Death
It is believed a Mossad agent, pseudonymously known as "Erika Chambers", a British citizen, took part in Salameh's assassination. She travelled to the Middle East with a charity supporting Palestinian refugees and arranged a meeting with Salameh in Beirut, where Salameh was being harbored by the Lebanese government. Chambers learned Salameh's daily routine.
On January 22, 1979, Salameh was in a convoy of two Chevrolet station wagons headed from Rizk's flat to his mother's for a birthday party. Chambers was on her balcony painting, with her red Volkswagen parked below on Rue Verdun. As Salameh's convoy passed the Volkswagen at 3:35pm and turned onto Rue Madame Curie, 100 kg of explosive attached to the car by a fellow Mossad agent was remotely exploded, either by Chambers or on her notification to another Mossad agent.
The detonation left Salameh conscious, but severely wounded and in great pain, having pieces of steel shrapnel embedded in his head and throughout his body. He was rushed to the American University Hospital, where he died on the operating table at 4:03pm. Salameh's four bodyguards were killed. Four bystanders were also killed. Immediately following the operation, the three Mossad officers escaped, as well as up to 14 other Mossad agents believed to have been involved in the operation.
Read more about this topic: Ali Hassan Salameh
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“She sought her happiness exclusively in the happiness of others. Death gave her her own.”
—Franz Grillparzer (1791–1872)
“I agree that we should work and prolong the functions of life as far as we can, and hope that Death may find me planting my cabbages, but indifferent to him and still more to the unfinished state of my garden.”
—Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)
“Most of the folktales dealing with the Indians are lurid and romantic. The story of the Indian lovers who were refused permission to wed and committed suicide is common to many places. Local residents point out cliffs where Indian maidens leaped to their death until it would seem that the first duty of all Indian girls was to jump off cliffs.”
—For the State of Iowa, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)