LCCC ENGLISH DAILY NEWS BULLETIN
February 15/08

Bible Reading of the day.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 7,7-12. Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
Which one of you would hand his son a stone when he asks for a loaf of bread, or a snake when he asks for a fish? If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him. Do to others whatever you would have them do to you. This is the law and the prophets.

Free Opinions, Releases, letters & Special Reports
Mughniyah's strike: A Benchmark in the Counter Terror War .By: Dr. Walid Phares. 14/02/08
Mughniyeh - like Hizbullah - was a product of outside aggression-The Daily Star. 14/02/08
Hariri's murder is not a battering ram-By Michael Young. 14/02/08

Latest News Reports From Miscellaneous Sources for February 14/08
Lebanon Marks Hariri Killing as Hizbullah Holds Funeral for Mughniyeh-Naharnet
Lebanese mourn Hezbollah militant and Hariri-AP
Israel Tightens Security after Mughniyeh Killing
Lebanon: Mughniyeh Funeral, Hariri Rally-The Associated Press
US Increases Sanctions On Syria Over Terrorists-Washington Post
Hezbollah terror thug behind '83 Lebanon bombing killed by car bomb-New York Daily News
Hizballah Mourns Its Shadowy Hero-TIME
Clancy: Little as it seems with terror mastermind-CNN
End of a Hezbollah militant-Los Angeles Times
Lebanese Christians Still Hoping, Says Priest-Zenit News Agency
Major Lebanon Events since Hariri Assassination-Naharnet
Iran FM to Take Part in Mughniyeh's Funeral-Naharnet
Mughniyeh's Murder Toughest Blow for Hizbullah-Naharnet
Iraq's Sadrists Declare 3-Day Mourning for Mughniyeh-Naharnet
Egyptian Steward: Mughniyeh Was Hijacker of 2 Kuwaiti Airliners
-Naharnet

U.S.: Better World Without Mughniyeh-Nahaernet
Bush expands US sanctions on Syria officials-Reuters
Analysis: The Second Lebanon War is not over yet-Jerusalem Post
Syria / Under their noses-Ha'aretz
Saniora: Electing a President is Our Top Priority--ahaernet
Bank Looter Arrested-Nahaernet
Iran Accuses Israel of Killing Mughniyeh
-Nahaernet

Hariri joins local chorus of condemnation-Daily Star
Imad Mughniyeh assassinated in Damascus-Daily Star
Slain Mugniyeh's townsmen remember 'legend' with pride-Daily Star
Suleiman promises military will prevent outbreak of civil war-Daily Star
Two-thirds of Israelis still believe summer war of 2006 was justified - survey-Daily Star
Lebanon and Syria can't fight fate without both sides losing-Daily Star
Jumblatt comes out swinging against Hizbullah again-Daily Star
Light at the end of the tunnel for slum dwellers-By IRIN News.org
Gemayel appointed president of Phalange Party-Daily Star
Police arrest bank robber in Amsheet-Daily Star
Issam Fares Institute program tackles needs of Palestinian refugees, hosts-Daily Star
Researchers say 2006 war left many children in targeted areas with emotional scars
-Daily Star

U.S. welcomes death of Hezbollah militant-AP
Mughniyeh Killing Denounced, Israel, Syria Charged-Naharnet
Iran Accuses Israel of Killing Mughniyeh-Naharnet
Hariri Denounces Mughniyeh's Assassination
-Naharnet
Yakan Urges Hizbullah to 'Deal Painful Blow' to Israel
-Naharnet

Senior Hezbollah militant killed AP
Attacks blamed on Mughniyeh AP
Top Hezbollah Commander Killed in Syria. Washington Post
Bomb kills top Hezbollah leader -BBC
Hezbollah's most secretive operative 
-BBC

