Finally, the Lebanese, and with them the Arabs and the world, can say that the truth about the assassination of Rafic Hariri has become quite clear, with its features accurately defined, and that they can, after the trial – in absentia until further notice – of the accused begins, be certain that what they and their country have been through, since the attempted assassination of Marwan Hamadeh in October 2004, reaching its peak in February 2005, and until today, are only links in a long series whose “protagonists” are well known, their goals having been exposed. Indeed, the details of the indictment released yesterday by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) makes clear beyond all doubt that the decision to carry out the assassination, the process of monitoring the movements of the late Prime Minister, the practical preparation of the instruments of the crime, as well as the coordination of communications between the members of the supervising unit, the murder unit and support networks, all require a large apparatus experienced in this kind of terrorist activity, and a machinery with massive financial means and specialized human resources – from those who planned and executed the assassination to experts at misleading the media and falsifying documents. All of this falls under the mantle of a single goal: to kill Lebanon itself, erase its pluralistic identity, subject it to the requirements of a foreign axis and implicate it in a regional conflict outside of Arab consensus, and in fact opposed to it. The moment the crime was committed, began the greatest campaign of misinformation, in media, politics and security, in the history of Lebanon and the region. Security and intelligence services, both local and from brotherly nations, sent dozens of “false witnesses” to the UN Investigation Commission to divert its work from its path and make investigators fall into carefully set traps, intended to undermine their credibility, shed doubt on their integrity and belittle their professionalism. This campaign made use of all kinds of political slogans, from liberation to resistance, national unity and others, coupled with various threats and accusations ranging from espionage to treason, conspiracy and the whole usual tune. The matter required more assassinations in order to “convince” those who were demanding to know the truth that the cost of their demand was too great, and to get rid of those who had contributed to exposing those involved, among them Captain Wissam Eid, the computer engineer thanks to whom came to light the evidence of “situational conjunction” of telecommunications and identifying the owners of the mobile phones used in those crimes. Within the framework of this misinformation campaign, rowdy press conference were held, fabricated films were shown, high-sounding speeches given, and media outlets were conceived with massive capabilities afforded them in order to undermine trust in international justice and smear the reputation of those charged with upholding it. Yet all of this failed to convince many, did not succeed at concealing the great concern and tension that prevailed among the ranks of those implicated, and did not prevent the international justice system from completing its investigations to the end. And today, after the truth and the lie have been revealed, and irrefutable evidence has appeared about those implicated, who implicated their sect and their country in crimes, wars and foreign axes, what could possibly happen? And what could those people possibly say to evade their responsibility for the death of Hariri and the other victims? Neither speeches and threats nor increased security tension and wars will save them, and continuing to misinform and to subvert the investigation will be of no use to them. They are facing international justice alone, and it knows only facts, evidence and proof. As for the Lebanese, they have only to wait, ignore provocations, and leap over the ambushes the murderers and their sponsors are so good at setting up.
