BEIRUT, Lebanon (Newsday) -- The ashes of Edward Said, the Columbia University literary scholar and foremost advocate for the Palestinian cause in the United States, were buried in the mountains of Lebanon at a private ceremony Thursday, Lebanon's official news agency said.

Said died at a New York hospital on Sept. 25 after a bout with leukemia. He was 67. He specified in his will that he wanted to be buried in Lebanon, where he spent part of his youth.

After cremation in the United States, Said's ashes were brought to the mountain resort town of Broummana, 10 miles east of the Lebanese capital. The Protestant cemetery, which overlooks the Mediterranean, is the burial place of the family of his Lebanese-American wife, Mariam Cortas.

The National News Agency said members of Said's family and a small number of close friends held a private ceremony.

Said was a leading member of the Palestinian parliament-in-exile for 14 years, stepping down in 1991. He wrote passionately about the Palestinian cause and a variety of other subjects, including English literature -- his academic specialty -- as well as music and culture.

Said was born in 1935 in Jerusalem, then part of British-ruled Palestine, but as an adult lived mostly in the United States.

He spent most of his academic career as a professor at Columbia, in New York City. He also was a visiting professor at such leading institutions as Harvard, Johns Hopkins and Yale.