Lebanon: Mughniyeh funeral, Hariri rally
By SAM F. GHATTAS, Associated Press Writer
BEIRUT, Lebanon - Throngs of Lebanese came out Thursday for two opposing gatherings: Hezbollah backers for the funeral of a slain militant suspected in hundreds of American deaths, and their pro-Western opponents to mark the assassination of an anti-Syrian former prime minister.
It was a showcase of Lebanon's divided soul, and it raised fears of violence between the two sides, prompting authorities to deploy thousands of troops and block major roads.
Hezbollah urged crowds to south Beirut to march behind the coffin of Imad Mughniyeh, the group's former security chief who was killed in a car bombing in Syria on Tuesday night. The funeral was expected to fully be underway in the early afternoon as the downtown Beirut rally marking the third anniversary of former premier Rafik Hariri's killing wound down.
Mughniyeh was a long-sought fugitive suspected in a series of attacks against the U.S. and Israel, including the bombings of the U.S. Marines barracks and two embassy compounds in Beirut in 1983-84 that killed about 260 Americans. He was also the suspected mastermind behind the kidnappings of Americans and other Westerners in Beirut in the 1980s, including former Associated Press correspondent Terry Anderson.
"Let us make our voice heard by all the enemies and murderers that we will be victorious, no matter the sacrifices," said a Hezbollah statement aired on the militant group's Al-Manar TV.
Hezbollah and its top ally, Iran, have accused Israel of Mughniyeh's slaying. Israel denied any involvement, but officials made no effort to conceal their approval of his death. The United States welcomed it.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah — himself in hiding because of fears of assassination since the 2006 summer war with Israel — was expected to address mourners through a video broadcast over a giant screen.
Mughniyeh's death from a bomb that blew up his SUV in Damascus could raise tensions between Israel and Hezbollah, as well as with the militants' allies, Syria and Iran. Some Lebanese figures close to the Shiite group called Wednesday for attacks against Israel.
In Israel, officials instructed embassies and Jewish institutions around the world to go on alert Thursday for fear of revenge attacks, and the army raised its awareness on its border with Lebanon and in the Palestinian territories.
Mughniyeh's slaying also could stir up more domestic turmoil in deeply divided Lebanon, where the Hezbollah-led opposition is locked in a bitter power struggle with the Western-backed government.
By midmorning, thousands poured into Beirut's main Martyrs' Square for the third anniversary of Hariri's assassination, braving the rain and the cold, waving Lebanese flags and carrying pictures of the slain leader.
Crowds paid respects at Hariri's gravesite next to the downtown square as his brother, Shafik, unveiled a statue of him at the spot where he was killed, a few hundred yards away on a seaside boulevard.
A flame was lit and a taped message broadcast from Hariri's widow, Nazek, who lives in Paris, urging against "falling into hatred" and calling on "unity to save the country."
The anti-Syrian parliamentary majority had hoped a massive show of popular support, perhaps by hundreds of thousands, on the Hariri anniversary would force the Hezbollah-led opposition to compromise in a 15-month political stalemate that has paralyzed the country.
The anniversary rally also meant to send a message to Syria to stay out of Lebanese politics. Billboards on major highways called for supporters to attend: "Come down, so they don't come back."
Hariri's supporters blame Syria for killing the prominent politician in a massive suicide truck bombing in Beirut three years ago and for a series of bombings and assassinations since. Hariri's assassination ignited mass protests and international pressure that forced Syria to withdraw its army from Lebanon after 29 years of control.
But statements from government coalition leaders offering condolences in the wake of Mughniyeh's killing indicated that majority leaders were toning down their sharp rhetoric, dominant in recent days, so as not to further inflame tensions with the opposition.
Authorities deployed some 8,000 troops and policemen to protect the Hariri rally and leading roads. Armored carriers took up positions on major intersections, and additional razor wire was brought in to separate the two sides on rain-drenched streets.
The U.S. Embassy encouraged American citizens in Lebanon to limit all but essential travel Thursday. Across Beirut, businesses and shops put off popular Valentine's Day celebrations for later in the week.
Mughniyeh's body was brought to south Beirut from Syria on Wednesday and laid in a refrigerated coffin, wrapped in Hezbollah's yellow flag.
His father — Fayez, a south Lebanese farmer — as well as Hezbollah's deputy leader, Sheik Naim Kassem, and other Hezbollah officials received condolences inside a hall from allied Lebanese politicians and representatives of militant Palestinian factions.
Mughniyeh was also on the FBI's list of most wanted terrorists, and the State Department had offered a $5 million reward for information leading to his arrest or conviction.
Besides his suspected role in the Marine barrack and embassy compound attacks, he was indicted in the U.S. for his role in planning the 1985 hijacking of a TWA airliner in which a U.S. Navy diver was killed.
A string of kidnappings he was believed to have directed included taking captive the AP's chief Mideast correspondent, Anderson, who was held for more than six years until his release in 1991, and CIA station chief William Buckley, who was tortured by his captors and killed in 1985.
Israel accused Mughniyeh of involvement in the 1992 and 1994 bombings of the Israeli embassy and a Jewish center in Buenos Aires, attacks that killed more than 100 people.
He vanished in the early 1990s, reportedly undergoing plastic surgery and moving between Lebanon, Syria and Iran on fake passports.
**Associated Press Writer Steve Weizman contributed to this report from Jerusalem.

