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February 7, 1978tuesday
A serious incident occurred in Fayadieh.
Lebanese Soldiers fought with elements of the Arab Strike Force. Shots were exchanged followed by heavy armaments shootings.
\_this day in full the books also date it 8 February 1978, 17 February 1978 \_on this day
\_what the books add
Historians date the Fayadiyeh incident to 7 February (de Clerck and Malsagne), 8 February (Hanf) or 17 February (Ménargues). It began when Syrian soldiers set up a roadblock in front of the Military Academy; officer cadets, led according to de Clerck and Malsagne by Captain Samir (Sami) al-Achkar, fought back and Syrian artillery shelled the barracks. Syrian losses are given as 13 dead and 36 wounded (de Clerck and Malsagne), over 30 dead (Ménargues) or 220 dead and 30 wounded (Hanf). As fighting spread into East Beirut, about a hundred people died when Syrian guns shelled Badaro, Ain el-Remmaneh and Karm el-Zeitoun. Sarkis and Damascus settled the affair with a joint Lebanese-Syrian military court. De Clerck and Malsagne date the Syria-Christian split to it.
February 25, 1978saturday
It is the first night, at the Casino du Liban theater, of the ' Akhwat Loubnan ' show written and interpreted by Nabih Aboulhosn.
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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.
September 10, 1978sunday
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.
\_this day in full the books also date it 25 August 1978, 13 September 1978 \_on this day
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Musa al-Sadr travelled to Libya on 25 August (de Clerck and Malsagne) at the invitation of the Libyan government (Ménargues) and was never seen again; Hanf dates the disappearance to September. Beirut papers speculated about the Shah's secret police or Libyan intelligence. Fisk writes that he was almost certainly killed in Libya. The loss mobilised the Shi'a and later strengthened Amal.
September 19, 1978tuesday
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.
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September 23, 1978saturday
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.
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Schools, hospitals and factories were destroyed in the new bombardment, and Lebanese gendarmes logged 2,000 impacts a day in Achrafieh. Hanf links it to the Camp David agreement reached a few days before.
September 26, 1978tuesday
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.
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September 28, 1978thursday
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.
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November 1, 1978wednesday
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.
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In February 1978 Achkar had led the Lebanese soldiers in the clash with Syrian troops at Fayadiyeh; in October he left the army with about twenty men and founded a 'Revolutionary Lebanese Army Movement'. Boutros was due to fly with the president to the Arab summit in Baghdad when the Lebanese Forces, avenging Achkar, ambushed him on the way to the airport. Lieutenant Qozhaya Chamoun, who led the convoy, was abducted and later murdered; Boutros himself got away.
November 16, 1978thursday
November 29, 1978wednesday
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.
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December 5, 1978tuesday
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.
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December 8, 1978friday
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.
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Ménargues writes that when the Moukafaha, Johnny Abdo's own intervention unit, arrested Elie Hobeika for allegedly having the Saudi ambassador's helicopter fired on, Bashir Gemayel had about a hundred army officers abducted; they were traded for Hobeika three weeks later.
December 20, 1978wednesday
January 5, 1979friday
Lebanon entered a complacency phase.
All sides seemed decided to wait for important regional developments to unfold in order to re-evaluate the situation and define the course of action. The situation was very tense in the South where the Israelis were shelling the Hasbaya region.
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January 6, 1979saturday
President Elias Sarkis re-affirmed the rejection of the implantation. The chief of State requested the reinforcement for the UNIFL
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January 8, 1979monday
The bad weather provoked considerable damages.
Following strong showers during the weekend in the North, landslides made several routes impracticable whereas, for the first time in twenty years, a flood was reported in Nahr El Kebir, which constitutes the Northern frontier between Lebanon and Syria. The El Arida metallic bridge collapsed.
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January 12, 1979friday
Members of the Commission of Justice requested the adoption of a law prohibiting the sale of lands to non-Lebanese. In the south, it seemed that many lands have been sold to non-Lebanese.
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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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January 19, 1979friday
The Israeli army launched a triple air, ground and sea operation against Arnoun, Aichieh and the costal region. These events caused 16 dead, 12 injured and 25 prisoners.
Concurrently, the Security Council renewed the UNIFL mandate until Beirut elaborated a program re-establishing its authority in Southern Lebanon.
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January 22, 1979monday
One of the closest collaborators of Yasser Arafat, Ali Hassan Salameh, nicknamed of Abou Hassan, died in an explosion. The attack that took place in the Snoubra sector caused 11 dead and 17 injured.
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According to de Clerck and Malsagne, a Mossad agent detonated a bomb in a Volkswagen as Salameh's Chevrolet passed. His wife, Georgina Rizk, had been Lebanon's first Miss Universe.
January 23, 1979tuesday
Considering the inflation and the depreciation of the Lebanese pound, new 250 LP bills were put in circulation starting February 1.
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February 12, 1979monday
Brian Urqhart, the assistant Secretary General of the United Nations, examined with Lebanese officials the modalities of the Army's deployment in the South next to the UNIFL Israel nevertheless rejected the program.
\_this day in full the books also date it 18 April 1979 \_on this day
February 28, 1979wednesday
Saudi troops decided to withdraw from the Arabic Strike Force. The Lebanese tried to dissuade them.
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The Saudis announced their departure in March 1979 (Ménargues). Picard has Syria's partners, among them Saudis, Sudanese and Emiratis, leaving two years after the 1976 summits; de Clerck and Malsagne call the ADF wholly Syrian from 1979.
September 7, 1979friday
Three commandos hijacked an Alitalia airplane. Their objective was to denounce Kadhafi in front of the international opinion. 141 passengers out of 175 were released at the airport of Rome. The air pirates surrendered to the Iranians the next day.
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September 8, 1979saturday
Dalida fascinated her fans at the Piccadilly. September 11
A confrontation between the Phalangists and the Tachnag (Armenian militia) caused 24 dead, 30 wounded and 40 hostages in Nabaa and Bourj Hammoud.
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Dalida also sang at the new Summerland hotel in Jnah in September 1979 (de Clerck and Malsagne). The Kataeb-Tashnag clashes of 11 September belong to a series: Hanf records hostilities in May and September 1979, settled amicably; de Clerck and Malsagne date fighting to November; Traboulsi says that in 1978-1979 the Phalange and Chamoun's Tigers gradually subdued the Armenian militias, which would not pay them taxes.
September 12, 1979wednesday
The notables of Zghorta and Becharreh reconciled under the aegis of Patriarch Khoreiche. In a common declaration, the notables requested the deployment of the army in their region.
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September 15, 1979saturday
Several hundreds of women gathered at the Arts and Crafts garden and head towards the office of the Prime Minister. Most of them were originally from the South and they were claiming peace.
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September 20, 1979thursday
September 22, 1979saturday
President Elias Sarkis delivered an important speech, in which he emphasized the overriding role the army should play. Without it 'the State will be a body with no soul', he said. He insisted that the Arabs should stop to shilly-shally about Southern Lebanon.
\_this day in full the books also date it 13 March 1979 \_on this day
September 26, 1979wednesday
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