The murder of Pascal Sleiman inflames the Lebanese internal front

A Syrian gang of car thieves would be responsible for the kidnapping and death of the senior leader of the Lebanese Forces, a Maronite party. But the political force speaks of a “premeditated crime.” The Minister for the Displaced, Issam Charafeddine, stated that “thousands of armed Syrians roam the refugee camps, waiting for a coup against Damascus.” Nasrallah denies any Hezbollah involvement and speaks of “dangerous reactions.”

Beirut () – “Don't kill me, I have three children, don't point that gun at my head” were the last words of Pascal Sleiman, senior leader of the Lebanese Forces – a Lebanese political party of Maronite inspiration – for the Jbeil region and employed at a bank in Byblos, before disappearing on the night of April 7. The Syrian army found the remains of the man, apparently the victim of a gang of car thieves operating in the Jbeil (Byblos) region, in the Hawit area, on the other side of the border with Syria. It is known that this area is under the control of these gangs, who would have handed over the body to the army, which in turn deliberately delayed the announcement of the death while waiting for the matter to calm down and the spirits inflamed by the news of the disappearance. It should be added that, at the time of writing this article, his remains are still being held by the military to perform an autopsy.

The rapid and tragic epilogue of this tragedy was possible thanks to a combination of factors that benefited the security services of the Lebanese army: the geolocation of Sleiman's camera, a few kilometers from the place where the thieves had intercepted him while he was driving alone. Black Audi. Added to this is the collaboration of a Syrian army unit under the command of officer Kifah Melhem, the arrest of three of the kidnappers in Syria and the denunciation of a Lebanese mole and the same “smugglers” who, meanwhile, had understood the repercussions of his crime in Lebanon.

The four members of the gang, including its leader Bilal Mohammad Dello (Syrian), are now in the hands of the Lebanese army. According to well-informed sources reported by the newspaper Al Akhbar (close to Hezbollah), the kidnappers did not know who they were dealing with and acted only because the man was driving alone in the car they intended to steal. According to the first information that emerged from the interrogations of the detained kidnappers, the man had tried to resist the attackers and was hit several times on the head with the butt of a rifle. The brutal blows caused internal bleeding that caused his death. They then loaded Pascal Sleiman's body into the trunk of his own vehicle and he headed towards northern Lebanon and then towards Syria via illegal routes.

The news of the death of the politician and father of three children was received with immense dignity by his wife Micheline, whose words were initially reported by the press: “We are children of the resurrection, children of hope.” However, what happened immediately acquired a strong political character because at first suspicions focused on Hezbollah, which is present in some Shiite villages in the region. Due to popular anger, the northern highway linking Beirut to the coastal city of Tripoli was closed in both directions throughout the day yesterday, while residents of Shiite villages, feeling threatened, hid in their homes.

After the first information released yesterday by the army, the tension seemed to have subsided, but the comments attributed to the main representative of the Lebanese Forces, Samir Geagea, have questioned its veracity and did not contribute to alleviating the climate. Although Geagea has asked his supporters to free the roads, he declared at the same time: “We believe this is a political crime, until proven otherwise.” One of his party members, former minister Pierre Bou Assi, was even more direct: “I don't trust the security services,” he said. This is a covert crime,” and he recalled the false claim of responsibility that followed the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri in 2005.

The Syrian presence

In any case, while awaiting the outcome of this matter and its consequences for the immediate future, the kidnapping of Pascal Sleiman has once again raised the old question of the Syrian presence in Lebanon, estimated by some at more than two million people. Interviewed today by the television channel Al-Jadid (NTV), Minister for the Displaced, Issam Charafeddine, harshly criticized the fact that this issue has been neglected for many months for political reasons. Charafeddine believes that the plan to repatriate Syrian citizens, many of whom are crammed into camps made of tents or folding materials, has been deliberately kept on hold, and the ruling class has also failed to work decisively on finding a solution. .

In his opinion, in Lebanon there are “several thousand men who belong to sleeper cells, ready to act against the Syrian regime”, at the behest of some foreign powers whose names, however, he did not want to reveal. Charafeddine then asked that Pascal Sleiman's murderers “be executed in the same place where they committed his crime. It is useless – he stated – that their files are presented before a magistrate and that the trial lasts one or two years.” Finally, the Secretary General of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, denied any involvement of the Shiite movement in the kidnapping and told Lebanese Forces and al Kataeb: “What they are doing is extremely dangerous and could lead to a civil war.”

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