Samir Kassir
Encyclopedia
Samir Kassir (May 5, 1960 – June 2, 2005) was a Lebanese professor of history at Saint-Joseph University and journalist
. Born to a Palestinian
father and a Syrian
mother, Kassir received his degree in philosophy and political philosophy in 1984, in 1990, Kassir earned his PhD in Modern History also from the University of Sorbonne. He held both Lebanese and French nationality. A prominent left-wing activist, he was a strong advocate of freedom for the Palestinians, democracy in Lebanon and Syria
and a vocal critic of the Syrian presence in Lebanon. He was assassinated on 2 June 2005 and his murderers remain unknown. A French investigation is currently underway but its results have yet to be released. Kassir was a keen advocate of secular democracy in the Middle East.
student at the Lycée Français de Beyrouth, with unsigned contributions to the Lebanese Communist Party
newspaper Al-Nidā. The same year, he began contributing to the French-language daily L'Orient-Le Jour, one of Lebanon's principal newspapers.
From 1981 to 2000, he contributed to the French international political review Le Monde Diplomatique
. In 1982 and 1983 he edited the newsletter Le Liban en Lutte (Struggling Lebanon), which was dedicated to the Lebanese resistance against the Israel
i occupation. In 1984 he gained a DEA (roughly equivalent to a Master's degree
in the British university system) in philosophy and political philosophy from the Université de Paris I. From 1984 to 1985 he edited the weekly Al-Yawm as-Sābi`, and from 1986 to 2004 he was a member of the editorial board of the Revue des Etudes Palestiniennes, the French-language journal of the Institute for Palestine Studies
. From 1988 to 1989 he contributed to the London-based pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat.
Samir Kassir obtained his PhD in modern and contemporary history from the Université de Paris IV in 1990, with a thesis on the Lebanese Civil War
. His books, in French and Arabic, include a history of Beirut and a study of the Lebanese Civil War. He also co-authored a book about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and Palestinian-French relations. In 1995 he founded a new monthly political and cultural review, L'Orient-L'Express, which he edited until it ceased publication in 1998, from lack of interest and pressure from the advertising industry. From that year on he was a professor at the "Institut des sciences politiques de l'Université Saint-Joseph" in Beirut.
It was also in 1998 that Kassir became an editorial writer for the daily Al-Nahar newspaper. He became widely known for his popular weekly column in which he wrote strong articles against the pro-Syrian regime. He also made frequent appearances on several television stations as a political analyst on news programs.
Known for his unrelenting courage, Kassir was unafraid of expressing trenchant opinions. He advocated democracy
in both Lebanon and Syria, and continuously spoke for the rights of the Palestinians. He recognised courage and determination in others and took under his wing leading young pro-democracy and human rights activists such as Wissam Tarif
, with whom Kassir developed a warm and close friendship. It was his non-compromising views on the Ba'ath regime that many believe led to his assassination.
He maintained a keen and sympathetic interest in Syria despite his criticism of its involvement in Lebanon, and was on close terms with many Syrian intellectuals, including those involved in the Damascus Spring
. He was a founding member of the Democratic Left Movement, which won a seat in the Lebanese parliamentary elections of 2005. Kassir and the party he helped establish were both very influential in triggering the popular upheavals following Prime Minister Rafik Hariri
's killing.
Kassir's last book in Arabic concerned the "Damascus Spring" and the consequences for Lebanon of Syrian political developments; Syrian dissident film-maker Omar Amiralay
penned its introduction. Before his assassination, he was working on another book about the "Beirut Spring" that aimed to discuss the recent momentous developments in Lebanon, that was supposed to be published by Actes Sud. In February 2006 a book was published with the same title, by Actes Sud, but contained translations of Arabic articles written mainly after Hariri's assassination
.
Samir Kassir was a Christian Orthodox
married to Giselle Khoury
, a talk-show host on Al-Arabiya television. He is survived by two daughters, Mayssa and Liana, from a previous marriage.
His wife, prominent TV presenter Giselle Khoury
, and a group of Kassir’s friends, students and colleagues from l'Orient Express, including writer Elias Khoury
, created the Samir Kassir Foundation. One of the foundation’s objectives would be translating his works into English
, Italian, and Norwegian.
