Arrest head of Qaeda.

Lebanese troops arrest head of Qaeda-linked group

The 'emir' of the Abdullah Azzam Brigades was arrested
 by the intelligence services of the Lebanese
 army in Beirut. (File photo: Reuters)

Al Arabiya News |1st jan 2013 :: Lebanese troops arrested the leader of the al-Qaeda-linked group responsible for a double suicide bombing at the Iranian embassy in Lebanon in November, the defense minister told Agence France-Presse on Wednesday.

Maged al-Maged, the "emir" of the Abdullah Azzam Brigades, "was arrested by the intelligence services of the Lebanese army in Beirut," Defense Minister Fayez Ghosn said, without specifying when the arrest took place.

"He was wanted by the Lebanese authorities and is currently being interrogated in secret," the minister added.

On Wednesday, Sirajeddin Zreikat, member of the Sunni Muslim extremist group, appeared to have had his Twitter account suspended.

Zreikat has claimed responsibility for attack on the Iranian embassy in Beirut which killed 25 people.

He also warned there would be more attacks in Lebanon, if Hezbollah continued to send troops to support President Bashar al-Assad's regime in Syria's on going civil war.

In an interview with Al Arabiya News on the day of the embassy attack, former Iranian President Abolhassan Banisadr said “What is happening in Syria is an international war, all regional parties are involved. Iran, Lebanon and Turkey are heavily involved,” adding that the “Syrian and Lebanese people are the victims of this global war.”(Courtesy : Al Arabiya )

al-Qaeda fighters at Damascus.

Syria: 12 killed in clashes between Army, al-Qaeda fighters at Damascus.

Beirut | Lebanon | 02 Oct 2013 :: Activists reported heavy clashes between Syrian troops and al-Qaeda-linked fighters in northern Damascus have killed at least 12 soldiers and pro-government militiamen.

International weapons inspectors are in Damascus to begin their complex task of overseeing the destruction of Syria's chemical weapons against the backdrop of the civil war.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Wednesday that the 12 died the day before in the city's Barzeh district.

Clashes in Barzeh flared up on Monday when the army launched a push to dislodge the rebels, including al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat al-Nusra fighters, from the district.

The Observatory says the opposition has been trying to capture the area for months in an attempt to take the battle for the capital closer to President Bashar Assad's seat of power.(Courtesy:The Indian Express)

Syrian air force bombs hospital in north, say activists.

Syrian air force bombs hospital in north, say activists.

Syrian warplanes have bombed one of the main hospitals serving
 rebel-held territory in the north of the country, according to
activists and video footage. (File photo: Reuters)

Beirut | Reuters | 12 Sep 2013 :: Syrian warplanes have bombed one of the main hospitals serving rebel-held territory in the north of the country, according to activists and video footage.

Eleven civilians, including two doctors, were killed in the strike against the hospital on Wednesday in the town of al-Bab, 30 kilometers northeast of Aleppo city, the opposition Aleppo Media Centre said on Thursday.

Video footage posted on YouTube showed the limp body of a young child being carried out of the hospital by a man. Another boy lies on the floor, blood on his head and dust covering his body.

In the video, dust fills the air. Rubble and smashed up air conditioning units lie on the floor.

The Aleppo Media Centre said that the emergency and radiology departments were destroyed in the attack.

Syrian jets have bombed civilian schools, hospitals and bakeries - illegitimate targets under the laws of war - during the two-and-a-half--year conflict which started with pro-democracy protests against four decades of Assad family rule.

More than 100,000 people have been killed and divided world powers have been unable to halt the violence.

The government has not commented on the strike but state news agency SANA said on Thursday that the army had killed 14 “terrorists” - a term it uses for rebels - north of al-Bab in an operation on a militant convoy.

Iranian diplomat threatens to kidnap Obama’s daughter if U.S. attacks Syria.

Iranian diplomat threatens to kidnap Obama’s daughter if U.S. attacks Syria.

