Almost all against all

Early one morning in September 1986 three gunmen patrolling Beirut’s scarred Green Line came across what they believed would be easy pickings.

Early one morning in September 1986 three gunmen patrolling Beirut’s scarred Green Line came across what they believed would be easy pickings. David Hirst the diminutive, silver-haired and donnish veteran correspondent was stranded by the side of the road in one of the most notorious areas of the city. Scores of Westerners had already been seized by militant groups allied to Iran and Hirst was pushed at gunpoint into the back of a BMW for what should have been the start of several miserable years handcuffed to a radiator in Beirut’s southern suburbs. To everyone’s surprise, the Guardian correspondent lived to tell the tale that very night back at his home overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. He explained that he had shouted, struggled, and kicked his way out of captivity.