Robert Fisk On Samir Kassir’s Mistake

Robert Fisk:

I think Samir Kassir misunderstood his future killers, whom he had clearly identified before he died as the Syrian military-intelligence apparatus. He broke one of the cardinal rules of journalism. As a reporter or columnist, you can take on governments or armies or corrupt politicians or secret policemen or clergymen or multinationals. But the one thing reporters must never attempt is to take on organised crime. Kassir’s enemies in Lebanon created and lived in a world of bribery and stolen wealth which spread like a web over the Middle East, to Egypt, to Iraq, to Jordan, even to Israel. To offend Syria was to offend the Saudis. And the Iranians. This was not about individuals […] We are talking about corporate crime.

I’m not sure I buy that. Samir Kassir, the man who coined the phrase “The Beirut Spring” was killed simply because he was a vehement supporter of the independence movement and a staunch, vocal enemy of Syrian meddling. He was a charismatic left winger who deprived many of the convenience of arguing that the independence movement was one of right-wing fascists. In other words, I still believe that this was a political assassination, not an “organized crime” assassination.