Berri Disappointed and Shocked as Authorities ID Suicide Bombers
Speaker Nabih Berri has expressed disappointment that one of the suicide bombers that attacked the Iranian embassy in Beirut on Tuesday was from southern Lebanon.
In remarks to An Nahar daily published on Sunday, officials quoted Berri as saying that he had hoped the two bombers would not be Lebanese to avoid widening the differences between the rival parties.
The southern city of Sidon was the home of Moein Abu Dahr, the Lebanese bomber in the deadly attack in the Bir Hassan neighborhood of Beirut's southern suburbs.
Abu Dahr's father told authorities he believed his son was involved after the army released a photograph of one of the suicide attackers. A DNA test identified his son as the bomber.
The other is Adnan Mohammed, a Palestinian from the Ain el-Hilweh refugee camp and a staunch supporter of Salafist cleric Sheikh Ahmed al-Asir.
Mohammed lived in Zahrani near Sidon.
When Berri found out the identity of Abu Dahr and that he was from Sidon, he said he was “shocked.”
“The south has never produced such men in its history,” the officials quoted him as saying.
An al-Qaida-linked group, the Lebanese Abdullah Azzam Brigades, claimed responsibility for the attack, one of the deadliest in a series of attacks targeting Hizbullah and its strongholds in recent months.
The group said it was avenging Hizbullah's military involvement in Syria.
The party has been openly backing troops loyal to President Bashar Assad against the rebels seeking to topple him.
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