U.S. President Barack Obama with his daughters
Malia and Sasha. (File photo: AFP)

Al Arabiya | 07 sep 2013 :: An Iranian strategic expert has warned that one of the daughters of U.S. President Barack Obama will be kidnapped and raped if America carries out a military strike on Syria, reported the Daily Mail on Friday.

Alireza Forghani, the former governor of the Kish Province in southern Iran, threatened mass murders and abductions on U.S. citizens in the event of an American-led attack on Syria.

“Hopefully Obama will be pigheaded enough to attack Syria, and then we will see the … loss of U.S. interests [through terrorist attacks],” the website reported him as saying.

“In just 21 hours [after the attack on Syria], a family member of every U.S. minister [department secretary], U.S. ambassadors, U.S. military commanders around the world will be abducted. And then 18 hours later, videos of their amputation will be spread [around the world].”

According to media reports on Friday, the United States intercepted an order from an Iranian official instructing militants in Iraq to attack U.S. interests in Baghdad if the attack goes ahead.

The State Department issued a warning on Thursday telling U.S. citizens to avoid all but essential travel to Iraq.

The United States has been preparing for a military strike on Syria, evacuating non-essential embassy staff from Beirut. It has also warned Americans to avoid all travel to Lebanon and southern Turkey.

Obama is still awaiting the Congress’ authorization for military action. The lawmakers will reconvene on Monday and the president will address the nation on Tuesday.(courtesy:Al Arabiya)

Shelling near Syrian capital kills 16, activists say.

Shelling near Syrian capital kills 16, activists say.

Fatalities include mostly rebel fighters, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights claims

Syrian forces loyal to President Bashar Assad take their
 position during clashes against Syrian rebels, in Aleppo,
 Syria,Sunday, May 26, 2013 (photo credit: AP Photo/SANA)

BEIRUT | 07 Sep 2013 ::  Syrian anti-regime activists say government shelling has killed 16 people, mostly rebels, near Damascus.

The attack near the Syrian capital comes as US Secretary of State John Kerry lobbies European allies to back Washington’s proposed military action against the Syrian regime.The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says President Bashar Assad’s troops fired mortars and artillery early Saturday at opposition fighters’ positions near Moldokhiya, an agricultural area south of Damascus, killing 14 rebels. Two civilians also died in the shelling, the Observatory said.

The group also reported heavy fighting between rebels and Assad troops around the Christian village of Maaloula. The attack, which started Monday, was reportedly spearheaded by al-Qaida-linked fighters and has added to fears of Syrian religious minorities over the role of Islamic extremists in the rebel ranks.(Courtesy:The Times Of Israel)

Lebanon braces for US strike.

Lebanon braces for US strike.

A Syrian boy looks out from his tent at a temporary refugee
 camp in the eastern Lebanese town of Marj near the border
 with Syria on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2013. The Lebanese are
 on the frontline of the latest west Asian crisis as the US laid
 the groundwork for a possible punitive strike.AP Photo

BEIRUT | 04 Sep 2013 :: Up in a small village on Mount Lebanon, an elderly man, Antoine, recounts the horrors of the Lebanese civil war (1975-90). “I had a machine gun. I had an M16 and a Kalashnikov,” he said calmly. “It was a dirty war. We don’t want that again” Not far, across a ridge, lies Syria. He reflects on what that war might bring to his small, coastal country. “We will not return to our civil war,” Antoine says. “We experienced it already. We saw that it is fruitless. We will not return to it.”

Scars of the Lebanese civil war dot the country, but monumentally so in Beirut. During the Battle of the Hotels in the early years of the war, the Christian Phalangists took control of the Holiday Inn in West Beirut to use as a base against the Lebanese National Movement. Today, the Holiday Inn stands as a sentinel of the destruction. At its base sit a force of armoured carriers of the Lebanese army. The floors above are rattled with bullet holes and missile craters. The Holiday Inn would be an artefact in the Museum of Futile Wars. A taxi driver from Idlib, Syria, a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, weaves his old Renault past the Holiday Inn. He points frantically at the building and says, “Surya, Surya,” the Arabic for Syria. Previously he had described the devastation in his native city, from where he had fled two years ago. “We had to go,” he said. “Our building had become the frontline.”

