Funeral Of Bashir Gemayel | Maronite Christian Warlord & President-Elect | September 1982

Wednesday, September 15th 1982. Brief footage of the funeral of 34-year-old Bashir Gemayel, President-elect of Lebanon who was killed on Tuesday, September 14th 1982 when a bomb shattered the headquarters of his Lebanese Christian Phalangist Party in east Beirut. Gemayel had been elected President on August 23rd 1982 at a special session of Parliament that was boycotted by many Moslem legislators. They, and some Christians, considered him an agent of Israel, whose invading troops made his election possible. The President in Lebanon is by tradition a Maronite Catholic and Gemayel had been the sole candidate for the presidency. On his election, he sought to portray himself as a moderate whose aim was to see foreign militias and armies leave Lebanon so as to effect national unity: ''We are looking to get all the foreigners out - Syrians, Palestinians and Israelis and even Unifil. We don't need any foreign armed presence in this country. We will take care of the security of our own country.'' Educated at a Lebanese Jesuit school and a university in Texas, Gemayel returned to Lebanon where he built up a large private militia of up to 25,000 guerrillas at the time of Israel's invasion. He ruthlessly attacked Christian rivals such as Suleiman Franjieh and Dany Chamoun until his Phalangists became the dominant force in the Christian community. After his election, he even predicted a ''new era of peace, security and tranquillity.'' However, violence continued and while he survived several assassination attempts in the past, the initial broadcast by Phalangist radio that he had walked away from the bomb blast of September 14th proved to be false. His body was found in the rubble of his collapsed headquarters about six hours after the blast. Source of footage: Reuters News Archive.