lebanese war
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1975/1990
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119 news for the 16th, 27th, 30th of every month

with the books

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January 27, 1975monday
After stormy debates and demonstrations, most schools reopened their doors.

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January 30, 1975thursday
15,000 persons demonstrated in Beirut to express their solidarity with South Lebanon, which had been regularly bombed by Israel.

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Traboulsi counts this among the early-1975 protests, a southern general strike and Beirut demonstrations, over the Palestinian presence and the south's defence.

May 16, 1975friday
The Solh Cabinet resigned due to pressures against its members.

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In a heated sitting of parliament Rashid al-Solh resigned, blaming the Kataeb for the fighting. His refusal to deploy the army had led the Kataeb ministers to leave the cabinet, and other Christian ministers had followed them.

September 30, 1975tuesday
A Tupolev 154 belonging to the Hungarian company Malev exploded in the air at 10 kilometers from Beirut, killing 60 persons, 34 of which were Lebanese.

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October 27, 1975monday
The Murr tower was occupied by the Mourabitun, and the Holliday Inn-Phoenicia region was held by the Phalange Party.

\_this day in full the books also date it 20 October 1975 \_on this day

\_what the books add

Begun in late October 1975 (20 October in de Clerck and Malsagne's chronology), the Battle of the Hotels ran for five months, ending when the Holiday Inn fell on 20-22 March 1976. Traboulsi links its launch to Black Saturday in December.

November 16, 1975sunday
President Sleiman Frangieh and Prime Minister Rachid Karameh studied the political reform and the secularization of public service.
The Prime Minister presented a plan to redress the economy and curb unemployment. He claimed religious equity in the parliamentary representation and a complete secularization of public service. The government decided to create a shock squad in charge of reestablishing security in the country.

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January 16, 1976friday
For the first time since the beginning of the war, the Lebanese aviation intervened against Palestinian and progressive activists settlements in the Khaldeh and Aramoun regions. Thirty women and children were killed at the entry of Damour.
The airport was closed after three shells hit the runways.

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De Clerck and Malsagne record that the besiegers executed some twenty Damour residents on this day, a first massacre a week after the siege began on 9 January. Whether these are the deaths reported 'at the entry of Damour' is not established.

January 30, 1976friday
While the normalization process continued, the Superior Military Committee decided to dispatch the Lebanese Army to Damour, Mkalles, and Dbayeh, as well as to the road leading to the Beirut International Airport.

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January 30, 1976friday
Lieutenant Ahmed Khatib left the Hasbaya barracks and announced the creation, in the Bekaa, of the Army of Arab Lebanon.

\_this day in full the books also date it 21 January 1976, 22 January 1976 \_on this day

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Historians date Lieutenant Ahmad al-Khatib's breakaway to 21 January (de Clerck and Malsagne, in the Bekaa) or 22 January (Julie Tegho Bou Nassif, from the diary of the Greek Catholic bishop of Zahleh); Hanf places the mutiny in the south. About 300-400 Muslim soldiers followed him at first. The entry of 30 January may record a later step.

May 16, 1976sunday
The Lebanese press was in mourning. A sniper's bullet killed Edouard Saab, the chief editor of L'Orient-Le-Jour.

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De Clerck and Malsagne note that Edouard Saab was Le Monde's correspondent too; a sniper shot him dead while he crossed the demarcation line.

May 27, 1976thursday
Linda Joumblatt, Kamal Joumblatt's 55 years old sister, was cowardly assassinated in her home in Beirut. A group of armed men broke into her apartment and opened fire on her. She was killed while her daughters Nouha, 28 years old, and Samar, 18 years old were injured.

\_this day in full the books also date it 2 June 1976 \_on this day

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On 2 June Bashir Gemayel, having asked for a secret meeting with Kamal Jumblatt, offered him condolences and information on who had killed her. Traboulsi names her Linda al-Atrash and puts her apartment in East Beirut.

May 30, 1976sunday
An avalanche of missiles and shells hit Beirut while combats continued on all fronts. The bombings reached the airport, imposing the closure of runways to air traffic at night.

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June 16, 1976wednesday
The US ambassador in Lebanon, Francis Meloy, the US economic advisor, Robert Waring, and the driver of the US embassy were assassinated after being kidnapped. They were about to cross the borderline between West and East Beirut.

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Fisk reports that the bodies of Ambassador Francis Meloy, his economic counsellor Robert Waring and their Lebanese driver, abducted near the Museum crossing, were found that evening at Ramlet al-Baida, and that Arafat, once sure of the three Palestinians responsible, sent them to Tyre. De Clerck and Malsagne judge that the murders ended American efforts at a settlement through the Lebanese parties.

June 27, 1976sunday
The Beirut International Airport was heavily bombed. An MEA Boeing 707 caught fire on the runway. The airplane's pilot died in the accident.

