Former Lebanese Communist Party (LCP) General Secretary George Haoui, described in an LCP press statement as “the founder of the Lebanese national resistance front and the basic leader of the national Lebanese movement,” was assassinated Tuesday morning.
Haoui was traveling through the Wata Musaitbi neighborhood of Beirut when a bomb planted in his car was detonated by remote control, according to press accounts of Lebanese security forces statements.
Haoui was killed instantly.
The LCP described the assassination as “terrible crime against the country and the nation...[that] reflects the fingerprints of the security regime and the death squad who fall under their sponsorship.” The LCP affirmed “its commitment to follow the party of the Martyred comrade” and called for swift punishment of those responsible.
The “security regime” reference is to the current ruling party in Lebanon that is closely aligned with the Syrian government.
The ruling party is currently headed by controversial President Emile Lahoud who is under pressure to resign. Lahoud denounced the murder and promised to investigate, asking the US for help from the FBI.
Syria denied involvement in the assassination and Syrian Information Minister Mahdi Dakhlallah said: “Syria is saddened by the fact that these Lebanese figures are the target of attacks and assassinations,” according to the Lebanon-based Daily Star newspaper.
In a letter to the current General Secretary of the Lebanese Communist Party Khaled Hdada, Abed Rabbo, a leading official in the Palestine Liberation Organization, described Haoui as a prominent communist, a Lebanese patriot and a pan-Arab leader.
“This cowardly political assassination comes at a time when the region and Lebanon in particular are witnessing a very grave and sophisticated political rebirth,” Abed Rabbo said.
“The series of assassinations against the Lebanese national and political symbols basically aims at undermining the ability of the Lebanese people and national movement to build an independent and sovereign Lebanon, and targets the democratic and secular movement” in Lebanon, he added.
Rabbo’s sentiments were echoed by other world and regional leaders. In a press statement yesterday, UN chief Kofi Annan “was appalled to learn of yet another assassination in Lebanon.” His spokesperson added: “The secretary general stands with the Lebanese today in their determination to shape a peaceful, independent and sovereign future.”
Other secular democratic forces in the pro-sovereignty coalition, which includes the LCP, expressed sorrow at Haoui’s death and blamed the ruling party. Elias Atallah, leader of the Democratic Left, a broad left political movement, had no doubt the bombing was the work of the “Syrian-Lebanese intelligence apparatus.”
Atallah called on “the UN to investigate this murder” and other assassinations committed in the past weeks.
The LCP, despite long-standing ties with Syria, has called for the restoration of Lebanese sovereignty and a “reappraisal” of its ties with Syria. This new view emerged in the last decade after Syria’s support for mostly anti-Communist fundamentalist sectarian movements and heavy-handed Syrian influence on the policies of the LCP caused it to lose hard-won credibility.
The LCP organized, along with Hezbollah, the armed resistance movement in the 1980s that eventually expelled Israel’s occupation army from Southern Lebanon in 2000.
The LCP has also condemned US interference in the Middle East. At a recent international meeting of communist parties, a representative of the LCP said, “the situation in the Middle is considerably worsened by impertinent advances of American imperialism in the region under the pretext of implementation the so-called ‘Greater Middle East’ project which represents nothing else but a new version of foreign interference in the domestic affairs of our countries.”
The LCP has called for greater cooperation among secular left parties in the region and plans an international conference to discuss regional issues.
--Reach Joel Wendland at jwendland@politicalaffairs.net.