Mughniyah's strike: A Benchmark in the Counter Terror War
By: Dr. Walid Phares
13 Feb 2008
http://www.analyst-network.com/article.php?art_id=1713
The killing of Imad Mughniye in Damascus, what ever is the context and whom ever are the executors, is a benchmark in the war between the Iranian Terror networks and their enemies. Mughniye has led the Iranian and Hezbollah operations against US personnel since 1983 and was the top planner in the Hezbollah-Israel war. He was seen as the principal link between the Pasdaran (Iranian Revolutionary Guard) power and its supported organizations around the world including Hezbollah in Lebanon and overseas. But as important, was his role in coordinating the Iranian Terror activities with Syria's intelligence services.
His elimination has mostly a symbolical effect on the secret war between Western intelligence and the axis' secret apparatus. In intelligence lingo, he was the top Terror operations general, not only central to Lebanon's activities but also to training Hezbollah's "international" action, including Iraq, Gaza and the West.
The impact of such an event is seen clearly in the statements made by the leadership of Hezbollah and the potential actions the group may take.
Late last night, senior Hezbollah leader Imad Mugniyah was killed by a car bomb in Damascus. Commonly referred to as a “master terrorist,” Mugniyah was has been implicated some of the most significant terrorist attacks in recent history, including the bombing of the Israeli embassy (1992) and Jewish community center (1994) in Buenos Aires, the 1985 hijacking of the of a TWA passenger jet, the 1996 Khobar Tower bombings in Saudi Arabia (1993), and the 1983 marine barracks bombing in Lebanon, which claimed the lives of 241 American servicemen. The list goes on. Mugniyah is also reported to have met with members of al-Qaeda’s senior leadership, including Osama bin Laden, and is believed to have played a role in the terrorist group’s technical development.
Hezbollah has been quick to place blame on Israel. In a statement broadcasted on al-Manar, Hezbollah’s television network, the Shi’a terrorist group declared, “The brother commander hajj Imad Mughinyah became a martyr at the hands of the Zionist Israelis.” It would not be the first time that Israel has attempted to assassinate the terrorist leader. In 1994, Mossad made an attempt on his life with a car bomb in Beuirut. However, Mugniyah failed to show at the destination, though his brother Faud was killed. For its part, Israel is denying any involvement. According to a statement from the Prime Minister’s office, “Israel rejects the attempt by terror groups to attribute to it any involvement in this incident.”
Israel’s denial aside, Hezbollah has already stated that it will use Mugniyah’s death as a justification for a wave of attacks against Israel. Hezbollah’s leadership plans to meet in Beirut where, according to Hezbollah lawmaker Ismail Sukeyir, they will discuss a response: “Hezbollah has the right to retaliate anywhere in the world and in any way it sees fit.”
Mugniyah’s death will be a significant blow to Hezbollah’s international operations. Analysts believe that Mugniyah was responsible for overseeing the terrorist group’s international operations, including its groups across the globe. Moreover, one of my sources in Lebanon said yesterday that he believed Mugniyah was overseeing the development of chemical and biological weapons for Hezbollah. Thus, the loss of such a central figure will surely be a blow. As an indication of Mugniyah’s prominence, the ransom for his arrest was higher than Hezbollah secretary-general Sayyid Nasrallah.
**Dr Walid Phares is Director of the Future Terrorism Project at the Foundation for teh defense of Democracies.

US welcomes death of Hezbollah militant
Wed Feb 13, 11:48 AM ET
WASHINGTON - The State Department said on Wednesday it welcomes the reported death of the suspected mastermind of attacks on the U.S. Embassy and U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon in the 1980s.
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that the United States has no independent information on the reports that Imad Mughniyeh was killed in a car bombing in Syria Tuesday.
"The world is a better place without this man in it," McCormack said. "One way or the other he was brought to justice."
The United States blames Mughniyeh for numerous terrorist attacks that killed hundreds of Americans.
He is on an FBI wanted list with a $5 million bounty on his head.
The Islamic militant group Hezbollah and its Iranian backers on Wednesday blamed Israel for the killing of Mughniyeh, Hezbollah's security chief in the 1980s who was one of the world's most wanted and elusive terrorists. Israel denied involvement.
Mughniyeh was Hezbollah security chief during a turbulent period in Lebanon's civil war. He has been accused of masterminding the April 1983 car bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut that killed 63 people, including 17 Americans, and the simultaneous truck bombings of the U.S. Marine barracks and French military base in Beirut, killing 58 French soldiers and 241 Marines.
He was indicted in the United States for the 1985 TWA hijacking in which Shiite militants seized the 747 and flew it back and forth between Beirut and Algiers demanding the release of Lebanese Shiites captured by Israel. During the hijacking, the body of U.S. Navy diver Robert Stethem, a passenger on the plane, was dumped on the tarmac of Beirut airport.
During Lebanon's civil war, Mughniyeh was also believed to have directed a string of kidnappings of Americans and other foreigners, including former Associated Press chief Mideast correspondent Terry Anderson — who was held for six years until his release in 1991 — and CIA station chief William Buckley, who was killed in 1985.