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June 27, 1976sunday
The Phalange Party, the NLP, and the Guardians of the Cedar launched the 'Camps Battle'.

\_this day in full the books also date it 22 June 1976 \_on this day

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Yara El Khoury dates the start of the final offensive on Jisr al-Basha and Tal al-Za'tar to 22 June 1976, and Hanf's account (Jisr al-Basha stormed eight days after the first assault, on 1 July) points to the same week. The camps had been blockaded since January. Hanf says Chamoun's Tigers and Christian units of the army led the attack, the Kataeb joining later; a joint command of Bashir Gemayel (Kataeb), Dany Chamoun and Nabil Karam (NLP), Fawzi Mahfouz (Tanzim) and Etienne Saqr (Guardians of the Cedar) coordinated it (de Clerck and Malsagne).

November 16, 1976tuesday
According to Ghassan Tueni, who was in Geneva asking for help from international organizations, 'In 18 months, the Lebanese war killed 60,000 persons, injured 200 000 others, and made 1.7 million homeless persons.'

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Later estimates for the 'two-year war' are below the figures quoted here. Published death tolls, de Clerck and Malsagne note, run from 15,000 to 40,000, and the displaced numbered at least 200,000. In The Times of 16 November 1976 Fisk reported almost 40,000 dead.

March 16, 1977wednesday
Kamal Joumblatt was assassinated
He was leaving Moukhtara when he and two other passengers were killed. An ambush was set up not far from an Arab Strike Force control post. This assassination aroused a huge wave of disapproval. A call for a strike was immediately issued. The country was in mourning. Chief of the Lebanese left wing, leader of the Druze community, author of several political books, coming from a famous family in the Chouf, Kamal Joumblatt was born in 1917 in Moukhtara, with essentially an eclectic spirit. After he graduated from the Law school in Saint Joseph University in Beirut, he went into politics very young. In 1946 he was elected for the first time Deputy of the Chouf in the Parliament and three years later he was appointed Minister of Economy and Agriculture. In 1949, he founded the Lebanese Progressive Socialist Party (PSP). Three months before his assassination, he had given up politics.

\_this day in full the books also date it 17 March 1977 \_on this day

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Jumblatt was ambushed near a Syrian checkpoint of the Arab Deterrent Force; Fisk places it on the mountain road near Baaqlin. Most historians give 16 March 1977 (Traboulsi, de Clerck and Malsagne, the Confluences authors, and Hanf on one page); Hanf elsewhere and Ménargues give 17 March, which Ménargues ties to the burial. His son Walid took over, and Christians were killed in reprisal in Chouf villages. Hanf writes that most politicians, Muslims above all, took the murder as a warning against defying Syria openly, and that Jumblatt had attacked the Syrian presence in speech and print, in Lebanon and abroad.

March 27, 1977sunday
The Arab League decided to renew the mandate of the Arab Strike Force for another six months.

\_this day in full the books also date it 18 October 1976 \_on this day

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The force is usually called the Arab Deterrent Force (ADF) in English.

March 27, 1977sunday
A powerful plastic charge, deposited in the elevator of the Minister of Defense, Fouad Boutros, exploded destroying the upper floor of the apartment.

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The bombing came the evening the government chose a new army commander, a change arranged by Boutros, who held foreign affairs and defence, and regarded by the Christian parties as cause for war.

April 16, 1977saturday
The Cairo agreement will be applied progressively. The worried Lebanese have been waiting for a long time for this agreement to be implemented.

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June 30, 1977thursday
On the last day of its full-powers, the Council of Ministers published a series of decree-laws. The most important ones stipulated the revision of certain laws relative to the Lebanese University, the amendment of some press censorship laws, and the adoption of the mandatory car insurance.

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July 30, 1977saturday
The Arab Strike Force deployed around the camps in Beirut, Tripoli, Saida and in the Bekaa region.

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August 27, 1977saturday
Although the collection of heavy arms was achieved, the Lebanese Front issued a press release, following the Ehden conference, emphasizing ' the necessity of spreading out Palestinians residing in Lebanon over the countries belonging to the Arab League.'

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Hanf records that Damascus rejected the Lebanese Front's demands of May 1977: annulment of the Cairo Agreement and dispersal among other Arab states of the 200,000 Palestinians its leaders regarded as illegal entrants.

September 16, 1977friday
15 cholera cases were reported in Lebanon.
The officials in the Health and Education departments recommended putting off the re-opening of schools to November 10.

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February 27, 1978monday
Diverse shows were scheduled in Lebanon. 'We Belnesba la bokra chou?' by Ziad Rahbani was a triumph at the Orly Theater.

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De Clerck and Malsagne and Haugbolle list this 1978 play first among Ziad Rahbani's comedies, which satirised the war from West Beirut.