The southern suburbs of Beirut, Dahieh, bristle with activity in preparation for more car bombs or even an aerial strike from Israel. Hezbollah, whose main Beirut base is in these neighbourhoods, is constantly on alert for some kind of attack. It is an organisation that is founded on the defence of this fragile country, whose sovereignty has been threatened since it came into existence as a modern state in 1943. Conversations in the area are often punctuated with fears about Israeli agents on the ground or Israeli drones flying overhead.(Courtesy:The Hindu)

Fears Growing as Syrians Wait for U.S. Attack.

Fears Growing as Syrians Wait for U.S. Attack.

BEIRUT | Lebanon  | 30 Aug 2013 ::  In a narrow alley in the old city of Damascus, a shopkeeper who opposes the Syrian government spent Thursday as usual, drinking coffee with the other merchants who keep him company in place of long-vanished tourists. But the calm on the cobblestone street, he said, could hardly mask the fear and ambivalence over an American military strike.

“Disorder, revenge. Sectarian violence,” he said in a text message, ticking off what he sees as the worst potential consequences of the missile strikes that American officials have threatened against President Bashar al-Assad’s government, which they blame for a deadly chemical attack last week.

In Damascus, as people stock up on food and water and the government closes central streets and moves troops and matériel into residential areas and schools, even staunch supporters of the uprising against Mr. Assad are divided on the looming attack.

Many here feel even a limited strike threatens to inject a new, unpredictable dynamic into a civil war that has largely spared their storied city. And some opponents of the government are loath to see direct American military intervention in their fight, fearful it will hijack and discredit the uprising they have waged for more than two years at great cost.

Though some called early on for NATO intervention, others said they wanted support and arms from Washington — not an attack by the American military.(Copy from:The New York Times)

Death toll in Lebanon bombings rises to 47; al-Qaeda blames Hezbollah.

Death toll in Lebanon bombings rises to 47; al-Qaeda blames Hezbollah.

Sheikh who is linked to Sunni group friendly with Hezbollah arrested as suspect, after surveillance video shows him at site of explosion

BEIRUT | 24 Aug 2013 ::  Lebanese security forces arrested a suspect on Saturday in connection with the devastating double bombing the day before that killed at least 47 people in the northern city of Tripoli, the state news agency said.

The National News Agency identified the suspect as Sheik Ahmad al-Ghareeb, and said police took him into custody at his home in the Miniyeh region outside Tripoli. It said al-Ghareeb, who has ties to a Sunni organization that enjoys good relations with Lebanon’s powerful Shiite Hezbollah militant group, appears in surveillance video at the site of one of the explosions.

The coordinated explosions Friday outside two mosques in Tripoli, a predominantly Sunni city, raised already simmering sectarian tensions in fragile Lebanon, heightening fears the country could be slipping into a cycle of revenge attacks between its Sunni and Shiite communities. For many Lebanese, the bombings also were seen as the latest evidence that Syria’s bloody civil war — with its dark sectarian overtones — is increasingly drawing in its smaller neighbor.

Lebanese police officials said Saturday 47 people were killed and more than 500 wounded in the attack. Some 300 people were still in the hospital a day after the attack, 65 of them in critical condition, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.

The United States, United Nations, and Arab League strongly condemned the violence and the loss of innocent lives.

Meanwhile, al-Qaeda claimed Saturday that Hezbollah, backed by Iran, was behind the bombings in Tripoli. The organization’s North African branch, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM, said via social media that it was “certain” that Hezbollah was behind the “heinous act” in Lebanon. The organization also vowed to retaliate for the attack.

For its part, Iran said the instability in Lebanon plays into the hands of “the Zionists,” aka Israel.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Araqchi “strongly condemned” the terror attacks and said “takfiri,” or Sunni Muslim extremists, were trying to sow unrest and create strife between the different communities in Lebanon, Iran’s news agency IRNA reported.(Courtesy:The Times of Israel)

Lebanon arrests three for planning car bombing.

