It’s funny how anti-Syrian members of the Lebanese Parliament keep having accidents:
A powerful bomb killed a pro-government lawmaker and six others Wednesday in a Christian neighborhood of Beirut, threatening to derail Parliament’s already deeply divided effort to elect Lebanon’s next president in voting due to start in days.
Antoine Ghanem, a 64-year-old member of the right-wing Christian Phalange party, was the eighth anti-Syrian figure and fourth lawmaker from the majority assassinated since 2005, reducing the ruling coalition’s margin in Parliament…
The assassination of anti-Syrian figures began in 2005 with the death of [Rafik] Hariri, the former prime minister. Hariri’s death sparked massive protests that helped bring an end to Syria’s nearly 30-year domination of Lebanon. Damascus was forced to withdraw its troops from Lebanon in 2005, and a government led by anti-Syrian politicians was elected.
Government supporters have accused Syria of seeking to end Saniora’s slim majority in parliament by killing off lawmakers in his coalition. — Jerusalem Post [my emphasis]
Syria denies everything, of course. This sort of thing has been going on for a lot longer than the last few years. According to Barry Rubin in his book “The Truth About Syria“, Syria was responsible for the 1977 murder of Druze leader Kamal Jumblatt, as well as the 1982 bombing which killed President Bashir Jumayyil, torpedoed a peace treaty with Israel, and provoked the Christian Phalangists — who blamed the Palestinians — to massacre scores of them in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps.
If the UN were worth anything, it would force Syria to leave Lebanon alone. Instead, it has rewarded the murderous Assad regime with a seat on the Security Council.