Night owls gathered in a bar in Mar Mikhael in August 2022. (Credit: Arthur Dumas/File photo/L'Orient Today)
A man on Thursday night shot dead a police officer and shot a pedestrian on a motorcycle after being detained by Beirut's municipality police on the street between Gemmayze and Mar Mkhayel.
Bechara Gholam, a Gemmayze mukhtar (a local elected official charged with administrative tasks) told L'Orient Today that the man, who was of Syrian nationality, was on his motorcycle before he was arrested at a municipality police checkpoint on suspicion of being illegally residing in Lebanon.
While he was detained in the police truck, the man managed to shoot at one of the police officers with a weapon he was hiding, killing him and shooting at a pedestrian on a motorcycle which he used to escape the scene, according to Gholam. "They should have searched him for weapons," Gholam said.
Security forces have so far not succeeded in finding the alleged killer and the pedestrian is being treated in the hospital Gholam added.
Until now, the Internal Security Forces could not be reached by L'Orient Today for more information on the matter.
MPs representing the Beirut I district, namely Ghassan Hasbani (Lebanese Forces), Nicolas Sehnaoui (Free Patriotic Movement), Jihad Pakradouni (independent but part of the LF parliamentary group) and Hagop Terzian (Tachnag) have planned a press conference at 12:30 p.m. to formally condemn the killing of the officer.