On 14 February 2005, former Prime Minister of Lebanon Rafic Hariri was killed along with 21 others in an explosion in Beirut, Lebanon. Explosives equivalent to around 1,000 kilograms (2,200 pounds) of TNT were detonated as his motorcade drove near the St. George Hotel. Among the dead were several of Hariri's bodyguards and former Minister of the Economy, Bassel Fleihan.

Hariri had been part of the anti-Syrian opposition in Lebanon. His assassination triggered the Cedar Revolution, a popular movement which forced Syria to withdraw all its troops in Lebanon by April 2005. The killing also led the United Nations to set up the Special Tribunal for Lebanon to investigate the killing. The Special Tribunal, along with an independent investigation carried out by Lebanese Brigadier General Wissam Al-Hassan, found compelling evidence for the responsibility of the Lebanese group Hezbollah in the assassination. One of the investigators, Wissam Eid, was assassinated in 2008.In August 2020, judges at the Special Tribunal for Lebanon found Salim Ayyash, a mid-level operative in Hezbollah, guilty in absentia of five charges including the intentional murder of Hariri with premeditation by using explosive materials. Three other defendants were acquitted. The panel of judges concluded there was "no evidence that the Hezbollah leadership had any involvement in Hariri's murder and there is no direct evidence of Syrian involvement." Hezbollah denied any involvement and its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, refused to allow the arrest of Ayyash.

A billionaire is a person with a net worth of at least one billion (1,000,000,000, i.e., a thousand million) units of a given currency, usually of a major currency such as the United States dollar, euro, or pound sterling. The American business magazine Forbes produces a global list of known U.S. dollar billionaires every year and updates an Internet version of this list in real time. The American oil magnate John D. Rockefeller became the world's first confirmed U.S. dollar billionaire in 1916, and still holds the title of history's second wealthiest individual.As of 2018, there are over 2,200 U.S. dollar billionaires worldwide, with a combined wealth of over US$ 9.1 trillion, up from US$7.67 trillion in 2017. According to a 2017 Oxfam report, the top eight richest billionaires own as much combined wealth as "half the human race". As of October 2021, ten people have reached the status of USD hectobillionaires, meaning that each has had a net worth of at least $100 billion. All but one (Bernard Arnault) are United States citizens.