Lebanon arrests three for planning car bombing.

BEIRUT | 20 Aug 2013 :: A Lebanese and two Palestinians suspected of planning a massive car bombing have been arrested, just days after a deadly attack on Hezbollah's southern Beirut bastion, the General Security agency said.

The men were accused of "setting up a terrorist group and conducting activities that affect security on Lebanese territory," according to a statement late Monday.

"They were preparing to stage an attack using an Audi car containing 250 kg (550 pounds) of explosives."

The car was seized in the Naameh area of southern Beirut two days after a car bomb killed 27 people in a bastion of Shiite militant party Hezbollah, a close ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

On Friday, the government said the army identified a network of people suspected of trying to carry out several car bomb attacks in southern Beirut.

The Thursday attack was the deadliest in Lebanon since a car bomb attack killed former prime minister Rafiq Hariri and 22 others in February 2005.

It was claimed by a previously unknown cell, whose name has strong Sunni connotations, with a spokesman saying in a video distributed online that it was a response to Hezbollah's support for Assad.

Lebanon is deeply divided between backers of the Assad regime and supporters of Syria's rebels.(Courtesy:Al Arabia)

Car Bomb in Lebanon Kills at Least 22.

Car Bomb in Lebanon Kills at Least 22.

BEIRUT | 16 Aug 2013 :: The death toll from a powerful car bomb that ripped through a southern suburb of Beirut has risen to 22, Lebanon’s interior minister said Friday.

The minister, Marwan Charbel, also said officials were conducting DNA tests on body parts discovered near the vehicle that blew up Thursday to try to determine whether the explosion was the work of a suicide bomber.

The car bomb struck a bustling street in the Rweiss district in Beirut’s southern suburbs, an overwhelmingly Shiite area and stronghold of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah. The explosion sent a massive plume of black smoke billowing into the sky, set several cars ablaze and blew out the fronts of buildings on the street.

The bombing was the second in just over a month to hit one of the Shiite group’s bastions of support, and the deadliest in decades. Many people in Lebanon see the attacks as retaliation for Hezbollah’s armed support for President Bashar Assad in neighboring Syria’s civil war.

The group’s fighters played a key role in a recent regime victory in the town of Qusair near the Lebanese border, and Syrian activists say Hezbollah guerrillas are now aiding a regime offensive in the besieged city of Homs.

Syrian rebels have threatened to retaliate against Hezbollah for intervening on behalf of the Assad regime, and Thursday’s car bombing raises the worrying specter of Lebanon being pulled further into the Syrian civil war, which is being fought on increasingly sectarian lines pitting Sunnis against Shiites.

Tensions between Lebanon’s own Sunni and Shiite communities have risen sharply, particularly since Hezbollah began fighting openly in Syria. Lebanese Sunnis support the rebels fighting to topple Assad, a member of a Shiite offshoot sect.(Courtesy:Epoch Times)

13 said killed as blast rocks Hezbollah stronghold.

13 said killed as blast rocks Hezbollah stronghold.

Officials say car bomb attack — the second in as many months — likely backlash for Shi’ite militia’s involvement in Syria

Smoke billows over a Hezbullah stronghold in Lebanon
in the wake of a car bombing attack, Thursday, August 15,
 2013 (photo credit: Channel 2 screen capture)

AP | 15 Aug 2013 :: An explosion ripped through a stronghold of the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah on Thursday in a suburb south of the country’s capital. Thick black smoke could be seen rising over nearby buildings, and eyewitnesses said the blast shook the area.

Lebanese media reported that at least 13 people were killed in the explosion, which took place in the Rweiss district, a Shi’ite region that is one of Hezbollah’s bastions of support. A similar attack took placenearby in early July but did not cause any deaths.

Lebanese officials said the powerful blast was caused by a car bomb, which they estimated was planted by activists opposed to Hezbollah’s involvement in Syria’s ongoing civil war.