A special edition of l'Orient Express was published in November 2005, to celebrate its tenth anniversary, under the title "The Unfinished Spring" and was dedicated in memory of Kassir. This project was initially Kassir's idea who was working on it before he was assassinated.
A square in downtown Beirut
, behind the Annahar building, was named in Kassir’s honor. The Samir Kassir Foundation erected a bronze statue of the journalist there on June 2, 2006, exactly a year after his assassination.
using a car bomb
in Beirut
on June 2, 2005. The investigation into his assassination is still underway, but no one has been indicted yet. Since Kassir had been constantly receiving threats from Lebanese and Syrian Intelligence Officers, there is widespread speculation in Lebanon that the perpetrators were the Lebanese-Syrian security apparatus or remnants of this force (as Syria has claimed that all its intelligence officers were out of Lebanon; in addition, the head of the Lebanese security forces had resigned). The Syrian government has denied these charges.
There was widespread condemnation
for the killing and many prominent opposition figures blaming the blast on the Lebanese and Syrian regimes. Among them were Hariri's son, Saad
, who said "the blood-stained hands that assassinated Rafiq Hariri are the same ones that assassinated Samir Kassir." Moreover, Elias Atallah
, Secretary General of the Democratic Left Movement, urged his allies on March 14 to march to the presidential palace and remove president Lahoud. However, the calls remained unanswered. Years later, March 14 allies admitted that had Lahoud been removed, Lebanon would have been spared the later political assassinations.
Kassir was among the first victims in the growing list of political assassinations that have occurred in Lebanon in the past few years. These began with the attempted assassination of Marwan Hamadeh and followed with the killing of Rafiq al-Hariri, the former Prime Minister. After Kassir, George Hawi
, the former head of the Lebanese Communist Party
was targeted by another car-bomb; this was followed by failed assassination attempts at former Interior Minister and former Syrian ally Elias Murr
and popular LBCI TV anchorwoman and journalist May Chidiac
who survived, but lost an arm and leg. On the 12th of December, Samir Kassir's colleague, An-Nahar
chief editor, and top anti-Syria legislator Gebran Tueni
, was killed by a car bomb. Pierre Amine Gemayel
, the former Minister of Industry, was another victim in the series of assassinations. Gemayel was travelling in his car when gunmen opened fire in broad daylight. MP Walid Eido
from the Hariri-led Future movement was killed near the Military Bath of Beirut on June 13, 2007, when leaving his gym club. Shortly afterwards, MP Antoine Ghanem
of the Lebanese Phalanges Party (aka Kataeb Party
), was killed in another car bomb on September 19, 2007 in the Sin al-Fil suburb of Beirut. Shortly afterwards, second-in-command of the Lebanese Armed Forces
, General François al-Hajj
was killed in the military-secured suburb of Baabda on December 12, 2007. One month later, security chief and top Lebanese investigator into the International Tribunal for the Hariri assassination was killed in January 2008. Many have blamed Syria
for all the recent assassinations of its opponents.
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
. Born to a Palestinian
Palestinian people
The Palestinian people, also referred to as Palestinians or Palestinian Arabs , are an Arabic-speaking people with origins in Palestine. Despite various wars and exoduses, roughly one third of the world's Palestinian population continues to reside in the area encompassing the West Bank, the Gaza...
father and a Syrian
Syrian people
The Syrian people are the inhabitants and citizens of Syria. Syrians are tied together by geography, linguistic heritage, religion, and similar Eastern Mediterranean ethnicities...
mother, Kassir received his degree in philosophy and political philosophy in 1984, in 1990, Kassir earned his PhD in Modern History also from the University of Sorbonne. He held both Lebanese and French nationality. A prominent left-wing activist, he was a strong advocate of freedom for the Palestinians, democracy in Lebanon and Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
and a vocal critic of the Syrian presence in Lebanon. He was assassinated on 2 June 2005 and his murderers remain unknown. A French investigation is currently underway but its results have yet to be released. Kassir was a keen advocate of secular democracy in the Middle East.
" ... What [Arab-American] reconciliation needs, if the United States were really willing to reach such reconciliation, is first [America's] revision of its understanding of Arab democracy, which has been restricted until now, to the American convention that mandates Arabs give up their pan-Arab ties... and the issues that steer their feelings most, on top of them the Palestinian issue ..."