Top Hezbollah Commander Killed in Syria

U.S. Target Accused of Masterminding Suicide Bombings, Hijackings
Wednesday, February 13, 2008; 11:01 AM
BEIRUT, Feb. 13 -- Imad Mughniyeh, a senior but shadowy Hezbollah commander accused by the United States and Israel of masterminding suicide bombings, hijackings and hostage-takings that spanned 25 years, was killed by a car bomb in the Syrian capital of Damascus, the Shiite Muslim group and other officials said Wednesday. Hezbollah accused Israel of carrying out the attack on Mughniyeh, a charge that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office denied. In the past, Israeli officials have rarely confirmed or denied their involvement in assassinations abroad.
A State Department spokesman welcomed the news of Mughniyeh's death, but said he did not know who was responsible for it.
"The world is a better place without this man in it. He was a cold-blooded killer, a mass murderer and a terrorist responsible for countless innocent lives lost," said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack. "One way or another, he was brought to justice."
The elusiveness of Mughniyeh, long a target of U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies , rivaled only that of Osama bin Laden and stretched over many more years. Until Sept. 11, 2001, the attacks for which the United States blamed him represented some of the deadliest strikes against Americans, at home or abroad. Along with bin Laden, he was included on the list of 22 "most wanted terrorists" released by President Bush a month after the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Although Hezbollah has always denied a role, the United States accused him of orchestrating two bombings of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut -- in 1983 and 1984 -- killing 72 people. Among the victims was Robert Ames, then the CIA's top Middle East expert. Even more devastating were the suicide truck bombings organized against U.S. Marines and French paratroopers in Beirut in October 1983. Together, those attacks killed 300 people.
Israel accused Mughniyeh, 45, of masterminding the 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Buenos Aires that killed 87 people and of a role in a 1992 bombing of the Israeli Embassy in the Argentine capital that killed 28. He was wanted by the authorities there.
"With pride and honor, we announce the martyrdom of a great resistance leader who joined the procession of martyrs in the Islamic resistance," said a statement read on al-Manar, Hezbollah's television station, and published on its Web site. "The martyr, may his soul rest in peace, has been a target of the Zionists for more than 20 years."
Hezbollah planned a show of strength on Thursday in its stronghold in the capital's southern suburbs to mark the death of Mughniyeh, whose nom de guerre was Hajj Radwan. Al-Manar interrupted programming to mark his death with Koranic recitation and called on supporters to begin paying condolences in the neighborhood Wednesday. By afternoon, al-Manar broadcast footage of a line of men in civilian clothes or the turbans and robes of the clergy paying their respects.
"Let us make our voice heard by all the enemies and murderers that we will make victory, no matter the sacrifices," the group said in a statement.
Syria had no comment. Its authoritarian government prides itself on the internal security it maintains, in Damascus, the tightly controlled seat of government.
In Iran, a key source of Hezbollah's support, a Foreign Ministry spokesman also accused Israel of involvement.
Bruce O. Riedel, a former CIA Middle East analyst and now at the Brookings Institution's Saban Center, said the fact that Mughniyeh was killed by a car bomb in downtown Damascus limits the possibilities.
The Israelis "have done it before in downtown Damascus," said Riedel. "He was also very much on their radar screen."
Riedel said Hezbollah will almost certainly seek to retaliate for Mughniyeh's death, giving whoever was behind it incentive to deny involvement.
"Some kind of retaliation is almost certain and for killing Mughniyeh, one of Hezbollah's founding architects, will be very serious," he said.
Al-Alam, the Iranian-owned Arabic-language television station, broadcast grainy footage of the car bombing scene from the upscale neighborhood of Kafar Sousah in Damascus, near an Iranian school, police station and an office for Syrian intelligence. It showed an ambulance and people milling around the site, although the targeted car was not visible. News agencies reported that the vehicle was a new model Mitsubishi Pajero.
Mughniyeh's elusiveness over the years had given him a ghost-like aura. His whereabouts were always the matter of speculation -- in the southern Lebanese village of Teir Dibba, where he was born to peasant parents, or somewhere in Iran, whose government had reputedly issued him a diplomatic passport. Few pictures of him existed, and he was said to have undergone plastic surgery more than once to conceal his identity.
After announcing his death, al-Manar broadcast what appeared to be a recent picture of Mughniyeh. It showed a burly man with glasses dressed in green military camouflage and a green baseball hat. He wore a full beard, streaked with gray.
Mughniyeh's name first emerged after the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon, then mired in civil war. He was reputed to be the commander of Islamic Jihad, a pro-Iranian group widely believed to be linked to Hezbollah, which had yet to officially emerge.
He was blamed for kidnapping many of the more than 50 Americans, Frenchmen, Britons, Germans and other foreigners held during the civil war's grimmest days. One of the most prominent hostages was William Buckley, the CIA station chief in Beirut, who was seized in March 1984. He was tortured by his Lebanese and Iranian interrogators and died in captivity, apparently from lack of medical attention.
Mughniyeh was indicted for his role in the hijacking of a TWA flight from Athens to Rome in 1985. The hijackers killed a U.S. Navy diver after taking the plane to Beirut. The United States had offered a $25 million reward for his capture or conviction.
His name emerged again in 2006, when he was said to have played a role in organizing Hezbollah's defenses during the war with Israel that year.
"This is a loss of a major pillar in resistance work. He was an expert at making victories and building fighting capacities against Israel," said Ali Hassan Khalil, a member of parliament with Amal, another Shiite Muslim group allied with Hezbollah. "He played an essential role in all resistance activities, especially the last war."
Over the years, both Israeli and American agencies had relentlessly pursued Mughniyeh. In 1994, Mughniyeh's brother was killed by a car bomb in Beirut, and reports at the time suggested Imad Mughniyeh had been the target.
A year later, FBI officials traveled to Saudi Arabia to take custody of him during a stopover of a Middle East Airlines flight from Khartoum, Sudan, to Beirut. Before they could, Saudi officials decided not to cooperate and refused to allow the plane to land, angering U.S. officials.
Washington Post staff writer Robin Wright in Washington and correspondent Samuel Sockol in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

