Car Bomb Kills 8, Injures 80 Near Beirut Falangist Office : Muslim Militias Fire Rockets Into 2 Christian Areas

A car loaded with TNT exploded outside an office of President Amin Gemayel’s Falangist Party in Christian East Beirut today, killing at least eight people and wounding 80, officials said.

The bombing and fighting in and around Beirut today and overnight killed a total of 22 people and wounded more than 150, police said.

Two hours before the car bomb exploded, a bomb went off at the entrance of a six-story apartment building housing another Falangist office in East Beirut, wounding six civilians, police said.

Muslim militias rocketed two Christian neighborhoods after the car bombing. Rockets crashing into the residential Ashrafiyeh neighborhood, where the car bomb blew up, and into the Dikwani area killed two people and wounded 15, police said.

They said seven people died and 30 were wounded in overnight battles between Christians and Muslims across Beirut’s dividing Green Line and in the hills near Souq el Gharb east of the capital.

Shelling between Christians and Muslims killed another five people and wounded 25 this morning near the president’s hometown of Bikfaya, 10 miles northeast of Beirut.

‘New Force’ Reported

The Lebanese army command issued a communique claiming that “a new force” has begun shelling military positions around Bikfaya, but it did not identify it.

Police explosives expert Roland Jawdeh estimated that the car bomb contained as much as 440 pounds of TNT.

A reporter for the Voice of Lebanon radio on the scene of the car bombing said there were “dozens of casualties, and more people trapped in burning buildings.”

Civil defense officials said at least eight bodies were taken out.

The blast set the nearby building housing the Falangist office on fire, and rescuers said dozens of people were trapped in the blazing building at Bishop Ghafrael Street off the Ashrafiyeh district’s crowded Fassouh shopping center.

People ran out in panic from adjacent buildings. Buildings within 50 yards were heavily damaged by the blast.

Series of Bombings

A young woman who identified herself only as Sonia said she was making coffee for other workers at a store about 25 yards away when the car bomb exploded. “The pot shot off the heater, and then we heard the ear-splitting explosion,” she said.

Falangist militiamen fired automatic rifles in the air to clear traffic for ambulances in the narrow, smoke-filled street.

There have been a series of bombings in East Beirut, many of them against Falangist offices, amid a campaign by Syrian-backed leftist, Muslim and Christian factions to oust Gemayel.

Falangist Chairman Elie Karameh visited the scene of the explosion and denounced the bombing as a “criminal terrorist act.” He urged Christians to keep constant watch for car bombs.

“Everyone from now on must be explosive experts. They should examine every driver who parks a car next to their homes or shops,” Karameh said.

He did not accuse any faction of carrying out the bombings.