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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Killed Hezbollah Man Revered in Hometown |
| 2008-02-20 |
| Decades of eluding U.S. and Israeli intelligence won Imad Mughniyeh a mythic stature in his home village, where even his family knew little of what the secretive Hezbollah commander was doing. After his death in a Damascus car bombing last week, his poster hangs on every lamppost and building corner here. "My feelings toward him were the same as a fan's for a celebrity, wanting to get his autograph," said Zaynab, 25, one of Mughniyeh's two sisters. Mughniyeh, who helped set up the Shiite Hezbollah guerrilla group, was one of the world's most feared terror masterminds, accused by the West of killing hundreds in suicide bombings and hijackings in Lebanon and around the world. He dropped out of sight some 15 years ago — few outside his inner circle knew where he was or even what he looked like — until Feb. 12, when a car bomb killed the 45-year-old in the Syrian capital. But in this Lebanese village, surrounded by hills lush with orange groves and wild flowers, the mystery surrounding Mughniyeh — known to his supporters by his nom de guerre of Hajj Radwan — only burnished his image as a warrior against Israel and its ally, the United States. "To us, he's holy, a great leader," said 18-year-old Hasan Karam. "When we were growing up we kept hearing about Hajj Radwan, the hero fighting Israeli occupation. We used to hear Israel was after him and that he liberated our lands. But I never met him or knew what he looked like. We didn't even know — until now — that Hajj Radwan was the same person as Imad Mughniyeh." Now there's no escaping his image here. A recent photo of Mughniyeh — stocky, wearing military garb, with a thick gray and black beard — is hung everywhere in his home village of Tayr Debba, nestled in Hezbollah's heartland of mainly Shiite south Lebanon. Over the weekend, thousands came to mourn his death and pay respects to his family. "He was like a ghost in hiding," said Badie Zaydan, 52, a high school teacher in the village. "The success of the resistance is in its secrecy, even from family members," said fellow teacher Yousef Haidar, 42, referring to Hezbollah, the well-armed and tight-knit guerrilla force backed by Iran. Even Mughniyeh's mother rarely saw him since 1982, when at the age of 19 he quit his business administration studies at the American University of Beirut to help set up Hezbollah after Israel's invasion of Lebanon that year. "I encouraged him," his 69-year-old mother said as she received hundreds of mourners. Mughniyeh's wife, who refused to talk to reporters, sat next to her, her eyes red and swollen from crying. They had three children, two boys and a girl. It was the brief earlier 1978 invasion by Israel — when Mughniyeh was 15 — that first planted the seeds of armed action in Mughniyeh's mind, said his mother, who refused to give her first name and goes as Umm Imad, or mother of Imad. "That's when he decided to carry the gun and fight Israel," she said. Western and Israeli intelligence accuse Mughniyeh of involvement in suicide bombings in the 1980s in Beirut that killed hundreds of American and French troops, as well as the 1985 hijacking of a TWA airliner in which a U.S. Navy diver was killed, and bombings in the 1990s against the Israeli Embassy and a Jewish cultural center in Argentina that killed over 100 people. Mughniyeh's relatives deny his role in any of those attacks. "My son is not a terrorist," his mother said. "These are silly allegations ... My son is a fighter." Mughniyeh's two brothers, Jihad and Fuad, were killed in car bomb explosions in Beirut in the 1980s and 1990s. The only time villagers saw Mughniyeh after some 20 years of absence was in 2002, when he attend his uncle's funeral. "He comforted me saying my father's passing was God's will," said Mahmoud Mughniyeh, 45, a cousin. He said he couldn't tell whether his fugitive relative had plastic surgery because he hadn't seen him since the early 1980s. Huge black banners cover the outside walls of the Mughniyeh family house, a one-story building at the end of a green field overlooking a valley that stretches to the Mediterranean. "You will continue to haunt them ... you will be victorious," one banner says. "We shall not cry for you Hajj Imad, but we will resist," says another. |
| Posted by:ryuge |
| #5 Sound like the town is a cesspool needing draining. |
| Posted by: 3dc 2008-02-20 19:11 |
| #4 I fought the law and the law won... |
| Posted by: Jomosing Bluetooth8431 2008-02-20 17:35 |
| #3 Not enough suffering for Imad or his family. However, I do note there is a 25 year old sister.... |
| Posted by: Scooter McGruder 2008-02-20 16:03 |
| #2 TAYR DEBBA, Lebanon Put it on the target list, Moshe. Yes, sir... |
| Posted by: tu3031 2008-02-20 09:40 |
| #1 Huge black banners cover the outside walls of the Mughniyeh family house, |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2008-02-20 06:44 |