Hezbollah's most secretive operative
By Kathryn Westcott
BBC News
Imad Fayez Mughniyeh was a secretive figure, who for decades managed to elude attempts by US spies and special forces to capture or kill him.
Mughniyeh reputedly planned the hijacking of a TWA plane in 1985
He was wanted by the United States and Interpol in connection with bloody attacks around the world.
Some US officials dubbed him the "faceless terrorist", because few outside his closest circle knew for sure what he looked like.
The FBI's picture of him on its most wanted list was 20 years out of date, and he is believed to have undergone plastic surgery to dramatically alter his appearance since then. Mughniyeh has been in hiding since the end of the 1980s. Until Osama Bin Laden appeared on the radar of US intelligence, he was one of the world's most hunted men. Before the 11 September attacks on the US, he was alleged to have been involved in the killings of more Americans than anyone else in the world.
Western attacks
In 1983, America was given a wake-up call to suicide terror on a massive scale. Mughniyeh was said to have been the mastermind of that attack - the bombing of the US marine barracks in Lebanon, which killed 241 people.
He had one foot in Hezbollah and one foot in elements of the Iranian intelligence
He was also the prime suspect in two bombings of America's embassy in the Lebanese capital and is believed to have been behind a wave of Western hostage-taking in Lebanon in the 1980s.
In 1985, Mughniyeh was identified as the man behind the brutal hijacking of a jet bound for Rome. Over 17 days, TWA pilot John Testrake was forced to criss-cross the Mediterranean with his 153 passengers and crew, from Beirut to Algiers and back again.
The plane finally came to rest in Beirut. The hijackers threatened to kill the passengers unless hundreds of Lebanese were released from Israeli prisons.
A US navy diver was summarily executed on the plane and thrown onto the tarmac.
Mughniyeh is also suspected of having a hand in the bombing of the Israeli embassy in Argentina in 1992, in which 29 people were killed.
Not much is known about his early years, other than that he was born to a prominent Shia religious family in southern Lebanon in 1962. The family then moved to the southern suburbs of Beirut.
According to some reports, he worked with Yasser Arafat's PLO - which set up in Lebanon in the early 1980s - before co-founding Islamic Jihad, a group closely connected with Hezbollah.
He went on to become one of Hezbollah's top leaders.
US intelligence officials have described Mughniyeh as one of the most intelligent and capable operatives they have ever come across.
'Secretive'
Robert Baer, who apparently hunted Mughniyeh for years as a CIA officer, once said that Mughniyeh rarely showed himself outside his inner circle. He said he was believed to hide out in both Lebanon and Iran.
"Mughniyeh is probably the most intelligent, most capable operative we've ever run across," Mr Baer told a CBS's 60 Minutes programme a few years ago.
"He enters by one door, exits by another, changes his cars daily, never makes appointments on a telephone, never is predictable... He only uses people that are related to him that he can trust. He is the master terrorist, the grail we are after since 1983."

