Anthony Shadid buried in Beirut; family, colleagues pay tribute to Pulitzer-winning reporter (VIDEO)

Anthony Shadid, the New York Times journalist who died in Syria last week while on a reporting assignment, has been laid to rest in Beirut, Lebanon.

(GlobalPost reports: Anthony Shadid, New York Times journalist, dies on assignment in Syria)

Friends, colleagues and loved ones of Shadid, 43, gathered in the Assembly Hall of the American University of Beirut to pay tribute to the Oklahoma-born Pulitzer Prize winner, the Washington Post reported.

Shadid, who was Beirut bureau chief for the New York Times when he died of an apparent asthma attack, was awarded an honorary doctorate at the university last year.

The Post, Shadid's former employer, wrote that:

"Shadid's father, wife, brother and cousin joined diplomats and fellow reporters in recalling a man who had won two Pulitzer prizes for his work in the Middle East, and, said the speakers, touched many lives."  

His family members addressed the hundreds gathered by paying emotional tribute; according to the Post, they said that although Shadid "often wrote about death and violence in the region, he sought life, joy and humanity both personally and in his work."

It quoted Antoine Chadid, the Lebanese ambassador to the US, as saying: "He captured the real essence of our boiling area.

"We realize how much the world, Lebanon, the US and of course his family have lost. But men like Anthony Shadid never leave."

Shadid worked in flash point countries throughout the Middle East for the Associated Press, the Boston Globe and The Washington Post. He won two Pulitzers covering the war in Iraq.

The Jerusalem Post quoted New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner, who helped make arrangements to transfer Shadid’s body to Lebanon for burial, as saying: 

"Had Anthony died several years earlier, it would have been the same enormous human tragedy. But in terms of our need to understand what’s going on in the Arab world in the past year, his loss is larger than that. We need his dispatches — by we, I mean all of us.

"He had tremendous sympathy and deep, textured knowledge of the region, without sentimentality or excuse-making," he added. "He was a great reporter who worked the street, got to know people and wrote stories of exceptional quality and lyricism. All around, it’s an enormous tragedy."

According to the Boston Globe, a memorial service will be held for Shadid on March 3 at 2 p.m. at the Civic Center Music Hall in downtown Oklahoma City.

Members of Shadid's family still live in Oklahoma City, where his cousin, Ed Shadid, is a City Council.