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Hitech bomb out matched hitech armored convoy Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L14373869.htmhttp://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L14373869.htm
Hi-tech armoured convoy no match for Beirut bomb
14 Feb 2005 16:58:06 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Lucy Fielder
BEIRUT, Feb 14 (Reuters) - The powerfully armed motorcade of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri was no match for the car bomb that gouged a massive blackened crater into Beirut's gleaming Corniche.
A blast so huge it blew out windows more than one kilometre away ripped apart the Mercedes vehicles like toys and engulfed the car Hariri was driving in fierce flames.
Black, acrid smoke billowed against a pristine blue sky from the broken facade of Beirut's legendary St George Hotel.
Young men wailed and clawed at debris to help rescue workers reach what one witness said were five bodies trapped underneath.
"Everything around us collapsed," a Syrian worker at the site said. "It was as if an earthquake hit the area."
Facades were ripped from luxury buildings and cars set ablaze on streets carpeted with rubble and broken glass. Officials confirmed 13 dead and at least 100 injured.
Scores of firefighters doused the burning vehicles and ambulances took away bloodied survivors.
So advanced was the bomb, security sources said, that it defeated jamming equipment so hi-tech that Hariri's passing convoy would interfere with cell phones and televisions.
Prime Minister Omar Karami silently visited the bomb scene, surrounded by security men.
MP Michel Feroun, weeping, said: "This is a disaster that has hit the country."
"THE HERO'S GONE"
The badly charred body of Hariri, a billionaire businessman, was taken to the American University Hospital where sympathisers gathered and wept.
"The hero's gone. Who are we going to vote for in the elections? We're not going to vote or support anyone," a man screamed at a tearful Atif Majdalani, an MP in Hariri's bloc, as he rushed into the building.
"There is no god but God, and a martyr is loved by God," supporters shouted, pounding the air with their fists as patients and staff appeared at hospital windows.
More supporters of one of Lebanon's most powerful men gathered outside his palace in Qoreitem neighbourhood chanting anti-Syrian slogans, witnesses said.
Lebanon declared three days of official mourning.
An unknown Islamist group, the Group for Victory and Holy War in the Levant, claimed responsibility for the killing in a video tape aired on Al Jazeera television.
Hariri was killed with several bodyguards after he left a meeting in parliament to discuss a law organising elections in May. Former Economy Minister Basil Fuleihan was critically wounded.
A heated contest was expected but Hariri's killing plunged Lebanon, still recovering from a 1975-90 civil war, into shock.
Hariri-owned Future Television broke into its normal programmes to read an announcement of his death from his family. It broadcast Koranic readings in mourning.
It later urged followers to stay calm and avoid any acts that could harm stability in the country.
In Hariri's hometown of Sidon, shops closed and followers burned tyres on the streets.
In Beirut, on a main shopping street in upmarket Hamra, shops were closed and shuttered. Broken glass was testimony to the force of a blast that was heard outside the city limits.
And in Beirut's gleaming downtown, rebuilt by Hariri after the war and perhaps his main legacy, the streets were quiet, the cafe tables lining them deserted.
(Additional reporting by Roula Najem)
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