Beirut (AsiaNews) - Speculation and mystery surround the killing of a Syrian general. Even the man's name is not known for sure - he may have been called Mohammed Suleiman - nor is his role. Arab media outlets and blogs are nonetheless saying that he was a leading figure. According to Al-Hayat, he was the liaison between Syria and Hezbollah in Lebanon, and various Arab websites attribute the same role to him, like Al-Bawaba, which is also describing him as an adviser to president Bashar Assad. For Lebanon's Al-Mustaqbal, he was one of the president's advisers, and also the head of the security detail at the presidential residence. L’Orient Le Jour attributes the same role to him, citing various dissident sources.
The manner of his death is also unclear. He may have been killed by a sniper, who shot him in a tourist spot in Tartus, at a hotel, or at his house.
In Syria, the newspapers, news agencies, and television stations - all tightly controlled - have not even released the news about his death, while in Lebanon a Hezbollah spokesman has stated that he did not even know him.
The role of the deceased and the manner of his assassination call to mind the February car bombing in Damascus that killed Imad Mughniyeh, military head of Hezbollah (in the photo, an image of his funeral). At that time, although popular opinion attributed the responsibility of his killing to Israel - which staunchly denied the allegation - there were some who noted the extreme difficulty for anyone to organize an attack of this kind against a leading figure, and on a street so close to one of the Syrian secret service offices, which must have at least turned a blind eye.
There are different conjectures over the assassination of Suleiman, which could be seen in the context of the divisions within Syria created by the thaw that Assad seems to want to foster with Israel and the United States, with the consequent distancing from Hezbollah and Iran.
