ZGHORTA, Lebanon -- It's been almost six years, but the walls of Zghorta, where Lebanese warlord Suleiman Franjieh has carved out his territory, still carry posters of his murdered son.
Franjieh says his blood feud is over with the Gemayel family, his rival for power among Lebanon's Maronite Christians. But the posters tell a different story.
Of all Lebanon's warlords, Franjieh, a former Lebanese president, perhaps best fits the image of Mafia don often used to describe the family heads who have been the real powers in Lebanon during its long slide into chaos.
Controller of a private army, the Marada militia, and dispenser of favors to his people, Franjieh is the undisputed ruler of the Maronite Christians in the hills rising inland from the north Lebanese port of Tripoli.
Aides signal visitors to rise as the white-haired Franjieh walks briskly into the reception room of his stone mansion on a Zghorta hillside. He is still very much 'his excellency, the president.'
When U.S. Ambassador Reginald Bartholomew traveled north early this month, he was acknowledging Franjieh's influence, both as a Christian and as a key ally of the Syrians.
It was Franjieh who scuttled the peace talks in Lausanne, Switzerland, in March by rejecting any reduction in the traditional ruling powers of his Christian sect.
Until that session in the luxurious Swiss hotel, he had been a key member of the opposition to President Amin Gemayel, because of his ties to Syria, his anti-Americanism -- and what happened in the Franjieh's summer house outside the mountain village of Ehden on June 13, 1978.
When the gunmen dispatched by Amin's brother, Bashir Gemayel, had finished at dawn that day, the wreckage of the house contained the bodies of Toni Franjieh, son and heir apparent; Toni's wife, Vera; and his 3-year-old daughter, Jihane.
Hundreds of members of Gemayel's Phalange Party paid for that ambush with their lives. The Franjiehs, who refused to officially bury their son, demanded more.
A year later, a bomb narrowly missed Pierre Gemayel, 79-year-old patriarch of the family. Another bomb killed Bashir's 4-year-old daughter.
Even the assassination of Bashir in 1982 drew only regret from Franjieh that he was not responsible and a declaration that his son's death had not yet been avenged.
Franjieh, sitting in front of glass-door display cases holding a collection of 41 pistols, dismissed the blood feud as 'past issues.' But posters of the slain family still are taped to windows and walls throughout the Franjieh domain.
Guards say the three bodies are in almond-wood coffins in a crypt underneath a memorial chapel that was built at the entrance to the Franjieh summer residence.
Such is the Franjieh reputation that the bizarre, and inaccurate, stories circulating about the bodies include one that has Toni kept in a glass coffin in the family living room.
The killing of the Franjiehs had ominous consequences. Bashir Gemayel's allies in the area were eliminated and to this day, the Phalange Party is nonexistent in Franjieh territory.
Franjieh takes care of his people. With most of Lebanon wracked by war, the domain around Zghorta is peaceful.
Buildings have extended far beyond the edge of the old city of stone houses. It is nondescript construction, but Zghorta is building when much of Lebanon is destroying.
The Franjiehs were only one of several prominent families early in the century in Zghorta, a city that even then had a tough reputation. Eventually Franjieh proved he was the toughest.
He started out running his brother's election campaigns. An admiring 1971 account said, 'His success at the job is indisputable, but his work in forming election tickets and rallying popular support earned him a reputation as a tough man, even a gunman.'
His own arrival in parliament was delayed by another blood feud, this time with the Douaihi family. When the shooting ended in the village church of Miziara on a Sunday in June 1957, Franjieh and his gunmen were standing over the bodies of more than 30 people, including nuns, priests, women and children.
He fled to Syria, where he became lifelong friends with the Assad family that now rules in Damascus. But he was soon given a pardon and returned to take up his seat in Lebanon's parliament, a club representing most of the nation's important families.
As president from 1970 to 1976, Franjieh presided over the descent of Lebanon into civil war. He shared the Phalange dislike for the Palestinians, but differed with his view of a benevolent Syria and a malevolent Israel.
He also demonstrated a strong dislike of the United States, which has not mellowed with age. Franjieh works a condemnation of 'this cowboy ruler,' President Reagan, into answers to most questions.
The origin of his anti-Americanism is not clear. But one factor is clearly the insult he suffered when U.S. customs agents used dogs, the lowest of animals to an Arab, to sniff for drugs in his luggage during a presidential visit to New York.
Franjieh does not easily forget personal slights, whether it is his treatment in the United States or more serious matters. Few believe he will ever list the killing of his son among 'past issues.'
