February 12 marked a point against radical Islam. The killing of Hezbollah’s mastermind and legend, Imad Mughnieh, in Damascus should be considered a great victory. The death of one of the most sophisticated and bloody terror masters that had been in “business” for 25 years makes the world a much better place, commented a U.S. State Department spokesman. The question remains: who is ultimately responsible for this?

Increasingly, it seems that maybe Syria was behind the attack. Indeed, on Feb. 17, Mike McConnell, the director of National Intelligence, told Fox News: “There’s some evidence that it may have been internal Hezbollah. It may have been Syria.”

Let’s review the chronology of what allegedly occurred on Feb. 12.

First, according to the well-informed Kuwaiti daily al-Seyassah, Mughnieh was reported to have attended a high-level meeting called by the head of Syrian security services and Syrian President Bashar Assad’s brother-in-law, Assef Chawkat. The other participants to that meeting included top Syrian leaders, representatives from Hamas (including its top leader Khaled Meshaal), Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and Hezbollah. The purpose of that meeting was allegedly to select the potential targets to strike in Arab countries, if the latter refused to participate in the Arab summit set for the end of March in Damascus. It was purportedly during that meeting that Mughnieh’s car was booby-trapped.

Second, and interestingly enough, initially, al-Arabiya TV reported that the victim was allegedly a Hamas top leader.

Third, what is most troubling is that the Syrian authorities were silent for nine hours after the explosion. They then finally announced the victim’s name.

Fourth and foremost, what makes also Syria a potential suspect is that security is very tight inside the country and even more so in Damascus. Furthermore, Mughnieh was famous for being rather paranoid about his security detail, so there is only a very slight possibility that foreign security services could have managed to approach and booby-trap his car.

Now, why would Syria “sacrifice” one of its allies? Lebanese analysts are offering a few suggestions:

First, since Mughnieh, as a top Hezbollah operative working for both Syria and Iran, was suspected of having a hand in the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, thus the Syrians might have found it convenient to eliminate him and in the process, sever any link to Damascus. Three years after Hariri’s murder, it now seems as though the international tribunal established by the United Nations will finally be hearing the case.

Many in Washington, Paris and Beirut have been frustrated by the fact that it is taking so long to judge Hariri’s killers, especially in light of how far the investigation of the first prosecutor, Detlev Mehlis, progressed during the first few months following the assassination.

Assad has been trying to prevent the international tribunal getting underway because, analysts believe, the killing of Hariri possibly involved some of his close entourage. The fear in some circles, particularly among the Lebanese, is that a deal may be in the making, whereas the West would agree to call off the international tribunal in return for Syria clamping down on Hezbollah, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Time will tell is this theory holds any water.

While Mughnieh’s involvement in various attacks have been quite documented – mostly in Lebanon in the 1980s (including the bombing of the U.S. Marine and French military barracks in Beirut in 1983), and then in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Argentina – one should not forget his alleged role in setting up Hezbollah offices in Iraq as early as 2003 and training Iraqi insurgents (mostly from Moqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army), and his alleged role in the Hezbollah-Israel war in the summer of 2006.

It is quite interesting to note Israel’s recent stance on Syria starting with the 2006 war. Leading Israeli government officials made a point over that summer of repeating time and again that Syria was not the enemy, at a time when Israeli soldiers were fighting Syrian-backed Hezbollah. Numerous reports of “secret” negotiations between the two countries have emerged, and just last week Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak was in Ankara to talk about improving relations with Damascus (among other things).

Could Mughnieh’s death be the first sign of Assad’s fulfilling his side of the deal?

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Olivier Guitta, an adjunct fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and a foreign affairs and counterterrorism consultant, is the founder of the newsletter, The Croissant (www.thecroissant.com).