The World - News from May 18, 1989

Lebanese Christians and Muslims staged a nationwide one-day strike in a unique show of unity to mourn the spiritual leader of the country’s Sunni Muslims, who was assassinated in a car bombing. “Lebanon today mourns its knight, the martyr of national unity, Sheik Hassan Khaled,” said the Voice of Lebanon Radio, mouthpiece of the Christian Falangist Party. Banks, government offices, shops, restaurants, movie theaters and other businesses closed in all areas, including Israel’s self-proclaimed “security zone” in the south, police said. Khaled, 68, known as the Grand Mufti, was killed Tuesday along with 21 other people when a bomb went off as his car drove by in Muslim West Beirut. There has been no claim of responsibility.