Dead to Rights

LATE at night on February 12, a car exploded in Kfar Sousse, a quiet residential district of Damascus, and killed the lone man who was about to drive away in it. Some say that a bomb was detonated by remote control; others say that the device had been placed in the driver’s headrest. There seem to have been no witnesses, and nobody else was hurt. So Imad Mughniyah died, or as an associate, the Iraqi Shiite militia leader Moqtada al-Sadr, put it, “He was sent to paradise where he became a martyr of world Islamic resistance.” Mughniyah may not be a household name in the West, but he deserves to be. A master terrorist of the times, thoroughly professional, he hid away without the element of playboy publicity common to the better-known Osama bin Laden and Carlos the Jackal. To catch him in the shadows of Kfar Sousse as he left a party given by an Iranian official was an exceptional feat. The consequences are quite unpredictable.

Devoted to violence, conspiracy, and secrecy, Mughniyah’s life illustrates the failure of the Arab and Muslim political and social order. In the absence of the rule of law and institutions to enforce it, the strong and the rich are free to act as they dare, thriving at the expense of everyone else and maintaining themselves in power by sponsoring individuals of bad character to do their bidding. In the course of lawless careers, ambitious but flawed individuals like Mughniyah acquire the means to challenge for power in their own right. So the cycles of violence are selfperpetuating, time and again degrading society as a whole.

About the Author

David Pryce-Jones

David Pryce-Jones (1936–2025) was a British author and commentator and served as a senior editor of National Review.

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LATE at night on February 12, a car exploded in Kfar Sousse, a quiet residential district of Damascus, and killed the lone man who was about to drive away in it. Some say that a bomb was detonated by remote control; others say that the device had been placed in the driver’s headrest. There seem to have been no witnesses, and nobody else was hurt. So Imad Mughniyah died, or as an associate, the Iraqi Shiite militia leader Moqtada al-Sadr, put it, “He was sent to paradise where he became a martyr of world Islamic resistance.” Mughniyah may not be a household name in the West, but he deserves to be. A master terrorist of the times, thoroughly professional, he hid away without the element of playboy publicity common to the better-known Osama bin Laden and Carlos the Jackal. To catch him in the shadows of Kfar Sousse as he left a party given by an Iranian official was an exceptional feat. The consequences are quite unpredictable.

Devoted to violence, conspiracy, and secrecy, Mughniyah’s life illustrates the failure of the Arab and Muslim political and social order. In the absence of the rule of law and institutions to enforce it, the strong and the rich are free to act as they dare, thriving at the expense of everyone else and maintaining themselves in power by sponsoring individuals of bad character to do their bidding. In the course of lawless careers, ambitious but flawed individuals like Mughniyah acquire the means to challenge for power in their own right. So the cycles of violence are selfperpetuating, time and again degrading society as a whole.