A disgruntled government employee raked an education ministry department with gunfire Wednesday, massacring eight people in a rarely matched shooting spree since Lebanon's civil war guns fell silent 12 years ago. Police, who finally overpowered and disarmed the berserk assailant, identified him as Ahmed Mansour, an employee of the teachers' fund section attached to the ministry's building in Beirut's Unesco district of Corniche Mazraa commercial thoroughfare.

Police chief Brig. Gen. Walid Koleilat corrected an earlier version given to newsmen that had the shooting occurring at the state-run Lebanese University. "It happened at the teachers' fund section close to the education ministry and most of the victims were department employees," Koleilat said.

"Mansour had applied for a loan to the tune of $12,700. When he was told at mid-morning that his request was turned down, he went wild, shooting in all directions," Education Minister Abdul Rahim Murad said.

Police originally said Mansour pulled a sub-machine gun from his left armpit and opened up. A later version said the assailant may have pulled a Soviet-designed Kalashnikov assault rifle from a briefcase and opened up.

Ambulances with sirens wailing at full blast raced through the streets of Beirut in and out of the tall education ministry headquarters. The dead were taken to the American University Hospital morgue and at least five injured to AUH surgery theaters.

Among the fatal victims was the woman who headed the teachers' fund department, Rachel Rahmeh Saade. The department deals with pay raises, bonuses, end of service indemnities and loans.

One eyewitness said a woman hugging her small daughter fell to her knees, pleading for mercy and sobbingly kissing his feet. "Get up and go woman. I won't kill you," the witness quoted the killer as responding.

Another witness contested the police claim that Mansour was overpowered and disarmed. "He kept firing until he ran out of ammunition. He then tossed the gun away and calmly walked down the stairways after lighting a cigarette," the witness recounted.

"By the time he arrived at the end of the stairway riot police had arrived at the entrance. He was arrested and I did not see any resistance," the witness said. Koleilat said the killer tried to get lost in the crowd and then sprinted away. But he was stopped and arrested by police.

Koleilat dismissed concerns that the attack by Muslim Ahmed Mansour might have had a sectarian motive. But George Saade, the Christian head of the teachers' union whose daughter-in-law was among the dead, was shouting outside the building: "He killed the Christian employees. How can we live in this country."



People survey the unidentified victim of a shooting on the third floor balcony of an Education Ministry building.


A general view of emergency vehicles lining the street and to the right, the balcony of an Education Ministry building in Beirut, Lebanon, where one of the victims of a shooting spree is slumped on Wednesday, July 31, 2002.

Jean-Claude Saadeh, left, whose wife was killed in a shooting spree, hugs his mother as his father, right, cries outside an Education Ministry building in Beirut, Lebanon on Wednesday, July 31, 2002.


Lebanese soldiers and policemen stand at the entrance to an Education Ministry building in Beirut, Lebanon, on Wednesday, July 31, 2002 as a relative of a victim in a shooting spree sits on the stairs.


Two women, who did not wish to be identified, mourn relatives killed in a shooting spree at an Education Ministry building in Beirut.


A Civil Defense worker opens the way for the evacuation of a victim.


A Civil Defense worker removes an unidentified dead man's body from the third floor of an Education Ministry building.