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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Lebanon
Index
The cease-fire signaled the start of a new stage in the war, as
Israel focused on PLO forces trapped in Beirut. Although Israel had
long adhered to the axiom that conquering and occupying an Arab
capital would be a political and military disaster, key Israeli
leaders were determined to drive the PLO out of Beirut. According
to the original plan, the Phalangists were to move into West Beirut
under the covering fire of Israeli artillery and reunite the
divided capital. Bashir Jumayyil concluded, however, that such
overt collusion with the IDF would prejudice his chances to become
president, and he reneged on the promises he had made.
Israel maintained the siege of Beirut for seventy days,
unleashing a relentless barrage of air, naval, and artillery
bombardment. At times, the Israeli bombardment appeared to be
random and indiscriminate; at other times, it was targeted with
pinpoint precision. Israeli strategists believed that if they could
"decapitate" the Palestinian movement by killing its leaders,
Palestinian resistance would disappear. Therefore, the Israeli Air
Force conducted what has been called a "manhunt by air" for Arafat
and his top lieutenants and on several occasions bombed premises
only minutes after the PLO leadership had vacated them.
If the PLO was hurt physically by the bombardment, the
political fallout was just as damaging to Israel. The appalling
civilian casualties earned Israel world opprobrium. Morale
plummeted among IDF officers and enlisted men, many of whom
personally opposed the war. Meanwhile, the highly publicized plight
of the Palestinian civilians garnered world attention for the
Palestinian cause. Furthermore, Arafat was negotiating, albeit
through intermediaries, with Ambassador Habib and other United
States officials. Negotiating with Arafat was thought by some to be
tantamount to United States recognition of the PLO.
Arafat had threatened to turn Beirut into a "second
Stalingrad," to fight the IDF to the last man. His negotiating
stance grew tenuous, however, after Lebanese leaders, who had
previously expressed solidarity with the PLO, petitioned him to
abandon Beirut to spare the civilian population further suffering.
Arafat informed Habib of his agreement in principle to withdraw the
PLO from Beirut on condition that a multinational peacekeeping
force be deployed to protect the Palestinian families left behind.
With the diplomatic deadlock broken, Habib made a second
breakthrough when Syria and Tunisia agreed to host departing PLO
fighters. An advance unit of the Multinational Force (MNF), 350
French troops, arrived in Beirut on August 21. The Palestinian
evacuation by sea to Cyprus and by land to Damascus commenced on
the same day. On August 26, the remaining MNF troops arrived in
Beirut, including a contingent of 800 United States Marines. The
Palestinian exodus ended on September 1. Approximately 8,000
Palestinian guerrillas, 2,600 PLA regulars, and 3,600 Syrian troops
had been evacuated from West Beirut.
Taking stock of the war's toll, Israel announced that 344 of
its soldiers had been killed and over 2,000 wounded. Israel
calculated that hundreds of Syrian soldiers had been killed and
over 1,000 wounded and that 1,000 Palestinian guerrillas had been
killed and 7,000 captured. Lebanese estimates, compiled from
International Red Cross sources and police and hospital surveys,
calculated that 17,825 Lebanese had died and over 30,000 had been
wounded.
On August 23, the legislature elected Bashir Jumayyil president
of Lebanon. On September 10, the United States Marines withdrew
from Beirut, followed by the other members of the MNF. The Lebanese
Army began to move into West Beirut, and the Israelis withdrew
their troops from the front lines. But the war was far from over.
By ushering in Jumayyil as president and evicting the PLO from
Beirut, Israel had attained two of its key war goals. Israel's
remaining ambition was to sign a comprehensive peace treaty with
Lebanon that would entail the withdrawal of Syrian forces and
prevent the PLO from reinfiltrating Lebanon after the IDF withdrew.
Jumayyil repudiated earlier promises to Israel immediately
after the election. He informed the Israelis that a peace treaty
was inconceivable as long as the IDF or any other foreign forces
remained in Lebanon and that it could be concluded only with the
consent of all the Lebanese.
But on September 14, 1982, President-elect Jumayyil was
assassinated in a massive radio-detonated explosion that leveled
the Phalange Party headquarters where he was delivering a speech to
party members. The perpetrator, Habib Shartuni, was soon
apprehended. Shartuni, a member of the Syrian Socialist Nationalist
Party, was allegedly a Syrian agent. Jumayyil's brother, Amin, who
was hostile to the Israeli presence in Lebanon, was elected
president with United States backing.
On the evening of September 16, 1982, the IDF, having
surrounded the Palestinian refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila,
dispatched approximately 300 to 400 Christian militiamen into the
camps to rout what was believed to be the remnant of the
Palestinian forces. The militiamen were mostly Phalangists under
the command of Elie Hubayka (also seen as Hobeika), a former close
aide of Bashir Jumayyil, but militiamen from the Israeli-supported
SLA were also present. The IDF ordered its soldiers to refrain from
entering the camps, but IDF officers supervised the operation from
the roof of a six-story building overlooking parts of the area.
According to the report of the Kahan Commission established by the
government of Israel to investigate the events, the IDF monitored
the Phalangist radio network and fired illumination flares from
mortars and aircraft to light the area. Over a period of two days,
the Christian militiamen massacred some 700 to 800 Palestinian men,
women, and children.
Data as of December 1987
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