Word: ites
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Syrian President Hafez Assad, who is clearly the strongest factor in the continued fighting in Lebanon. But that trip had to be delayed when Assad underwent an appendectomy. In the meantime, Israeli and later French warplanes bombed and strafed positions in eastern Lebanon held by pro-Iranian Shi'ite Muslims believed to be responsible for the recent suicide bombings of American, French and Israeli headquarters in Lebanon. Theoretically, the "truce" in Beirut was still holding, but the pressures to resume all-out fighting were rising again like a thunderstorm over the Chouf...
While the struggle within the P.L.O. was being played out in Tripoli, a long-awaited act of revenge was taking place in the Bekaa Valley. On Wednesday, the Israelis staged a reprisal raid against the pro-Iranian Shi'ite Muslim splinter group, known as Islamic Amal, which is believed responsible for the suicide attacks that killed 28 Israeli soldiers on Nov. 4, as well as 239 American servicemen and 58 French paratroopers on Oct. 23. Four Israeli warplanes, ejecting thermal balloons in their wake in order to confound heat-seeking surface-to-air missiles, attacked a training camp...
...sure that the crime of Oct. 23 will not go unpunished." Scarcely 17 hours later, 14 French Super Etendard fighter-bombers from the aircraft carrier Clemenceau staged a 35-minute attack on the same region of the Bekaa Valley, leveling barracks and training bases of the Shi'ite extremists. Among the targets was the ancient city of Baalbek's Khawwam Hotel, the command headquarters of the estimated 1,000 Iranian Islamic revolutionary guards who have been operating in the Bekaa Valley for the past 18 months (see box). The next step could be a retaliatory strike...
...Israeli and French retaliatory air strikes last week may have destroyed the headquarters of the Shi'ite Muslim militia called Islamic Amal, but the attacks could not hope to wipe out the group's suicidal zeal. For the followers of Shi'ite extremists, especially supporters of Iran's Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini, dying in a jihad, or "holy war," means martyrdom and a guaranteed place in heaven. With the recent suicide bombings of the U.S., French and Israeli headquarters in Lebanon, radical Shi'ite groups have become a small but potentially destabilizing force in Lebanon. Says...
Since the 7th century, when the death of the Prophet Muhammad precipitated the division of Islam between Sunnis and Shi'ites, the Shi'ites have stressed martyrdom as a way of atonement. About 20% of the world's 750 million Muslims are Shi'ites and they are the dominant majority in Iran. In Lebanon, Shi'ites outnumber Sunnis 3 to 2, but are overshadowed by the Sunnis in wealth and influence. Over the past few years, as the political situation in Lebanon deteriorated, the Shi'ite community grew susceptible to the radical religious politics...