Samir Kassir (Arabic: سمير قصير; 5 May 1960 – 2 June 2005) was a Lebanese-Palestinian journalist of An-Nahar[1] and professor of history at Saint-Joseph University,[2] who was an advocate of democracy and prominent opponent of the Syrian occupation of Lebanon.
[5] Kassir's journalistic career began when he was a seventeen-year-old secondary school student at the Lycée Français de Beyrouth with unsigned contributions to the Lebanese Communist Party newspaper Al Nidā.
From 1984 to 1985 he edited the weekly Al-Yawm as-Sābi', and from 1986 to 2004 he was a member of the editorial board of the Revue des Etudes Palestiniennes, the French-language journal of the Institute for Palestine Studies.
[7] In 1995 he founded a new monthly political and cultural review, L'Orient L'Express, which he edited until it ceased publication in 1998, from lack of interest and pressure from the advertising industry.
[8][9] The investigation into his assassination directs to Unit 121 Of Hezbollah as part of its policiy to eliminate political and journalist threat of those who appose to them and the Syrian government influence in Lebanon.
Moreover, Elias Atallah, Secretary General of the Democratic Left Movement, urged his allies to the presidential palace and remove president Lahoud.
After Kassir, George Hawi, the former head of the Lebanese Communist Party was targeted by another car-bomb; this was followed by failed assassination attempts at former Interior Minister and former Syrian ally Elias Murr and popular LBCI TV anchorwoman and journalist May Chidiac who survived, but lost an arm and leg.
On 12 December 2005, Samir Kassir's colleague, An Nahar's chief editor, and top anti-Syria legislator Gebran Tueni, was killed by a car bomb.
... What [Arab-American] reconciliation needs, if the United States were really willing to reach such reconciliation, is first [America's] revision of its understanding of Arab democracy, which has been restricted until now, to the American convention that mandates Arabs give up their pan-Arab ties... and the issues that steer their feelings most, on top of them the Palestinian issue ..."[5]Known for his unrelenting courage, Kassir was unafraid of expressing trenchant opinions.
He recognised courage and determination in others and took under his wing leading young pro-democracy and human rights activists such as Wissam Tarif, with whom Kassir developed a warm and close friendship.
Before his assassination, he was working on another book about the "Beirut Spring" that aimed to discuss the recent momentous developments in Lebanon, that was supposed to be published by Actes Sud.
A special edition of l'Orient Express was published in November 2005 to celebrate its tenth anniversary under the title "The Unfinished Spring" and was dedicated in memory of Kassir.