Security Meeting at Baabda Expresses Solidarity with Army, Urges it to Arrest Gunmen
إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية
A statement issued on Monday after a security meeting presided by President Michel Suleiman at the Baabda Palace voiced solidarity with the military institution and called on the army to arrest those who assault it.
The statement urged the army to take all the necessary measures too confront the gunmen until it ends all armed presence in the southern city of Sidon.
The attendees called on the army to evacuate civilians from the areas of clashes and to maintain their safety.
The security meeting was held in presence of Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Miqati and several ministers in his cabinet and security leaders.
At least twelve Lebanese soldiers were killed in less than 24 hours in clashes with supporters of Salafist cleric Sheikh Ahmed al-Asir in the Sidon suburb of Abra.
Abra is home to a mosque, Bilal bin Rabah, where Asir leads the main weekly prayers on Fridays. The sheikh believes Hizbullah uses apartments in Abra to keep him under surveillance.
He also says the Lebanese army has provided cover to Hizbullah, whose members are fighting alongside Syrian President Bashar Assad's troops against rebels.
Asir was unknown until around two years ago, when he gained prominence for his opposition to Hizbullah and its ally Assad.
The military urged political leaders in Sidon to choose sides and to stand either alongside the army, or with "those who promote strife and the killing of troops".
24 June 2013, 13:59
12
nobody cares about what your useless meetings come up with. we need to be proactive, everyone was seeing this chaos approaching yet Charbel was praising Assir and making kick backs so he boosts his chances furing next presidential elections. so many soldiers and civilians died today who's fault is it? you should all be brought to justice.
24 June 2013, 16:07
21
Asir is a criminal now. When he makes a call to his co-confessionalists to fire on the Lebanese Army, he has put himself in league traitors engaging in treasonous behavior.
And why and how did a character like Asir rise in the Sunni political picture? Because the more moderate Sunni political voices have been stilled either by assassination, or in the case of Saad Hariri self imposed exile under threat of assassination issued by Assad to be carried out by Assad's executioner, Hassan Nasrallah. So, indirectly at least, Assad and Nasrallah are the cause of the rise of criminals such as Asir.
24 June 2013, 16:16
20
2) More directly, when Hassan Nasrallah assumes the authority of the State and prosecutes policies which are necessary to his confessional faction, but repulsive to at least two-thirds of the Lebanese population, this provides the fuel for the fire that has been lit in Sidon, Tripoli and Arsal.
It is critical at this time of turbulence in Syria that will now get more turbulent since the arms embargo to the FSA has been lifted, that Lebanon not get sucked in. The single most effective counter measure that the Lebanese can employ not to get sucked in, is to buttress the legitmacy of the State and of State Institutions such as the LAF, the ISF and the political institutions that direct them, the Parliament, Council of Ministers and the Presidency.
24 June 2013, 16:20
20
3) Instead, because the political class couldn't figure out who would win Parlamentary elections, or maybe because they could, they decided to cancel elections which strikes a body blow to the legitimacy of Parliament.
The PM resigned and the PM-Designate can't put a government together, which strikes a blow at the legitimacy of the "caretaker cabinet". This leaves the figure head president and these meetings that he is calling.
This is the very same pattern that was followed in 1975, the last time that the Lebanese decided to do this stupid thing. Run down the legitimacy of the government so that the confessional militia could arise. And what good is a confessional militia if you don't go out and kill the militia men of the other confessional group?
This is national suicide. It is stupid. It is happening within the collective memory of many Lebanese who did this before.
24 June 2013, 16:30
20
4) And why is this? Just look around at your political class. Jumblatt, Berri, Aoun, Gemayel, Geagea, Hariri, Arslan, Frangiehi. They are 40 years older, but are driven by the same ambitions, fears, economic motivations and political calculations for survival as before. The same traits that caused them to lead Lebanon into an era of illitimacy and lawlessness in 1975 are still there in 2013.
The solution, Lebanse people is rather simple. Break the cycle of incompetency. Go down to the street. Demand Parlimentary elections and a new Parliament. If Berri refuses to call a session, have a sit in at Ain al Tineh until he performs his duties to the People, not just to AMAL.
Only the LAF, with the full political decision of legitimate government can end the "Asir Phenomena" and bring Lebanon back from the brink of destructive stupid war and destruction.
24 June 2013, 17:19
11
@mowatan. Each Middle Eastern country is different. Lebanon happens to be the host country for Hezbollah which is a focal point of the sectarian divisions that have been created first in the Iraq War and continued now in the Syrian Civil War. However, regionally, there is a borderless dimension to the sectarian problems such that events in Syria for instance has a transnational effect, via news outlets such as Al Jezeera or Al Arabiya and the internet that can cause sectiaran inspired hatred to arise in Egypt among Egyptian Sunni against the Shia.
It is a regional powderkeg to stir up this type of sedition. Once this type of regional fire gets started, whoever is starting it has no capacity to bring it to an end.
24 June 2013, 21:00
01
Terrorists target civilians. Example: al Qaïda in USA, Nigeria, Yemen, etc... Or Hezbollah in Argentina, Syria, or Bulgaria and Lebanon.
24 June 2013, 21:01
00
You live in fantasyland. I truly wish you were right but it won't happen in the 21st century.
