the need for a free, sovereign, and united Lebanon. The DLM called on the protesters to press on to Baabda Palace, residence of the president, hoping to use the momentum to compel Emile Lahoud to resign. However, resistance by Maronite Patriarch Nasrallah Sfeir prevented this, resulting in a temporary fallout between the DLM and opposition. The movement remains critical of perceived Syrian interference in Lebanon, citing its participation in the March 14 Alliance parliamentary bloc as "defending Lebanese independence against the Syrian government’s attacks and against Hezbollah and its allies' attempts to impose their views and choices". It lists "attaining full independence of the country" as a political goal. Kassir and Hawi assassinations On 2 June 2005, Samir Kassir, a founder and leader of the movement, a prominent Lebanese journalist, and an outspoken critic of Syria was assassinated in a car bombing. DLM activists marched to the presidential palace in the Beirut suburb of Baabda to lay a wreath representing guilt for Kassir's death. Elias Atallah, head of the DLM, explained that the wreath would "place the blame at the head of the joint Lebanese-Syrian security regime". Emile Lahoud, then president, condemned the killing and told reporters, "My conscience is clear". After Kassir's death, membership in the DLM surged to a few thousand. Less than one month later, on 21 June 2005, George Hawi, a former secretary general of the LCP, was killed in a similar car bombing in Beirut. Hawi, an outspoken critic of Syria in recent years, actively campaigned for DLM leader Elias Atallah's candidacy in Lebanon's 2005 Elections. Atallah and other allies of Hawi blamed the bombing on pro-Syrian forces in the Lebanese-security apparatus. In an interview with NOW Lebanon, former DLM Vice President Ziad Majed explained, "Georges Hawi ... was trying to bring the communist party, or at least part of it, to join efforts with us [the DLM]." In Al Mustaqbal newspaper, Elias Atallah called for broadening the planned inquiries into Rafic Hariri's assassination to include the Kassir and Hawi bombings. He demanded Lahoud's resignation, saying the president was "incapable of protecting leadership figures in Lebanon." Structure and composition The DLM operates under a decentralized framework in which internal movements are encouraged and represented in a national body. The party's constituency elects a National Assembly, the principal decision-making body, through proportional representation, where every internal movement forms a list. Composed of 51 to 101 members,