Clashes broke out in in Abra, east of the southern Lebanon city of Sidon on Sunday, claiming the lives of at least five army soldiers and stoking fears that violence triggered by the war in Syria will increasingly engulf its smaller neighbor.Here is some of Sunday afternoon's fighting in Sidon:
Two gunmen loyal to an anti-Hezbollah sheikh were also killed in the clashes , security sources said, in an act the Army deemed as a cold-blooded attack on the military which called for an “iron fist” approach to deter further aggression.
The army said the fighting began when supporters of Shiekh Ahmed Assir, an outspoken Sidon cleric, launched a surprise attack on one of its checkpoints in the Abra neighborhood of the city, 25 miles south of the capital. Lebanese television said that the army had earlier arrested several of his supporters.
“What happened today in Sidon went beyond all expectations,” the army said in a statement. “The army was targeted in a cold blooded and deliberate attack.”
Assir, known for his tirades against Iran-backed Hezbollah’s influence over the Lebanese state and army, posted a video online Sunday calling for Sunni soldiers to defect from the army, which he lambasted as “Iranian and Shiite”.
“To all our partisans, we are being attacked by the Lebanese Army, which is Iranian and Shiite,” Assir said in the video. He claimed the Army belonged to the “shabiha [thugs]” of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and his ally, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, who heads the Amal Movement.
Also in Lebanon:
Initial investigations have determined that the only forces that possess 122mm Grad rockets that were discovered in Ballouneh in Lebanon’s Kesrouan region on Friday are Hezbullah and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command PFLP-GC informed sources told the Central News Agency (CNA) according to a report by An Nahar newspaper.This is in addition to the fighting that has been going on for months in Tripoli between Shiites and Sunnis, and the rockets that have been fired from Syria towards Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon, or Syrian Army forays into Sunni areas of Lebanon.
Both Hezbollah and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) are staunch allies of the Syrian regime of president Bashar Al Assad
An Nahar reported that the investigations are currently focusing on how the rockets and their launch pads were placed in the region and what their target was.
Sources told the daily that the incident was aimed at intimidation and creating confusion in Lebanon.
You just know the Zionists are behind it. After all, if you ask the Shiites, they would tell you the Sunnis are Zionist, and if you ask the Sunnis, they would insist the Shiites are Zionist (or, sometimes, even Jews.)
They can't both be wrong!