Mughniyeh represented the secret dimension of Hezbollah

According to Dr Magnus Ranstorp, a specialist in Hezbollah and a terrorism expert at the Swedish National Defence College in Stockholm, as Hezbollah began to emerge as a major political party, Mughniyeh "disappeared into the shadows".
"He was someone who was only brought out for special missions," Dr Ranstorp told the BBC News website.
"He always kept a low profile. He had one foot in Hezbollah and one foot in elements of the Iranian intelligence."
Dr Ranstorp said that from the late-1990s, Mughniyeh had played a key role in creating a link between Hezbollah and the Palestinian militant Islamist organisation Hamas.
He said that his death would be a blow to Lebanon's powerful military organisation of Shia Muslims.
"When US senators latterly talked about Hezbollah's 'A-team', it was Mughniyeh and his closest associates that they were talking about," he said.
Mr Ranstorp, who has interviewed members of Hezbollah many times, said he was very much the secret dimension - or the dark side - of Hezbollah and that it was an unwritten rule never to talk about him.
"Just mentioning his name was considered dangerous," he said.
In Beirut's southern suburbs, Mughniyeh will be remembered by many as a hero.
Senior cleric Sheikh Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah said after hearing of his death that "the resistance has lost one of its pillars".

Attacks blamed on Mughniyeh By The Associated Press

Wed Feb 13, 11:39 AM ET
Major attacks linked to Imad Mughniyeh, who was killed in a Damascus car bomb blast, according to Hezbollah.
• April 1983: suicide bomber rams van packed with explosives into the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, killing 63 people, including 17 Americans.
• October 1983: suicide attackers carry out near simultaneous truck bombings against barracks of French and U.S. peacekeeping forces in Beirut, killing 241 American Marines and 58 French paratroopers.
• March 1984: Lt. Col. William F. Buckley, CIA station chief in Beirut, kidnapped and eventually killed in the beginning of a spate of kidnappings linked to Hezbollah.
• March 1985: Associated Press chief Mideast correspondent Terry Anderson kidnapped and then held for more than six years.
• June 1985: Lebanese Shiite militants hijack TWA Flight 847 heading from Athens to Rome, flying it back and forth between Beirut and Algiers. At Beirut's airport, the hijackers shoot U.S. Navy diver Robert Stetham, a passenger on the plane, and dump his body on the runway. Most of the 150 passengers were freed during the three day hijacking; some were held for two weeks. The United States indicted Mughniyeh for his role in the hijacking, and he was put on FBI's most wanted list with a $5 million bounty for information leading to his capture.
• March 1992: A pickup truck packed with explosives smashes into the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina, killing 29 people.
• July 1994: A van packed with explosives levels a seven-story Jewish center in Buenos Aires, killing 85 people. Argentina issues an arrest warrant for Mughniyeh in 1999.

Yakan Urges Hizbullah to 'Deal Painful Blow' to Israel
Islamic Scholar Fathi Yakan on Wednesday condemned the assassination of top Hizbullah official Imad Mughniyeh and called on the Shiite group to "deal a painful blow to Israel.""We consider the martyrdom of Hajj Radwan (Mughniyeh's nom de guerre) a big loss," Yakan said in a statement distributed by the state-run National News Agency. "This martyrdom will give the mujahideen strength to continue on their path of Jihad (or holy war)," he said.
"We call on the Islamic resistance (Hizbullah) to avenge this operation and deal a painful blow to the Zionist Entity," Yakan added.
Beirut, 13 Feb 08, 14:10

Imad Mughniyeh assassinated in Damascus
Hizbullah to host funeral for 'martyr' killed by car bomb

