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On October 13, 1990, the Syrian Air Force bombed the presidential palace in East Beirut,

forcing their most outspoken opponent, the Christian Army commander General Michel Aoon

to take refuge in the French embassy.

I'm Louis Adago and I've been talking to veteran Lebanese journalist

Hanah Anbar about that day.

At that time, I was one of the managing editors of an Arabic language newspaper.

That's headquarters is about maybe 500 yards from the

palace and we used to go up to the palace every day.

Town was the hero of the area because he promised to get rid of the militias that were really

hemorrhaging the country. He promised to get rid of Syrians and he, you know, promised Rosie life for everybody.

Didn't work out that way. Michel Aun, Un, a Maronite Christian, had been the commander of the Lebanese army.

In 1988, after another political assassination in Lebanon's shifting array of sectarian and foreign-backed factions,

Aoun was appointed interim Prime Minister, even though in Lebanon the post was supposed to go to a Muslim. The Syrians didn't approve.

Syria was already powerful in Lebanon. Its troops had been there since almost

the start of the war in 1975. The next year Aoon was sacked, but he refused to step down,

instead launching what he called a war of liberation against the Syrians, vowing to drive them from Lebanon.

Soon he was fighting rival Christian militias too.

Now was vehemently anti-Sirial.

But when he started a war also with the Christian militias, the area around the palace and the villages around that were being hit from two sides.

And of course the army was split. Muslims were fighting from the other

side, the Lebanese army and the Christians stayed here. It was so confusing. By the end of

...