Beirut Bomb Injures Cabinet Official, Kills 8

Lebanese Defense Minister Michel Murr narrowly escaped assassination Wednesday when a car bomb blasted his motorcade, killing eight people and wounding 38.

An estimated 132 pounds of explosives packed into a Mercedes were detonated by remote control as Murr’s heavily guarded convoy passed on the way to a Cabinet session, military sources reported.

The dead included one of the minister’s Lebanese army bodyguards and a child. Murr, who is also deputy prime minister, was among the injured. Five dead in one car were burned beyond recognition.

The 59-year-old minister, his head bandaged, said later: “These methods will not terrorize us. We will continue the march, and we will not be scared by explosives and car bombs.”

Murr, a Christian, was being driven from his home in northern Lebanon to the mainly Muslim western sector of Beirut for a meeting of the Syrian-backed Cabinet to discuss disbanding the country’s Christian and Muslim militias.

“We will continue our steps with no retreat,” Murr told reporters as he arrived at the meeting.

“These acts will do nothing but strengthen us to save Lebanon from the nightmare imposed on it,” he added.

Christian militia leader Samir Geagea later resigned from the Cabinet. Militia sources said one of the main reasons was concern for his security.

The explosion, on a busy seaside highway in the Antelias area of the eastern sector of Beirut, flipped over the minister’s bulletproof Mercedes and destroyed more than 25 other cars. It also damaged several shops.