Hizbullah Says Jammo Assassination Highlights Threat Facing Lebanon, Saniora Slams Murder
Hizbullah on Wednesday condemned the “terrorist and heinous” assassination of prominent Syrian pro-regime figure Mohammed Darrar Jammo in southern Lebanon, a Hizbullah stronghold.
The party said the incident “increases the belief that the criminal hand that is committing massacres in Syria does not differentiate between those fighting in the battlefield and those struggling through their words and stance, the thing that exposes the inability of the killers to confront an argument with a counter-argument.”
“The heinous assassination crime that targeted struggler Jammo -- who had raised his voice high to express his free stance and honest word – highlights the approach of elimination that governs the behavior of the groups of violence and terror who claim to be seeking justice and freedom while exerting efforts to stifle every free opinion that contradicts with their interests and desires,” Hizbullah added.
It warned that “this terrible crime must raise the alarm in Lebanon and push us to look for the most appropriate way to confront these terrorist groups before they become out of control … which would threaten safety and stability in Lebanon and in the region.”
Hizbullah called on Lebanese authorities to “take all the necessary measures immediately in order to arrest the terrorists and bring them to justice and to pursue the conspirators and instigators to hold them accountable and protect the country from the evil of any new crime they might be plotting.”
Meanwhile, head of al-Mustaqbal parliamentary bloc, ex-PM Fouad Saniora, condemned Jammo's assassination, describing it as a “crime by all standards.”
“The assassination or killing of any Lebanese, Arab or foreign citizen is rejected and the killers must be identified and held accountable,” Saniora added, noting that the March 14 camp “had suffered assassination crimes committed over political differences.”
“We reject this approach and we reject the use of violence and weapons against civilians,” Saniora added.
He also condemned the roadside bomb attack that targeted a Hizbullah convoy on Tuesday in the Bekaa region.
Jammo was assassinated by armed men at his home in south Lebanon early Wednesday, his wife and witnesses said, in the first such killing on Lebanese soil.
He is a pro-regime Syrian political commentator who often appeared on Lebanese television to defend the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Witnesses said the 44-year-old official was shot as he arrived at his home in Sarafand, southern Lebanon, at around 2:15 am.
His wife Siham Younis said his "friends in the (ruling) Baath party in Syria had warned him (on Tuesday) by phone that he needed to be careful."
Lebanon is deeply divided between opponents and supporters of Assad, a rift that has intensified since the open intervention by Hizbullah on the side of the regime.
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