Life
Samir Kassir's journalistic career began when he was a seventeen year old secondary schoolSecondary school
Secondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of schooling, known as secondary education and usually compulsory up to a specified age, takes place...
student at the Lycée Français de Beyrouth, with unsigned contributions to the Lebanese Communist Party
Lebanese Communist Party
The Lebanese Communist Party – LCP or Parti communiste libanais in French, is a communist political party in Lebanon...
newspaper Al-Nidā. The same year, he began contributing to the French-language daily L'Orient-Le Jour, one of Lebanon's principal newspapers.
From 1981 to 2000, he contributed to the French international political review Le Monde Diplomatique
Le Monde diplomatique
Le Monde diplomatique is a monthly newspaper offering analysis and opinion on politics, culture, and current affairs. It was first created mainly for a diplomatic audience as its name implies...
. In 1982 and 1983 he edited the newsletter Le Liban en Lutte (Struggling Lebanon), which was dedicated to the Lebanese resistance against the Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
i occupation. In 1984 he gained a DEA (roughly equivalent to a Master's degree
Master's degree
A master's is an academic degree granted to individuals who have undergone study demonstrating a mastery or high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice...
in the British university system) in philosophy and political philosophy from the Université de Paris I. From 1984 to 1985 he edited the weekly Al-Yawm as-Sābi`, and from 1986 to 2004 he was a member of the editorial board of the Revue des Etudes Palestiniennes, the French-language journal of the Institute for Palestine Studies
Institute for Palestine Studies
The Institute for Palestine Studies is the oldest independent non-profit, public service, research institute in the Arab world, was established and incorporated in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1963 and has since served as a model for other such institutes in the region...
. From 1988 to 1989 he contributed to the London-based pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat.
Samir Kassir obtained his PhD in modern and contemporary history from the Université de Paris IV in 1990, with a thesis on the Lebanese Civil War
Lebanese Civil War
The Lebanese Civil War was a multifaceted civil war in Lebanon. The war lasted from 1975 to 1990 and resulted in an estimated 150,000 to 230,000 civilian fatalities. Another one million people were wounded, and today approximately 350,000 people remain displaced. There was also a mass exodus of...
. His books, in French and Arabic, include a history of Beirut and a study of the Lebanese Civil War. He also co-authored a book about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and Palestinian-French relations. In 1995 he founded a new monthly political and cultural review, L'Orient-L'Express, which he edited until it ceased publication in 1998, from lack of interest and pressure from the advertising industry. From that year on he was a professor at the "Institut des sciences politiques de l'Université Saint-Joseph" in Beirut.
It was also in 1998 that Kassir became an editorial writer for the daily Al-Nahar newspaper. He became widely known for his popular weekly column in which he wrote strong articles against the pro-Syrian regime. He also made frequent appearances on several television stations as a political analyst on news programs.
Known for his unrelenting courage, Kassir was unafraid of expressing trenchant opinions. He advocated democracy
Democracy
Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...
in both Lebanon and Syria, and continuously spoke for the rights of the Palestinians. He recognised courage and determination in others and took under his wing leading young pro-democracy and human rights activists such as Wissam Tarif
Wissam Tarif
Wissam Kassem Tarif has played a key role in the field of pro-Democracy and Human Rights work in Syria and Lebanon, as both an intellectual and activist...
, with whom Kassir developed a warm and close friendship. It was his non-compromising views on the Ba'ath regime that many believe led to his assassination.
He maintained a keen and sympathetic interest in Syria despite his criticism of its involvement in Lebanon, and was on close terms with many Syrian intellectuals, including those involved in the Damascus Spring
Damascus Spring
The Damascus Spring was a period of intense political and social debate in Syria which started after the death of President Hafiz al-Asad in June 2000 and continued to some degree until autumn 2001, when most of the activities associated with it were suppressed by the government.- Background...
. He was a founding member of the Democratic Left Movement, which won a seat in the Lebanese parliamentary elections of 2005. Kassir and the party he helped establish were both very influential in triggering the popular upheavals following Prime Minister Rafik Hariri
Rafik Hariri
Rafic Baha El Deen Al-Hariri , was a business tycoon and the Prime Minister of Lebanon from 1992 to 1998 and again from 2000 until his resignation, 20 October 2004.He headed five cabinets during his tenure...
