BEIRUT: Four Sunni Muslim scholars were beaten up in two separate attacks in Beirut on Sunday night, testing a fragile peace between the sects and factions that fought Lebanon’s 15-year civil war.
Mazen Hariri and Ahmed Fekhran, both scholars at Lebanon’s highest Sunni seat of learning, Dar Al Fatwa, were attacked by a group of men in the mainly Shia Khandak Al Ghamik area after they left the Mohammed Al Amin mosque in downtown Beirut, security sources said yesterday. Ibrahim Abdul-Latif and Omar Imani, also Sunni scholars, were assaulted in Shiyah, a Shia district in southern Beirut.
The two main Shia parties in Lebanon, the militant Hezbollah group and Amal, were quick to condemn the attacks and handed over five suspects to security forces, the sources said. They said the five men had been under the influence of drugs.
Lebanese Interior Minister Marwan Charbel later said that 10 men had been arrested.
The two-year-old conflict in neighbouring Syria — which pits mainly Sunni Muslims against President Bashar Al Assad, who comes from the Shia-derived Alawite sect — has deepened divisions in Lebanon between some Sunnis and Shi’ites.
Lebanon-based political scientist Hilal Khashan said Syria could be implicated in the attacks as it had warned Lebanese groups not to support the uprising against Assad.
The extent of the injuries inflicted on the Sunni sheikhs was not clear, but a photo of two of them posted on Facebook showed one in a neck brace and the other with a bruised face.
Lebanon’s civil war ended in 1990 but its political system remains based on sectarian allegiances and the country is plagued by occasional clashes between militant groups and vitriolic rhetoric from some politicians.
Lebanon’s Grand Mufti Mohammad Rashid Qabbani said the attacks were the result of a “political war” by Sunni and Shia leaders. He described condemnations of the perpetrators as insufficient and demanded swift action.reuters