An Associated Press photographer saw at least two bodies and many wounded people at the scene. Lebanese TV showed a raging fire and thick black smoke from the blast, which set ablaze several cars. Dozens of ambulances rushed to the scene of the explosion and fire fighters were seen trying to evacuate residents from burning buildings.

Last month, a car bomb exploded in the same south Beirut suburb, wounding more than 50 people, in an attack that what was widely assumed to be the handiwork of Syrian rebels.

In May, two rockets slammed into Hezbollah’s stronghold in south Beirut, wounding four people. The rockets struck hours after the organization’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, vowed in a speech to help propel President Bashar Assad to victory in Syria’s civil war. In June, a rocket slammed into the same area, causing no casualties.(Courtesy:The Times of Israel)

Activists: 75 Syria rebels dead in Damascus battles.

Activists: 75 Syria rebels dead in Damascus battles.

A Syrian rebel points his gun towards pro-regime

 forces during clashes in Aleppo

BEIRUT | AP | 22 Jul 2013 ::  Syrian activists say government troops have killed at least 75 rebels over 24 hours in battles for control of the capital, Damascus.

The death toll reported by the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Monday included 49 rebels killed in an ambush in Damascus' northeastern suburb of Adra early Sunday. The group says an elite unit loyal to President Bashar Assad ambushed the rebels as they were trying to push into the city.

Syrian state news agency SANA reported the ambush Sunday, without giving a casualty figure.

The Observatory reported that another 17 rebels died in fighting Sunday in central Damascus, while another nine were killed in its suburbs.

It was one of the deadliest days for the opposition in the 2-year-old conflict, which has killed 93,000 people.(Courtesy:USA TODAY)

NGO: Clashes between Kurds, jihadists kill 29 in Syria.

NGO: Clashes between Kurds, jihadists kill 29 in Syria.

Al-Nusra Front member holds the jihdist group’s flag in
 Raqqa province, eastern Syria. (File photo: Reuters)

Beirut |AFP |18  Jul 2013 :: At least 29 people have been killed in fighting between Kurdish and jihadist fighters in northern Syria in the past two days, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Thursday.

“At least 19 Al-Nusra Front (jihadist) fighters and 10 Kurds have been killed since the day before yesterday in clashes in the oil region of Hassakeh,” the NGO said.

On Wednesday, the group said Syrian Kurdish fighters had pushed members of Al-Nusra and the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant out of the town of Ras al-Ain and its nearby border crossing with Turkey.

The clashes between Kurdish fighters and jihadists erupted after Al-Nusra Front militants attacked a convoy of Kurdish women fighters, Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman said.

Activists in Ras al-Ain said members of the jihadist groups had taken advantage of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, which began last week, to try to impose their extreme version of Islam.

In the early days of the Syria conflict, when the opposition was desperate for help from any quarter, jihadist fighters were welcomed but a spate of abuses has fuelled a major backlash.

The Observatory said that jihadist fighters began firing rockets at Ras al-Ain, in western Hassakeh, after their expulsion.

They also attacked several roadblocks manned by Kurdish fighters and clashes were ongoing in the village of Tall Alu and Karhok in eastern Hassakeh, the group added.

Kurdish fighters meanwhile advanced elsewhere in the northeastern province, taking control of part of the Sweidiya area of Hassakeh, which is the only majority Kurdish province in Syria.

Syria’s Kurdish minority have walked a sometimes ambiguous line in the country’s conflict, which is now in its third year.

Despite occasionally cooperating with rebel fighters, the country’s Kurds have largely chosen to remain outside the conflict, and have sought to keep both regime troops and rebels out of their areas.

Their position has earned them the ire of some rebels, who fault them for failing to back the uprising.

And the community’s more liberal interpretation of Islam has also made it a target for some extremist rebel groups, including Al-Nusra and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.(Courtesy:AL Arabia)

Jihadists expelled from flashpoint Kurdish Syrian town, NGO says.

Jihadists expelled from flashpoint Kurdish Syrian town, NGO says.