's killing.
Kassir's last book in Arabic concerned the "Damascus Spring" and the consequences for Lebanon of Syrian political developments; Syrian dissident film-maker Omar Amiralay
Omar Amiralay
Omar Amiralay was a Syrian documentary film director and prominent civil society activist. He is noted for the strong political criticism in his films and played a prominent role in the events of the Damascus Spring of 2000....
penned its introduction. Before his assassination, he was working on another book about the "Beirut Spring" that aimed to discuss the recent momentous developments in Lebanon, that was supposed to be published by Actes Sud. In February 2006 a book was published with the same title, by Actes Sud, but contained translations of Arabic articles written mainly after Hariri's assassination
Assassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
.
Samir Kassir was a Christian Orthodox
Eastern Orthodox Church
The Orthodox Church, officially called the Orthodox Catholic Church and commonly referred to as the Eastern Orthodox Church, is the second largest Christian denomination in the world, with an estimated 300 million adherents mainly in the countries of Belarus, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Georgia, Greece,...
married to Giselle Khoury
Giselle Khoury
Giselle Khoury is a talk show host on the Al Arabiya news channel. She has her own program, Bil Arabi, hosting many prominent and high profile guests, political decision makers, heads of states, prime ministers and ministers of foreign affairs. The show covers current events and the latest...
, a talk-show host on Al-Arabiya television. He is survived by two daughters, Mayssa and Liana, from a previous marriage.
His wife, prominent TV presenter Giselle Khoury
Giselle Khoury
Giselle Khoury is a talk show host on the Al Arabiya news channel. She has her own program, Bil Arabi, hosting many prominent and high profile guests, political decision makers, heads of states, prime ministers and ministers of foreign affairs. The show covers current events and the latest...
, and a group of Kassir’s friends, students and colleagues from l'Orient Express, including writer Elias Khoury
Elias Khoury (writer)
Elias Khoury is a Lebanese novelist, playwright, critic and a prominent public intellectual. He has published ten novels, which have been translated into several foreign languages, as well as several works of literary criticism. He has also written three plays...
, created the Samir Kassir Foundation. One of the foundation’s objectives would be translating his works into English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, Italian, and Norwegian.
A special edition of l'Orient Express was published in November 2005, to celebrate its tenth anniversary, under the title "The Unfinished Spring" and was dedicated in memory of Kassir. This project was initially Kassir's idea who was working on it before he was assassinated.
A square in downtown Beirut
Beirut
Beirut is the capital and largest city of Lebanon, with a population ranging from 1 million to more than 2 million . Located on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coastline, it serves as the country's largest and main seaport, and also forms the Beirut Metropolitan...
, behind the Annahar building, was named in Kassir’s honor. The Samir Kassir Foundation erected a bronze statue of the journalist there on June 2, 2006, exactly a year after his assassination.
Assassination
Kassir was assassinatedAssassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
using a car bomb
Car bomb
A car bomb, or truck bomb also known as a Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Device , is an improvised explosive device placed in a car or other vehicle and then detonated. It is commonly used as a weapon of assassination, terrorism, or guerrilla warfare, to kill the occupants of the vehicle,...
in Beirut
Beirut
Beirut is the capital and largest city of Lebanon, with a population ranging from 1 million to more than 2 million . Located on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coastline, it serves as the country's largest and main seaport, and also forms the Beirut Metropolitan...
on June 2, 2005. The investigation into his assassination is still underway, but no one has been indicted yet. Since Kassir had been constantly receiving threats from Lebanese and Syrian Intelligence Officers, there is widespread speculation in Lebanon that the perpetrators were the Lebanese-Syrian security apparatus or remnants of this force (as Syria has claimed that all its intelligence officers were out of Lebanon; in addition, the head of the Lebanese security forces had resigned). The Syrian government has denied these charges.
There was widespread condemnation
Condemnation
Condemnation or condemned may refer to:*a strongly worded rebuke* Damnation, the antithesis of salvationIn other contexts, it may also refer to:-Historical:...
for the killing and many prominent opposition figures blaming the blast on the Lebanese and Syrian regimes. Among them were Hariri's son, Saad
Saad Hariri
Saad-eddine Rafiq Al-Hariri is a Saudi-Lebanese billionaire who served as the Prime Minister of Lebanon from 2009 until 2011. He is the second son of Rafiq Hariri, the former Lebanese Prime Minister who was assassinated in 2005...
