Beirut: A Fortress Under Heavy Fire

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At midweek, journalists in West Beirut were summoned to a press conference by a group called the High Security Committee. There they were introduced to three Lebanese Muslims who had confessed, under duress, to working for the Israelis in a series of car-bomb incidents that had killed 30 people and injured 100. One, an admitted addict, said he did it for drugs; the others claimed that an Israeli officer said their families in southern Lebanon would be imprisoned if they did not cooperate. A few hours later, the three men were executed at the sites of the explosions. The body of one man was set afire by spectators. Above the larger bomb crater a banner was posted: THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS TO THOSE WHO SET CAR BOMBS.

Water was in short supply for days. As taps were broken by angry crowds, the city seemed at tunes on the verge of panic. One evening, the manager of a West Beirut supermarket drove painstakingly along side streets through the no-man's land separating East and West Beirut. In East Beirut, where a sort of normality prevailed under Israeli occupation, he picked up a truckload of bottled water and returned with it after midnight to West Beirut. The next day he sold it at regular prices. As rumors of food shortages spread, people lined up for emergency supplies. Said the proprietor of one grocery store: "People are frightened. They are afraid that in case of a battle, they will not be able to leave their homes, and they are afraid that the Israelis will try to starve the city."

Most of the Syrian occupation forces pulled out of West Beirut during the first week of the fighting, and since then the quality of law-and-order in the streets has been erratic. Some shopkeepers complained of armed gangs demanding food or liquor, and rumors spread about car thefts and people forcing their way into gasoline lines at the point of a gun. On the bright side, as one merchant noted: "There is not much looting because there is nowhere to take the Loot. You can't steal it and go off to sell it elsewhere. We are all stuck here together."

Reported TIME Correspondent Roberto Suro: "Most of West Beirut's people have slipped into a sullen lethargy. There is nowhere to go and nothing to do. Rather than risk going out while the shelling continues, people are staying at home. They sit on their balconies playing cards, and they sit by the radio and listen to the various versions of the news offered by the Israelis, the Phalangists, the Palestinians and the Lebanese government. For most people, the big chore is getting water. Then they sit back and wonder when this will all end, and whether it can get any worse."

Far removed from the danger and discomfort of West Beirut, in both a physical and symbolic sense, was the residence of U.S. Ambassador Robert Dillon. The house, from which Negotiator Habib has been operating for almost a month, is comfortably situated in the hills outside East Beirut. The tough and tight-lipped Habib has had little to say in public about the progress of negotiations, but it is known that he sternly told the Israelis to remove their ring of tanks from around the palace of his neighbor, Lebanese President Elias Sarkis, who happens to live across the road.