By Hussein Abdallah
Daily Star staff
Thursday, February 14, 2008
BEIRUT: Imad Mughniyeh, reputed to be one of Hizbullah's top security officials and high on America's list of wanted "terrorists," was killed by a car bomb in Damascus, the party announced on Wednesday. Syria's interior minister, Brigadier General Bassam Abdul-Majid, confirmed the news in a statement carried by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA). The agency quoted Abdul-Majid as saying that an investigation into the blast was under way.
"The investigation over the car bomb in the residential Kfar Sousse neighborhood last night has established that it targeted Lebanese fighter Imad Mughniyeh," SANA said, quoting Abdul-Majid as condemning the "cowardly and terrorist act."
Tuesday night's attack took place in an up-market district that houses an Iranian school, a police station and a Syrian intelligence office.
Witnesses at the scene in Damascus told Reuters they saw security officers hauling the body away. Scores of police and intelligence officers rushed to the site. A police truck towed away the wrecked car, a late- model Mitsubishi Pajero.
Hizbullah accused Israel of assassinating Mughniyeh, who was reportedly head of the group's security network during the 1975-90 Civil War, by planting a bomb in his car.
Israel denied any involvement in the killing, seen as a major setback for Hizbullah, but officials expressed satisfaction at his death.
Mughniyeh, whose age was estimated 45, had long been on a list of foreigners Israel wanted to kill or apprehend and the United States had offered a $5 million reward for his capture.
Mughniyeh was widely accused of involvement in the 1983 bombings of the US Embassy and US Marine and French paratrooper barracks in Beirut, which killed more than 350 people, as well as the 1992 bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, the kidnapping of Westerners in Lebanon during the 1980s, and a series of other high-profile operations.
Interpol recently put out an international warrant for him for his alleged role in the Buenos Aires attack
The United States indicted him for his role in planning and participating in the June 14, 1985, hijacking of an American commercial airliner and the killing of US Navy diver who was aboard the flight.
After announcing the assassination, Hizbullah urged its supporters and those of other parties in the opposition March 8 Forces coalition to attend a funeral for Mughniyeh in the southern Beirut suburb of on Thursday afternoon.
The funeral comes on the same day as a mass rally called by the ruling March 14 camp in Downtown Beirut to mark the third anniversary of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri's assassination. The timing prompted concerns that conflict could break out between large numbers of opposition and government supporters using the same road to travel to the capital from the Bekaa Valley, as well as from the Chouf Mountains and points south.
"After a life full of jihad, sacrifices and accomplishments ... Hajj Imad Mughniyeh ... died a martyr at the hands of the Israeli Zionists," Hizbullah said. "The martyr had been a target for Zionists for 20 years."
Hizbullah pledged "to continue Mughniyeh's jihadist path until achieving complete victory ."
"He was not only being targeted by Israel, but also by the Americans and many other parties," Danny Yatom, ex-head of Israel's Mossad spy service, told Israel Radio. "He was one of the terrorists with the most amount of intelligence agencies and states chasing him."
Mughniyeh had been a very tough target to track, he added, describing his death as a severe blow to Hizbullah.
"He behaved with extreme caution for many years. It was impossible even to obtain his picture. He never appeared or spoke to the media," Yatom said. "His identity was hidden. His steps were hidden. He behaved with extreme caution, and that was the reason it was difficult to get to him for so many years."
Despite the favorable impression conveyed by Yatom and current Israeli officials, the Jewish state denied any role in Wednesday's assassination.
"Israel rejects the attempts of terror elements to attribute to Israel any involvement," Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office said in a curt statement.
Mughniyeh was reputed by some Western intelligence services to have led Islamic Jihad, a pro-Iranian group which emerged in Lebanon in the early 1980s and some of whose members later joined Hizbullah. Islamic Jihad kidnapped several Westerners, including Americans, in Beirut in the mid 1980s. The group killed some of its captives and exchanged others for US weapons to Iran in what was later known as the Iran-Contra scandal. Among those killed was the CIA's station chief.
Mughniyeh's brother was killed in a car bomb in Beirut in 1994. Reports at the time suggested Imad had been the target. - With agencies

Iran Accuses Israel of Killing Mughniyeh

Iran accused Israel on Wednesday of assassinating a top commander of the Lebanese Shiite militia Hizbullah, the state IRNA news agency said.
Foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini "strongly condemned the terrorist operation which led to the martyrdom of Imad Mughniyeh", describing it as "a clear example of the organized terrorism of the Zionist regime.""The record of Mughniyeh, who had spent a lifetime fighting against usurping occupiers, is a golden page in the history of people's fights against Zionist aggressors," Hosseini said.The office of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert denied that Israel had any involvement in Mughniyeh's assassination in a car bombing in Damascus late on Tuesday. Beirut, 13 Feb 08, 18:20

