Beirut: After marathon coverage from yet another crime scene that cost the life of former finance minister Mohammad Chatah, Lebanese television networks provided extensive discussions all night long, to assess the impact of his assassination.
Journalists, analysts and political figures offered their condolences to each other, exchanged barbs, vented ad nauseam, accused the usual suspects that ranged the gamut from Iran/Hezbollah/Syria to Israel/Saudi Arabia/Gulf States, and lamented overall security conditions. Nearly everyone agreed that conditions on the ground were going from bad to worse.
A few anticipated reprisals, while brave commentators pleaded with the head-of-state to find the courage to act and save the country from catastrophe. It was an eerie evening that assembled every available tenor in town, with the exception of Mohammad Chatah, whose phantom haunted those who cherished the late economist’s vision for Lebanon.
Repeated video clips highlighted his numerous comments on the state, the need to uphold the constitution and the 1989 Taif Accords that ended the civil war, his opposition to the Syrian dictatorship that ruled with impunity over Lebanon for nearly three decades, and his pleas to Hezbollah to distance itself with Damascus.
Among the more forceful calls uttered on Friday evening were those that invited every Lebanese to attend funeral services for the slain official on Sunday, precisely to express national outrage over the murder. Lebanon will officially bid farewell to the former minister following midday prayers at the Mohammad Al Amin Mosque located in Downtown Beirut. He will be buried in the adjoining mausoleum alongside former prime minister Rafik Hariri and his companions.
Dr. Chatah, a former Lebanese finance minister and ambassador to the United States, was assassinated on Friday morning when a car bomb struck his convoy as he was heading to Saad Hariri’s residence to attend a March 14 meeting to discuss security conditions in his native Tripoli. Hariri acknowledged that the message reached him loud and clear and chimed in on several networks to declare that his adviser’s killers are “those who are hiding from international justice and who have spread the regional fire to the (Lebanese) nation ... and who killed Rafik Hariri.”
No one has yet claimed responsibility for the attack even if accusatory fingers pointed at Hezbollah, Iran and Syria on account of Chatah’s outspoken criticisms of the Iranian-backed, pro-Syrian March 8 Coalition that is dominated and led by Hezbollah.
Speaking for the March 14 Coalition, former prime minister Fouad Siniora called for the UN-backed Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) to also investigate Chatah’s killing. The STL is tasked with investigating the Hariri assassination, which will begin the trial, in absentia, of five Hezbollah members on January 16, 2014. Local media outlets quoted an anonymous source close to Chatah, who interpreted the bombing as a message ahead of the STL trial, saying “You want justice? Here it is.”
For his part, Souaid Fares, the March 14 Coalition secretary-general insisted that the Lebanese were entitled to express their “overwhelming national outrage,” adding that he would recommend the adoption of a March 14-led government without any opposition figures in it. Irrespective of such deliberations, Chatah’s loss denied Lebanon one of its moderate voices, a patriot in a divided land where religious and tribal affiliations competed with and stifled nationalism.
In an unprecedented display of support, Future TV broadcast its coverage from the slain official’s home, welcoming several commentators in his living room. His wife Nina Chatah wept as she added, “I was happy that he [Mohammad] was an academic, a minister. But I didn’t want him to be a martyr.
“If someone as good as him was killed, then there is no future for Lebanon,” his son said.
Whether the Lebanese will repeat their March 14, 2005 massive demonstrations at Chatah’s funeral/burial, his phantom swivelled over all of Lebanon last evening. It will probably be present over the Mohammad Al Amin Mosque on Sunday too.
