Assaad Chaftari
Assaad Chaftari (also spelled Assad Shaftari, Arabic: أسعد الشفتري) served as a senior intelligence official of the Lebanese Christian militia Lebanese Forces during the Lebanese Civil War. Chaftari was a close associate of Elie Hobeika. He published a letter of apology to the Lebanese people in 2000, in a national newspaper, for his war actions, he is now dedicated to promote personal change, peace building and reconciliation. Chaftari was a subject in Eliane Raheb's 2012 documentary, "Sleepless Nights". Chaftari wrote a book titled "La vérité même si ma voix tremble" in French, translated to Arabic as " الحقيقة  و لو بصوت يرتجف", in November 2015. Biography. Born in 1955, Chaftari grew up in a French-speaking home in Beirut’s Christian Gemmayze district. In 1974, he joined the Kataeb Party while he was in his fourth-year as an engineering student, one year before the civil war started, when he receiving a military training and helped to create the Kataeb's intelligence service. While in his 20s, he rose in the party the second in command, to become the deputy to Elie Hobeika, whose Israeli-backed group was involved in the notorious 1982 massacre of Sabra and Chatilla , in the Palestinians' refugee camps. In 1988 he participated in a meeting held by the Initiatives of Change movement. Although he had initially been suspecting a hidden agenda, the meeting initiated a deep change in him. Asked to look back over his life, he saw "a path full of blood". He is currently an activist, member of movements and NGOs, including the coalition Wahdatouna khalasouna.