, who said "the blood-stained hands that assassinated Rafiq Hariri are the same ones that assassinated Samir Kassir." Moreover, Elias Atallah
Elias Atallah
Elias Atallah born in 1947, is a Lebanese politician, and an elected member of parliament during the 2005 elections. He is also the chairperson of the Democratic Left Movement, and a prominent member in the March 14 Alliance...
, Secretary General of the Democratic Left Movement, urged his allies on March 14 to march to the presidential palace and remove president Lahoud. However, the calls remained unanswered. Years later, March 14 allies admitted that had Lahoud been removed, Lebanon would have been spared the later political assassinations.
Kassir was among the first victims in the growing list of political assassinations that have occurred in Lebanon in the past few years. These began with the attempted assassination of Marwan Hamadeh and followed with the killing of Rafiq al-Hariri, the former Prime Minister. After Kassir, George Hawi
George Hawi
George Hawi was a Lebanese politician and former secretary general of the Lebanese Communist Party . He was assassinated in 2005.-Background:...
, the former head of the Lebanese Communist Party
Lebanese Communist Party
The Lebanese Communist Party – LCP or Parti communiste libanais in French, is a communist political party in Lebanon...
was targeted by another car-bomb; this was followed by failed assassination attempts at former Interior Minister and former Syrian ally Elias Murr
Elias Murr
Elias Murr is the former Lebanese Defense Minister and Deputy Prime Minister. He held the positions of Deputy Prime minister and Interior Minister in previous Cabinets....
and popular LBCI TV anchorwoman and journalist May Chidiac
May Chidiac
May Chidiac is a Lebanese Christian Maronite journalist.Chidiac is a former television journalist at the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation and one of the station's main television anchors until an assassination attempt on her life...
who survived, but lost an arm and leg. On the 12th of December, Samir Kassir's colleague, An-Nahar
An-Nahar
An-Nahar , is the leading Arabic-language daily newspaper in Lebanon.It was first published on August 4, 1933 as a four-page, hand-set paper. The paper provided a platform for various free thinkers to express their views during the years of the Syria occupation of Lebanon. The paper can be best...
chief editor, and top anti-Syria legislator Gebran Tueni
Gebran Tueni
Gebran Ghassan Tueni was a Lebanese politician and the former editor and publisher of the mass circulation An-Nahar daily newspaper in Beirut, Lebanon....
, was killed by a car bomb. Pierre Amine Gemayel
Pierre Amine Gemayel
Pierre Amine Gemayel was a Lebanese politician in the Kataeb Party, better known in English as the Phalange Party. Lebanon's second-youngest MP, he was a rising star in his party...
, the former Minister of Industry, was another victim in the series of assassinations. Gemayel was travelling in his car when gunmen opened fire in broad daylight. MP Walid Eido
Walid Eido
Walid Eido was a Lebanese politician and member of the Current for the Future Lebanese political movement and an MP in the Lebanese Parliament. He was also a member of the March 14 Coalition...
from the Hariri-led Future movement was killed near the Military Bath of Beirut on June 13, 2007, when leaving his gym club. Shortly afterwards, MP Antoine Ghanem
Antoine Ghanem
Antoine Ghanem was a Lebanese politician and an MP in the Lebanese Parliament. He was also a member of the Kataeb party and the March 14 Coalition. He was killed on September 19, 2007 in a car bomb explosion in the Sin al-Fil suburb of Beirut...
of the Lebanese Phalanges Party (aka Kataeb Party
Kataeb Party
The Lebanese Phalanges , better known in English as the Phalange , is a traditional right-wing Lebanese political party. Although it is officially secular, it is mainly supported by Maronite Christians. The party played a major role in the Lebanese War...
), was killed in another car bomb on September 19, 2007 in the Sin al-Fil suburb of Beirut. Shortly afterwards, second-in-command of the Lebanese Armed Forces
Lebanese Armed Forces
The Lebanese Armed Forces or Forces Armées Libanaises in French, also known as the Lebanese Army according to its official Website The Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) (Arabic: القوات المسلحة اللبنانية | Al-Quwwāt al-Musallaḥa al-Lubnāniyya) or Forces Armées Libanaises in French, also known as the...