Slain Mugniyeh's townsmen remember 'legend' with pride
By Mohammed Zaatari
Daily Star staff
Thursday, February 14, 2008
TAIR DEBBA: Anger swept the hometown of top Hizbullah military commander Imad Mughniyeh, who was killed in a car bombing in Syria blamed on Israel, as residents of Tair Debba, 90 kilometers south of Beirut, mourned their elusive "legend" on Wednesday.
A coffin holding Mughniyeh's body was placed on a podium in Hizbullah's stronghold in Beirut's southern suburbs, where the group planned a memorial service for the "martyr" on Thursday.It was not clear, however, where Mughniyeh, who was killed on Tuesday in Damascus, would be buried.
"He was a legend. We always heard of his victories against Israel although we never knew him personally," said Ahmad, a 22-year-old man, as he climbed an electricity pole to put up a black flag. "Today each one of us has become an Imad Mughniyeh" against Israel, he said.
WASHINGTON - The State Department said on Wednesday it welcomes the reported death of the suspected mastermind of attacks on the U.S. Embassy and U.S. Marine barracks in Lebanon in the 1980s.
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said that the United States has no independent information on the reports that Imad Mughniyeh was killed in a car bombing in Syria Tuesday. "The world is a better place without this man in it," McCormack said. "One way or the other he was brought to justice."
The United States blames Mughniyeh for numerous terrorist attacks that killed hundreds of Americans.
He is on an FBI wanted list with a $5 million bounty on his head. The Islamic militant group Hezbollah and its Iranian backers on Wednesday blamed Israel for the killing of Mughniyeh, Hezbollah's security chief in the 1980s who was one of the world's most wanted and elusive terrorists. Israel denied involvement.
Mughniyeh was Hezbollah security chief during a turbulent period in Lebanon's civil war. He has been accused of masterminding the April 1983 car bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Beirut that killed 63 people, including 17 Americans, and the simultaneous truck bombings of the U.S. Marine barracks and French military base in Beirut, killing 58 French soldiers and 241 Marines. He was indicted in the United States for the 1985 TWA hijacking in which Shiite militants seized the 747 and flew it back and forth between Beirut and Algiers demanding the release of Lebanese Shiites captured by Israel. During the hijacking, the body of U.S. Navy diver Robert Stethem, a passenger on the plane, was dumped on the tarmac of Beirut airport. During Lebanon's civil war, Mughniyeh was also believed to have directed a string of kidnappings of Americans and other foreigners, including former Associated Press chief Mideast correspondent Terry Anderson — who was held for six years until his release in 1991 — and CIA station chief William Buckley, who was killed in 1985.
For over 20 years Mughniyeh eluded Western and Israeli intelligence services who considered him a top criminal responsible for a spate of bloody attacks from Beirut to Buenos Aires. "We were shocked to learn he was killed in Syria. We thought he was safe there," Mughniyeh's 51-year-old aunt Fayza told AFP as she stood outside the abandoned family home near the village cemetery.
"He left the village a long time ago, shuttling between Syria and Iran, and for years I did not see him. But two years ago he snuck in after his mother passed away to pay his respects," she said. According to several reports, Mughniyeh eluded his enemies by undergoing plastic surgery to alter his features.
"We heard that he underwent plastic surgery because the intelligence services of the whole world were after him," said Ahmad.
Not a single picture of Mughniyeh could be seen in Tair Debba, although the village was decked with portraits of his two brothers Fouad and Jihad, who were also killed in car bombings blamed on Israel. Black flags and the yellow banners of Hizbullah fluttered in the village, which resounded with verses of the Koran.
"We will not cry and we will teach our children ... even the youngest ones how to fight Israel and never surrender," said Ramzieh Nanouh, a resident of Tair Debba, as she was hanging banners in support of Hizbullah in the village square. "Imad will be a role model to our children and to all the younger generations," she told The Daily Star. A somber mood also took hold of the Ruweiss district of Beirut's southern suburbs, where Hizbullah leaders gathered under heavy security to receive condolences and pay tribute to Mughniyeh.
Hizbullah number two Naim Qassem and Mughniyeh's father shook hands with mourners in a building that housed a mosque and a cultural center, where banners praised Mughniyeh. The Shiite militant group has blamed Israel for Mughniyeh's assassination and described him as a "great resistance leader ... assassinated by 'Israeli' criminal hands."  "The martyr, may his soul rest in peace, had been a target for the Zionists for more than 20 years," and has joined the "divine legion of honor" of fighters who died confronting Israel, a statement said. - With AFP