Kurdish fighters have taken near-total control of the town of Ras al-Ain
 (pictured), near the Turkish border, on July 17, 2013. (File photo: AFP)

Beirut | AFP | 17 Jul 2013 :: Kurdish fighters have expelled Jihadists from the Syrian flashpoint frontier town of Ras al-Ain near Turkey, a watchdog said Wednesday, adding that only the border crossing remains under the extremists’ control.

Kurdish fighters “have taken near-total control of Ras al-Ain after fierce battles raged since [Tuesday] evening, pitting [Kurds] against al-Nusra Front, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and other groups,” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Ras al-Ain is home to a majority Kurdish population and is of strategic importance given its location close to Turkey.

Its fighters are trying to ensure neither the regime of President Bashar al-Assad nor the opposition takes control of its areas.
The clashes between Kurdish fighters and Jihadists broke out after al-Nusra Front attacked a convoy of Kurdish women fighters, according to Observatory Director Rami Abdel Rahman.

Nine Jihadists and two Kurdish fighters have been killed since battles erupted in Ras al-Ain Tuesday, said the Observatory.

Activists in Ras al-Ain said members of the Jihadist groups had taken advantage of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, which began last week, to try to impose their extreme version of Islam.

In the early days of the Syrian conflict, when opponents of the Assad regime were desperate for assistance from any quarter, jihadist fighters were welcomed but a spate of abuses has fuelled a major backlash.(Courtesy:Al Arabia)

Syrian rebels, al-Qaida fighters battle in Aleppo .

Former allies have turned against each other and are fighting for control of a key checkpoint in the northern city

Buildings damaged by Syrian government airstrikes
 and shelling, in the Salah al-Din neighborhood of Aleppo

BEIRUT | AP | 13 Jul 2013 ::   Activists say Syrian rebels and fighters from an al-Qaida-linked group have turned their guns on each other and are fighting for control of a key checkpoint in the northern city of Aleppo.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says Saturday’s clashes are focused on the strategic checkpoint in Aleppo’s Bustan al-Qasr district.

The checkpoint is the only gateway between rebel-held eastern districts and the city’s western areas, controlled by President Bashar Assad’s troops.

Earlier this week, al-Qaida-linked militants seized the checkpoint and closed it for several days, cutting the flow of food supplies to the city and triggering the confrontation.

Residents angry over the blockade have staged protests against the anti-Assad forces as food prices soar in Aleppo at the start of the Muslim Holy month of Ramadan.(Courtesy:The Time of Israel)

Powerful blast rocks Hezbollah stronghold in Beirut.

Powerful blast rocks Hezbollah stronghold in Beirut.

At least 53 wounded in apparent car bomb attack; Syrian rebels recently threatened Lebanese militia, but lawmaker blames Israel

BEIRUT  | AP | 09 Jul 2013 ::  A car bomb rocked a stronghold of the Shiite militant Hezbollah group south of the Lebanese capital Tuesday, wounding at least 53 people and setting several cars ablaze in the most serious knock-on effect from Syria’s civil war on its smaller neighbor since the Syrian crisis began, officials said.

The powerful blast struck a bustling commercial and residential neighborhood as many Lebanese Shiite Muslims began observing the holy month of Ramadan, and is the worst explosion to hit Beirut’s southern suburbs in years. While there was no immediate claim of responsibility, there have been growing fears in Lebanon that Hezbollah could face retaliation for its now overt role fighting alongside President Bashar Assad’s troops inside Syria, including, activists say, in the embattled city of Homs near the Lebanese border.

The bombing also is likely to inflame already simmering tensions in Lebanon itself, where deadly clashes between Shiites and Sunnis have grown increasingly common as the civil war in Syria has taken on ever darker sectarian overtones. Some Sunnis in Lebanon, many of whom support Syria’s rebels, have expressed growing resentment over what they see as Hezbollah’s unchecked power in the country.

