This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 AMMAN 009594 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR NEA/ARN, NEA/PA, NEA/AIA, INR/NESA, R/MR, 
I/GNEA, B/BXN, B/BRN, NEA/PPD, NEA/IPA FOR ALTERMAN 
USAID/ANE/MEA 
LONDON FOR TSOU 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
 
TAGS: KMDR JO
SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION ON LEBANESE ASSASSINATION 
 
                        Summary 
 
-- Lead story in all papers today, December 13, 
focuses on reports about the assassination of Lebanese 
MP Gebran Tueni in Lebanon yesterday.  All reports 
highlight international condemnation of the crime, 
including Jordan's denunciation. 
 
                 Editorial Commentary 
 
-- "No conspiracy theorists" 
 
Centrist, influential among the elite English daily 
Jordan Times (12/13) editorializes:  "If these attacks 
are aimed at silencing the loudest critics of 
Damascus, they are obviously counterproductive.  After 
each bombing, Lebanese opposition against Syria grows 
louder and more effective, more and more people take 
to the streets, international support for the Lebanese 
grows, the language of the international community 
against Damascus rings harsher and harsher, and Syria 
finds itself even further isolated.  The criminals who 
are orchestrating all these attacks are definitely 
doing Syria no favor.  Still, this is no time for 
conspiracy theories.  Only backward elements, sad 
dinosaurs entrenched behind a long-gone cold war 
mentality and nave enough to think that anyone could 
believe them in this 21st century of ours, would point 
the finger at their usual suspects:  the Zionist 
enemy, imperialist America, or both..  The Mehlis 
report had already put Syria in an extremely grave 
situation.  Yesterday's attack lays the ground for 
more suspicions against certain Damascus circles.  It 
is in everyone's interest that Damascus comes out 
clean, and only hard facts - and not empty rhetoric - 
will achieve that." 
 
-- "Gebran's assassination and the other face of 
terrorism" 
 
Chief Editor Taher Udwan writes on the back-page of 
independent, mass-appeal Arabic daily Al-Arab Al-Yawm 
(12/13):  "Everything is possible and all conclusions 
are legitimate in this case of terrorism that does not 
bear the identity of Al-Qaeda" and that "security in 
Lebanon has become exposed in a serious manner and 
that the bloody game on its territories continues 
either to serve Lebanese internal conflicts or to 
serve regional and international purposes seeking to 
expand the circle of instability in the lands between 
Iraq and the Mediterranean". 
 
-- "Gebran Tueni . and the episodes continue" 
 
Daily columnist Urayb Rantawi writes on the op-ed page 
of center-left, influential Arabic daily Al-Dustour 
(12/13):  "From their standpoint, the killers manage 
the killing game among the parties, the sects and the 
media organizations at the beat of the investigation 
and Mehlis' reports.  They think that the more they 
shed Lebanese blood, the more they wreak havoc in 
Lebanon's social matrix, and hence the more their 
chances are of escaping the grip of justice.  They 
killed whoever 'moaned' about the guardianship in the 
past, then they killed whoever called for the truth 
and for investigation, and now they prepare to kill 
whoever calls for international justice.  They are 
used to having their crimes, their mass graves, their 
assassinations and their killings be forgotten and 
overtaken by the lapse of time.  One can only respond 
to these people by adhering to the truth and to the 
investigation.  One can only avenge Tueni and his 
predecessors and successors by handing the killers 
over to an international court." 
 
-- "Assassination of Gebran Tueni a typical detonator! 
 
Daily columnist George Haddad writes on the op-ed page 
of center-left, influential Arabic daily Al-Dustour 
(12/13):  "Without a doubt, the assassination of Tueni 
in this manner will re-ignite what Bush and Rice had 
called 'the revolution of the cedars" in the aftermath 
of Hariri's assassination when the days and months 
were sufficient to cool it down and to put its fires. 
That "revolution of the cedars" did not succeed in 
achieving its objectives.  That revolution, although, 
with international pressure, succeeded in effecting 
Syria's withdrawal from Lebanon, it failed and 
continues to fail in achieving its other objectives, 
namely the disarmament of the Lebanese, Islamic and 
Palestinian resistance.  Furthermore, from the 
perspective of the cedars rebels, the international 
investigation . could not come up with any conclusive 
evidence that would prove the pre-set charges and 
accusations.  This failure increased doubts and 
created more difficulties for directing the 
investigation in the targeted direction, which in turn 
made it difficult to charge a specific party with the 
assassination of Hariri in a manner that would make 
pursuing and besieging that party with unjust 
international decision acceptable and permissible and 
even a form of justice.  Thus came the media leaks 
from Paris and Washington that the Security Council is 
going to extend the investigation another six months 
only in order to finalize it with entertaining the 
idea of imposing sanctions on the suspected Syrians. 
Such a development means only one thing: the 
objectives behind the Hariri assassination, with all 
accompanied instigations, repercussions, rumors, 
divisions, alliances, explosions and instability, 
reached the maximum and were still not accomplished. 
Under these circumstances, the planners who stand to 
benefit from the assassination crime had to think of 
something, an event, an assassination, that would 
breathe life into the dying fire that followed the 
Hariri assassination..  What does all this have to do 
with the assassination of Gebran Tueni?  We do not 
know, but what we do know is that Tueni's 
assassination may be the new typical detonator that is 
designed to take the crime of Hariri's assassination 
back to square one, that to re-ignite the fire that 
was almost dying out". 
 
-- "Investigation and international court" 
 
Daily columnist Jamil Nimri writes on the back-page of 
independent Arabic daily Al-Ghad (12/13):  "What good 
is it to argue about who is behind the crime?  One can 
easily say that targeting one of the most prominent 
opponents of Syria is a conspiracy to incriminate 
Syria . but for how long are the enemies of Syria 
going to keep on killing Syria's opponents in Lebanon? 
This is a difficult formula for the Lebanese to 
digest, particularly those who may be targeted.  Let 
there be an international investigation then and let 
it be comprehensive and include yesterday's heinous 
crime and all the other crimes since the Hariri 
assassination.  There is definite logic in the demand 
for a wide scale international investigation, and if 
Syria is innocent, then not even a thousand 
investigators can prove its involvement.  Syria's 
political conduct towards Lebanon does not show any 
forgiveness or readiness to turn the page of hegemony 
and guardianship.  The Syrian minister's remarks 
yesterday, reminding everyone that Lebanon was safe 
when Syria was there, is not good and evokes a sense 
of threat.  Once again, we do not rule out the 
hypothesis that another party or intelligence system, 
including the Mossad, may be involved.  But there is 
no solution to this situation other than seeking the 
help of the international community". HALE