Once, on the way to the airport, Friedman witnessed a kidnapping, and noticed that his taxi driver barely reacted to this horrifying event. This proved to Friedman that he needed a “wild imagination” to endure Beirut (22), and he must be ready for surprises at any given moment. Even a hardened Israeli general would later tell Friedman that Beirut shocked him, recalling a story where a large group of Druse (an Abrahamic religious sect in Lebanon) approached him with orange crates full of body parts, allegedly men killed by the Maronites Phalangist militia. The Phalangist commander said that the Druse carve up their own battlefield dead to accuse the Maronites of atrocities; it was at that point that the general realized he was in a situation he did not understand.

Friedman’s own realization to the same effect occurred when a family of Palestinian refugees fleeing the Israeli invasion of southern Lebanon arrived outside his apartment building, the father carrying a rocket-propelled grenade launcher. Friedman relocated to the Commodore Hotel, where many journalists were staying, and lent the apartment to his driver and two of his children. Friedman later received word that his apartment had been bombed, killing both children and his wife, along with 16 others in the building.