Tuesday’s blast struck the area of Beir el-Abed, and was most likely caused by a car bomb, officials said on condition of anonymity in line with regulations. They said it went off in the parking lot near the Islamic Coop, a supermarket usually packed with shoppers, and a petrol station.

“The explosion was so strong I thought it was an Israeli air raid,” said Mohammad al-Zein, who lives near the blast site. “My wife was sleeping in bed and all the glass fell on her, injuring her in the mouth, arms and legs.”

Another resident said that he was fasting on the first day of Ramadan and was on his way to shop for the evening meal that would break his daylong fast.

“I was riding my motorcycle on my way to a sweets shop and then there was this massive explosion that knocked me off and I fell on the ground,” said a 52-year-old employee of a private company. He declined to be named out of security concerns.

Health Minister Ali Hassan Khalil said 53 people were wounded. He said most of injuries were light, and that many of them were caused by breaking glass.

The parking lot where the bomb went off is a few hundred meters (yards) away from what is known as Hezbollah’s “security square,” where many of the party’s officials live and have offices. Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah received dignitaries there before the 2006 war. The area was bombed byIsrael in that conflict and Nasrallah has gone underground since then, only rarely appearing in public and never for more than few minutes, fearing Israeli assassination.

“This (blast) is a message, but we will not bow,” said Ziad Waked, a municipal official speaking to Hezbollah’s Al-Manar television.

With smoke still hanging in the air after the bombing, a group of about 100 outraged Hezbollah supporters stormed through the area, carrying aloft pictures of Nasrallah, shouting in support of their leader and chanting sectarian slogans.

Hezbollah operatives fired in the air to disperse people who attacked the interior minister with stones after he inspected the scene of the blast, trapping him for 45 minutes in a building before he was escorted through a backdoor.

“The Shiite blood is boiling,” the Hezbollah supporters shouted.

Minister Marwan Charbel is seen by some Shiites as sympathetic to hardline Sunni cleric Ahmad al-Assir, who was agitating against Hezbollah for months and is now on the run.

Tuesday’s explosion is one of the biggest in the capital’s southern suburbs since the end Lebanon’s 15-year civil war in 1990, and a major breach of a tightly controlled, high security area.(Courtesy:The Times of Israel)Read More>>>

Syrian President: Opposition Failed to Oust Regime.

BEIRUT | 04 Jul 2013 :: Syria’s President Bashar Assad claimed in an interview published Thursday that his opponents have “used up all their tools” and failed to overthrow his regime. The remarks came as Western-backed Syrian opposition figures gathered in Turkey for talks on electing a new leadership.

In comments to the state-run Al-Thawra newspaper, Assad rejected the idea that what has been happening in Syria since more than two years is a revolution. Instead, he insisted it is a conspiracy by Western and some Arab states to destabilize his country.

In the same interview, Assad praised this week’s massive protests by Egyptians against their Islamists leader and said the overthrow of President Mohammed Morsi meant the end of “political Islam.”

In Syria, more than 93,000 people have been killed since the crisis erupted in March 2011. The conflict began as peaceful protests against Assad’s rule, then turned into civil war after some opposition supporters took up arms to fight a brutal government crackdown on dissent. Millions of Syrians have been forced to flee their homes.

Throughout the crisis, Assad has insisted that his government is not faced with a popular rebellion, but a Western-backed conspiracy against Syria, accusing the rebels fighting to topple his regime of being terrorists, Islamic extremists and mercenaries of the oil-rich Arab Gulf states that are allies of the United States.

“The countries that conspire against Syria have used up all their tools and they have nothing left except direct (military) intervention,” Assad said in the interview, adding that such an intervention would not happen.

The comments coincided with a meeting of the Western-backed Syrian National Coalition in Istanbul in the second attempt in as many months by Assad’s opponents to unify their ranks.

The opposition bloc is mostly made up of exiled politicians with little support from Syrians trying to survive the third summer of conflict in the country that has been devastated by the fighting.

Sarah Karkour, a spokeswoman for the SNC, said that acting leader George Sabra and senior opposition figures Louay Safi and Mustafa Sabbagh are topping the list of candidates for the new leadership, including an interim government.

