It would take the skills of a Shakespeare to do justice to the drama of the Gemayel family’s leadership of the Maronite Christians in Lebanon. But it’s not too soon to say that the assassination in Beirut of Pierre Gemayel is more than just another political murder apparently perpetrated by a Syrian dictator who’s making a habit of this sort of thing. Pierre was the grandson and namesake of a patriarch of Lebanon, the nephew of an elected president, Bashir — who was himself assassinated shortly after being elected in 1982 — and the son of another president, Amin. The Gemayels were for peace with Israel. The killing of Pierre Gemayel is a challenge to American politicians who view negotiations with Syria and Iran as a viable exit strategy in Iraq.

Gemayel’s killing, which was done by gunfire, comes while an investigation is still underway into the bombing murder of a former Lebanese prime minister, Rafik Hariri. Both Gemayel and Hariri appear to have been targeted for their hostility to Syrian meddling in Lebanese politics. It may yet be a while before the details fully emerge, if they ever do, but it’s no accident that almost immediately the world cast blame on President Al Assad of Syria.

Suspicions are turning to Mr. Al Assad even as some American politicians are talking — or behaving — as if they think he could become a useful partner for peace negotiations in Iraq. The theory goes that since many of the terrorist insurgents currently attacking American troops in Iraq originate in Iran and Syria, negotiating with the heads of those countries could lead to more effective control of the problem. Well, the Hariri and Gemayel murders point up how, in Syria’s case, that theory is just so much pie in the sky. Syria’s government is busily exporting death to advance its own despotic interests. Mr. Al Assad’s campaign to stifle a neighboring democracy highlights exactly how at odds he is with America’s goal of exporting freedom.

One irony of the negotiate-with-Iran-and-Syria axis in America has been that so many of its members also campaigned on a platform of fully implementing the 9/11 Commission’s recommendations for averting future terror attacks on American soil. Legitimizing Mr. Al Assad’s regime by making him a negotiating partner would mark an obvious violation of at least one of those recommendations.

The commission, after noting that America needs to spread a vision of the future that stresses “life over death” and “widespread political participation and contempt for indiscriminate violence,” as well as “respect for the rule of law… and tolerance for opposing points of view,” recommended that “Where Muslim governments, even those who are friends, do not respect these principles, the United States must stand for a better future.”

“One of the lessons of the long Cold War,” the commission recommendation continues, “was that short-term gains in cooperating with the most repressive and brutal governments were too often outweighed by long-term setbacks for America’s stature and interests.” That pronouncement would appear to be exactly on point.

It bears remembering that the last time America retreated in Lebanon, after the 1983 bombing of the Marines barracks in Beirut, the move only deepened instability in the country and emboldened terrorists. Osama bin Laden harkened back to the event in his infamous fatwa against America. Back then, the threat Islamic radicalism posed to America wasn’t as clear as it is now, but today there’s no excuse. Were there any doubt before that negotiating with Syria is counterproductive, none can obtain now.