Lebanon ? Lebanese leaders pledged Thursday to press ahead with a divisive election for president, to be held in parliament in coming days, despite the car bombing assassination of an anti-Syrian lawmaker.

The powerful bombing Wednesday killed lawmaker Antoine Ghanem and six others, and threatened to derail efforts to bring the country’s rival parties together to agree on a head of state before voting is set to begin next week.

Prime Minister Fuad Saniora pledged that Lebanon would press ahead to pick a president.

“The hand of terror will not win and will not succeed in subduing us and silencing us,” he said in a statement late Wednesday carried by the official news agency. “The Lebanese will not retreat and will have a new president elected by lawmakers, no matter how big the conspiracy was.”

A Cabinet statement Thursday vowed that terrorism will not prevail, and the killers would be found. It stressed that presidential elections should be held and called on lawmakers to attend Tuesday’s session.