In late May, the opposition leaders met for more than a week in Istanbul, but failed to elected new leaders or devise a strategy for possible peace talks that the U.S. and Russia have been trying to convene in Geneva.

Assad has repeatedly dismissed his political opponents as foreign-directed exiles who don’t represent the people of Syria. He has also shrugged off calls to step down, saying he will serve the rest of his term and could consider running for another one in next year’s presidential elections.

The paper, Al-Thawra, also quoted him saying his opponents failed because they tried to bring religion onto the battlefield. Assad insisted he still enjoys the support of the majority of Syrians, who have stood against Islamic radicals who have emerged as the most effective force on the opposition’s side.

Members of Syria’s Sunni Muslim majority have dominated the rebel ranks, while Assad’s regime is mostly made up of Alawaites, an offshoot sect of Shiite Islam.

“Whoever brings religion to use for political or factional interests will fall anywhere in the world,” Assad said in the interview, again citing Morsi’s overthrow by the military in Egypt.(Courtesy:Epoch Times)

Shelling kills 11 near Syrian capital, activists say.

Shelling kills 11 near Syrian capital, activists say.

his image made from amateur video released by Ugarit News,
 which has been authenticated based on its contents and other
 AP reporting, shows smoke rises in Damascus, Syria, Friday
, June 21, 2013. (Photo credit: AP/Ugarit News via AP video)

BEIRUT  | AP | 02 Jul 2013 :: — Syrian troops shelled a rebel-held suburb of the capital Damascus Tuesday, killing at least 11 people including women and children as government forces forge ahead with offensives against rebel-held areas around the country, activists said.

The shelling on Kfar Batna appeared to be part of a concerted government push against contested and rebel-held areas around the capital. In recent months, troops have captured several suburbs of the capital, Damascus, as President Bashar Assad regime’s looks to secure its seat of power.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the dead in Tuesday’s shelling include two women and a child. Mohammed Saeed, an activist based in the nearby suburb of Douma, said the shelling began early Tuesday and lasted several hours and put the death toll at 13.Saeed said Kfar Batna is usually relatively quiet and shelters a large number of Syrians displaced from other, more tense suburbs of Damascus.“Kfar Batna gets hit every day with a shell or two but today it was struck with about 60 mortar shells in four hours,” Saeed said via Skype.An amateur video showed a man carrying into a hospital a dead baby boy who was draped in white cloth in accordance with Muslim traditions while saying in a shaking voice: “Oh God.”“Oh son” said the man, whose arm was bandaged and shirt smeared with blood, as he placed the dead baby next to other bodies put together in a hospital room.Activists then brought the body of what appeared to be a female relative of the man next to the dead infant. “May God forgive you,” the man said as looked at the woman’s covered body.Another video showed the dead baby boy before he was covered laying on a hospital bed, his mouth open and his face covered with blood. A man in the room said the dead boy was three months old. “May God help us,” the man said.A third video showed seven bodies lined in a room, two of them of children. Names of the dead, who were covered in white sheets, were handwritten on the white covers. One of the dead, next to the two children was identified as “Nour Turshi and her children.”The videos appeared genuine and corresponded to other AP reporting on the events depicted.The United Nations has estimated that more than 6,000 children are among the some 93,000 people killed in Syria’s more than 2-year-old conflict, which started with largely peaceful protests against the rule of President Bashar Assad. The uprising escalated into an armed rebellion in response to a brutal government crackdown on the protest movement.Activists say more than 100,000 people have been killed since the crisis began.The Observatory said that in the northern province of Aleppo, rebels were able to destroy an army vehicle using a Russian-made Konkurs anti-tank missile that they recently received from Gulf Arab states. Observatory director Rami Abdul-Rahman said the rebels appear to have received large numbers of such missiles in recent days.Activists said recently that Syria’s rebels have received shipments of more powerful weapons from Gulf allies in recent weeks, particularly anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles, that have already helped stall aggressive new advances by regime forces.