Word: syria
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...killing of Rafik Hariri and 22 other people in a massive Valentine's Day truck bomb explosion, which tore through Beirut's plush seafront hotel district. Hariri had been on the verge of leading an electoral campaign aimed at ending the dominance of Lebanese politics by neighboring Syria, a goal that many Lebanese believe cost him his life. "The Syrian regime killed my father," said Saad Hariri. "Bashar al-Assad gave the order to his goons and they executed the order." He added, "My father's murder was meant to cripple Lebanon and put fear into the Lebanese people...
...children. Raya, the maternity doctor, says her family decided to leave when her brother found a note tucked under his windshield wiper saying: "Your whole family will be killed because you work with the Americans." Raya and her sister tossed bedsheets over the living room furniture and fled to Syria, where they bought forged European papers and then boarded a flight for Prague...
Permission to attend a dinner at the Iranian embassy is not exactly commonplace for American journalists in Damascus. So neither I, nor my friend Andrew Tabler, editor of Syria Today magazine, hesitated when we were cleared to attend a banquet celebrating the 28th anniversary of Iran's Islamic Revolution...
...Before we could eat, the Iranian Ambassador, Mohammed Hassan Akhtire, a confidant of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, made a sentimental speech about the significance of the Iranian Revolution in 1979. In particular, the turbaned diplomat remembered that Syria was the only country to support the fledgling Islamic Republic, and he said that relations were growing even stronger. Syrian President Bashar Al Assad is due to visit Tehran in the near future, he announced...
...Perhaps allowing the rare presence of two Americans at the annual event was intended to relay the message to Washington that the so-called Rejectionist Crescent, the arc of state and non-state actors from Iran to Syria, was united in opposition to the Bush Administration's "New" Middle East. But that wasn't the only message. At the end of the evening, Ambassador Akhtire lingered long enough to say goodbye to us. "If America wants trust in the Middle East, it has to have a balanced policy based on respect, and which deals with the root causes of problems...