Word: assads
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...last week, after another prolonged period of anarchy in the Lebanese capital, Syrian President Hafez Assad took one of the biggest gambles of his 16 years in power. He sent 7,500 Syrian troops into West Beirut to try to restore order there -- a task that several countries, including the U.S., France, Israel and Syria itself, had previously tried without success. Was Assad about to become the latest victim of Lebanon's endless civil war, or could he restore peace to the troubled land...
...last time Assad sent in his army was in 1976. At that time the Syrians were trying to save the Maronite Christian forces from total defeat at the hands of an alliance of leftist Lebanese Muslims and the Palestine Liberation Organization, thereby disrupting the country's delicate balance of power. The Syrians ended up fighting the Christians they had come to save, suffered heavy casualties, and had to pull out of the Beirut area in a hurry after the Israelis invaded Lebanon...
This time a worried Assad decided to occupy West Beirut, the predominantly Muslim half of the divided Lebanese capital, because of what he regarded as an ominous series of threats to Syria's long-term strategic interests. In the first place he was concerned about the renewed strength of the P.L.O. in West Beirut, especially in the refugee camps of Sabra, Shatila and Burj el Barajneh. More specifically, he was angry about the resurgence of P.L.O. Chairman Yasser Arafat, with whom Assad has been feuding for years. The one good thing about Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon, from Assad...
...from the Maronite Christians and Sunni Muslims, who have divided most of the political spoils since Lebanon became independent of French rule in 1943. In recent months, however, Amal has lost ground within the Shi'ite community to the radical Hizballah (Party of God). Hizballah's rising power concerns Assad because the group, which is allied with Iran, has dreams of establishing an Iranian-style Islamic republic in Lebanon...
...beat him brutally and then shot him to death. Over the next two weeks the masked hijackers, reinforced by fellow terrorists, threatened to blow up the aircraft, while they gradually released all but 39 of the original 153 passengers. The remaining captives were set free after Syrian President Hafez Assad intervened...