Lebanese president Gemayel’s killer convicted, 35 years later
beirut — A Lebanese supporter of the Syrian regime was convicted in absentia on Friday over a 1982 bombing that killed 23 people including Lebanese president-elect Bashir Gemayel.
Seen as a hero by many Lebanese Christians but hated by many in Lebanon for his cooperation with Israel, Gemayel died in a massive September 14, 1982 blast at the headquarters of his Christian Phalange Party in the Ashrafiyeh neighbourhood.
Habib Al Shartouni, a member of the Damascus-backed Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP), was found guilty of planting the bomb.
The Court of Justice sentenced him to death for “premeditated murder”, an AFP correspondent at the courthouse said.
His alleged co-conspirator, SSNP security official Nabil Faraj Al Alam, was also sentenced to death on the same charge, but according to Lebanese media he is believed to have already died in 2014 in Brazil.
Shartouni was arrested in 1983 but was mysteriously released from prison in October 1990 during a Syrian-led offensive that ousted former prime minister Michel Aoun.
Gemayel, a warlord adored by many in his community, was killed just 20 days after his election as president in the weeks following Israel’s invasion of Lebanon.
Many see him as a traitor for his cooperation with Israel, with which Lebanon is still technically at war.
Gemayel’s widow Solange and other supporters gathered outside the court following the verdict and chanted “Bashir lives in us”.
SSNP supporters also gathered nearby to condemn the verdict, calling Shartouni a “hero” and brandishing photos of Gemayel with Ariel Sharon, Israel’s defence minister at the time.
A year before the bombing, Bashir’s four-year-old daughter Maya was killed in a car bombing targeting her father. —