this day
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Ménargues sets the agreement at the Vigilance Committee meeting of 11 September, where Syria's Mohammad Ghanem came out for deploying the Lebanese Army from Sodeco to the port. The Museum crossing, almost completely shut for five months, reopened on 12 September.
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De Clerck and Malsagne, drawing on Ronen Bergman, attribute to Ariel Sharon a series of car bombings from October 1981, carried out under the name 'Front for the Liberation of Lebanon from Foreigners' and aimed chiefly at Palestinians, to provoke retaliation that could justify an invasion. They list no individual attacks, so this bombing cannot be matched to their account.
\_this day in full the books also date it 4 June 1982, 14 June 1982 \_on this day
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Robert Fisk cites Red Cross and police counts of 9,583 killed and 16,608 wounded across Lebanon by 14 June; Israel's own civilian casualty figure for 4-21 June was 460. Hanf notes that the Syrian-Israeli ceasefire of 11 June excluded the PLO.
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On 13 June Israeli forces reached Baabda and Yarze, seats of the presidency and the army command, and joined the Lebanese Forces' lines (Hanf, Ménargues); Fisk dates the arrival of Sharon and his forward troops at Baabda to just before midnight.
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After the Israeli advance, Lebanese Forces militiamen set up checkpoints in the Chouf and Aley; clashes with Druze fighters followed and the Israelis often mediated (Hanf). De Clerck and Malsagne date the 'Mountain War' from summer 1982, the Lebanese Forces fighting first the SSNP's Druze and then the PSP.
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Lebanese and Israeli delegates met in turn at Khalde, in a repaired beach hotel, and at Kiryat Shmona. De Clerck and Malsagne count 37 meetings over 138 days, from December 1982 to May 1983.
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