WikiLeaks: Syria Likely behind Gebran Tueni’s Assassination

Syria was likely behind the assassination of MP Gebran Tueni in 2005, which was aimed at silencing his caustic remarks against the regime of President Bashar Assad, stated a leaked U.S. Embassy cable dated December 19, 2005, published exclusively in al-Jumhuriya newspaper on Wednesday.

The WikiLeaks cable added that the assassination was also a message to the Lebanese opposition that “no one can protect them.”

Syrian sources said that the murder was also a blow to the “intellectual leadership” within the camp, adding: “Contrary to the assassination of former Lebanese Premier Rafik Hariri, Tueni’s murder was not a mistake and Syria will pay the price for it for some 40 days.”

“The assassination will have long-term repercussions on the Lebanese opposition because Tueni acted as its intellectual force,” they said.

On the regional scene, his killing will not have the same affect as Hariri’s murder because the Saudis didn’t view the MP as an ally and he wasn’t a Sunni figure either, they continued.

Meanwhile, an expert on foreign relations stated that Syria wanted to tell the Lebanese opposition that “despite all the pressures it was under, it is still here and can target it. None of your new friends can protect you.”

“Tueni’s murder was not a strong enough message and so Druze leader MP Walid Jumblat or his ally Marwan Hamadeh may be the next targets,” he said.

“The opposition now believes that oppression and arrests in Lebanon will increase after Tueni’s assassination,” he noted.

The murder also served as a message to the United States and France, and that is: “The Syrian government considers Lebanon to be of great strategic interest and it is prepared to take great risks and wage a dirty game in order to protect it.”

The foreign relations expert added: “It’s as if Syria is trying to say that it is behind the MP’s murder, but it can also escape its punishment.”

“If it was behind the assassinations, then it demonstrates that the Syrian regime, with its long history of political assassinations on the internal and regional scenes, is incapable of change or implementing any actual political reform,” he said.

The expert added however that Assad may not have been necessarily the one who ordered the assassination “as he does not have absolute control over the regime.”

Furthermore, a source monitoring the situation in the region added that the entire Syrian government was not behind the assassination, but members within the government and military intelligence were possibly responsible.

They are seeking to spoil Assad’s efforts to positively cooperate with Detlev Mehils, then head of the investigation into Hariri’s assassination, by destabilizing Lebanon, it remarked.