Slate Scribe Gets in Syrian Street Brawl

Hitchens, two others jumped during junket
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 19, 2009 9:40 AM CST
Slate Scribe Gets in Syrian Street Brawl
Essayist Christopher Hitchens speaks during a debate on Iraq and the foreign policies of the United States and Britain, on Sept. 14, 2005 in New York.   (AP Photo/Chad Rachman)

Three journalists—including columnist and author Christopher Hitchens—were jumped by thugs during a press junket in Beirut, reports Lawrence Osborne in a column for Forbes. Hitchens “rather gallantly insulted the swastika flag” of a “Syria-loving skinhead party called the SSNP” by scrawling an obscenity on it. He got gashed knuckles and bruises in the resulting fight. “I was on the ground and getting it in the head,” Hitchens says.
(More Christopher Hitchens stories.)

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