March 27, 1978monday
' The 'National parliamentary gathering', a Shiite block, was created under the presidency of Kamel El Assaad.

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March 30, 1978thursday
A little bit of cheerfulness in the midst of despair ! The Boney M gave a flamboyant show to a heartbroken Lebanese audience.

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November 16, 1978thursday
According to a study done by the national federation of syndicates, the cost of living had increased by 90% in four years.

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January 16, 1979tuesday
The disappearance of the Imam Sadr was back on the news. Seven young Lebanese Shiite militiamen hijacked the MEA Boeing 720, in order to attract the world's attention on the sequestration of the Imam. The militants affirmed that General Kadhafi, who was vigorously opposed to the Palestinian settlement in Lebanon, detained Imam Moussa Sadr. The hijackers surrendered to the Lebanese justice at night.

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May 16, 1979wednesday
The Hoss cabinet resigned.

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June 16, 1979saturday
After murderous combats, the Lebanese authorities decided to send the army to Ain el Remmane at the beginning of the week.

\_this day in full the books also date it 12 May 1979, 18 June 1979 \_on this day

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Bashir Gemayel's men fought a bloody battle with army units sent, at Pierre Gemayel's and Camille Chamoun's request, to separate the Kataeb and National Liberal militias, at war since 12 May. De Clerck and Malsagne call it the first serious armed clash between the army and a Lebanese militia, dating it once to 14 June and once to 18 June.

June 27, 1979wednesday
Syrians and Israelis faced each other in the sky of Damour. Four Syrian Migs were shut down. At the Southern border, shelling continued between Progressive Palestinians on one side and the militia of Saad Haddad and Israel on the other.

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June 30, 1979saturday
The 'race for peace' organized by the Lebanese Federation of Athletics under the patronage of L'orient-Le Jour was a manifestation of the Lebanese sportsmen in favor of national unity. Departed from Achrafieh, the 66 participants representing 18 clubs from all the Lebanese regions met in Manara after having crossed the Fouad Chehab Ring.

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July 16, 1979monday
Two months after the resignation of the Hoss Cabinet formed at the end of the 75-76 war, Selim El Hoss announced the formation of his second Cabinet. The ministerial team included:
Selim El Hoss: Prime Minister - Fouad Boutros: Vice-president of the Council and Minister of Foreign affairs - Charles Helou: Minister of State - Bahige Takieddine: Minister of Interior and Tourism - Joseph Skaff: Minister of Defense and Agriculture - Anouar Sabbah: Minister of Resources and Industry - Ali El Khalil: Minister of Finance - Nazem Kadri: Minister of Social Affairs - Boutros Harb: Minister of Education and Public Works - Talal Merhabi: Minister of Health and Economy - Youssef Germanos: Minister of Justice and Information

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August 16, 1979thursday
The Lebanese weightlifter Mohammed Traboulsi won several gold medals during the 11th Asian championship of weightlifting that was taking place in Tokyo.

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October 27, 1979saturday
A car bomb exploded in basta, next to the office of the Army of Arabic Lebanon provoking 8 deaths and 32 injuries. The attack was followed by a strike in West Beirut.

\_this day in full the books also date it 22 April 1979 \_on this day

November 16, 1979friday
The dollar registered its highest level in Beirut, reaching 347 Lebanese Pounds, something that never happened before.

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January 30, 1980wednesday
The situation worsened in Ehmej. Some sources reported 4 dead and 10 injured persons.

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See the note on the entry of 25 January 1980.

April 16, 1980wednesday
The conflict between Amal and the Iraqi Baas worsened.
Violent fights raged in the Southern suburbs of Beirut claiming 40 victims. The Iraqi and the Iranian embassies were attacked. The Amal organization, founded by Imam Moussa Sadr who disappeared in 1978, accused the Iraqi agents of ignoring the cease-fire.

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Hanf sees the Iran–Iraq war of September 1980 as already being fought earlier in Beirut's suburbs: Amal and the Iraqi-backed Arab Liberation Front clashed there despite repeated ceasefires, and the fighting spread south, where a dozen villages were contested until mid-1982. De Clerck and Malsagne list the Iraqi Baath among Amal's adversaries.

May 27, 1980tuesday
Violent confrontations burst between Shiite militiamen from Amal and a coalition including the Communist Party and the Resistance. The confrontations lasted three days, claiming a big number of victims. The Arab Strike Force mediated between the belligerent parties. A normalization and demilitarization agreement was signed in Damascus with the participation of the PLO.

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De Clerck and Malsagne list Amal's opponents once Nabih Berri led it, from 1980: the Communist Party, the Communist Action Organisation, the Iraqi Baath, Fatah and the Army of Arab Lebanon. Traboulsi notes frequent fighting between Amal and the Palestinian groups and National Movement up to June 1982.

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