, General François al-Hajj
François al-Hajj
General François al-Hajj was born in the southern Lebanese town of Rmaich. He was assassinated by a car bomb on December 12, 2007.-Military career:...
was killed in the military-secured suburb of Baabda on December 12, 2007. One month later, security chief and top Lebanese investigator into the International Tribunal for the Hariri assassination was killed in January 2008. Many have blamed Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
for all the recent assassinations of its opponents.
See also
- Lebanese civil warLebanese Civil WarThe Lebanese Civil War was a multifaceted civil war in Lebanon. The war lasted from 1975 to 1990 and resulted in an estimated 150,000 to 230,000 civilian fatalities. Another one million people were wounded, and today approximately 350,000 people remain displaced. There was also a mass exodus of...
- Cedar RevolutionCedar RevolutionThe Cedar Revolution or Independence Intifada was a chain of demonstrations in Lebanon triggered by the assassination of the former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri on February 14, 2005.The primary goals of the original activists were the...
- Rafik HaririRafik HaririRafic Baha El Deen Al-Hariri , was a business tycoon and the Prime Minister of Lebanon from 1992 to 1998 and again from 2000 until his resignation, 20 October 2004.He headed five cabinets during his tenure...
- George HawiGeorge HawiGeorge Hawi was a Lebanese politician and former secretary general of the Lebanese Communist Party . He was assassinated in 2005.-Background:...
- Gebran TueniGebran TueniGebran Ghassan Tueni was a Lebanese politician and the former editor and publisher of the mass circulation An-Nahar daily newspaper in Beirut, Lebanon....
- May ChidiacMay ChidiacMay Chidiac is a Lebanese Christian Maronite journalist.Chidiac is a former television journalist at the Lebanese Broadcasting Corporation and one of the station's main television anchors until an assassination attempt on her life...
- Pierre Amine GemayelPierre Amine GemayelPierre Amine Gemayel was a Lebanese politician in the Kataeb Party, better known in English as the Phalange Party. Lebanon's second-youngest MP, he was a rising star in his party...
Works
- Itinéraires de Paris à Jérusalem. La France et le conflit israélo-arabe, 2 volumes, Paris, Revue des études palestiniennes, 1992 et 1993 (with Farouk Mardam-Bey).
- La guerre du Liban; De la dissension nationale au conflit régional (1975-1982), Paris, Karthala/Cermoc, 1994.
- Histoire de Beyrouth, Paris, Fayard, 2003. ISBN 2-213-02980-6
- `Askar `ala mén? Lubnan al-jumhúriyya al-mafqúda, Beirut, Dár al-Nahár, 2004. (Soldiers against whom? Lebanon, the lost republic).
- Dímúqrátiyyat súria wastiqlál lubnan; al-ba`th `an rabí` dimashq, Beirut, Dár al-Nahár, 2004. (Syrian democracy and Lebanese independence: in search of the Damascus Spring).
- Considerations sur le malheur arabe, Paris, Actes Sud, 2004. Translated and published by, Dár al-Nahár, in November 2005.
- Liban: Un printemps inachevé, Actes Sud, 2006. Translated from Arabic by Hoda Saliby.
- L'infelicità araba , Giulio EinaudiGiulio EinaudiGiulio Einaudi was one of the most important publishers in Italian history.-Biography:Giulio Einaudi was born in Dogliani in 1912, the son of Luigi Einaudi, future president of the Italian Republic, and his wife Ida.He attended the Massimo d'Azeglio liceo classico, and became a student of noted...
editore s.p.a. Torino 2006. - Primavere per una Siria Democratica e un Libano Independente, Mesogea by GEm s.r.l. 2006.
- Das Arabische unglück, Schiler 2006
- De la desgracia de ser árabe, Almuzara 2006
- Being Arab, Verso, London 2006
- Den arabiska olyckan, Ruin, Stockholm 2006
- At være araber, Informations Forlag, Købehavn 2009
- Arap Talihsizliği, İletişim Yayınları, İstanbul 2011
External links
- Samir Kassir Website done by members of the Democratic left movement (inactive since January 2006)
- Samir Kassir's articles (ArabicArabic languageArabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
) - Samir Kasir Prize for the freedom of the press (In French)
- Connecting the dots in Lebanon