Syria's Assad Tries To Draw Lebanon Into War...Lebanon's Top Intelligence Official Victim of Car Bomb Attack

When the bombing first happened this morning in Beirut, Lebanon...there were many possibilities as to who carried out the car bombing but now the smoke has cleared and it was clearly an assassination attempt that succeeded in killing the most senior intelligence official in all of Lebanon and every finger in Lebanon is pointing to Syrian President Bashir Assad for the attack.

From the report at The Telegraph:

Gen Wissam al-Hassan, head of Lebanon's internal security forces and a known thorn in the side of the Bashar al-Asssad's Syrian regime, was fatally injured when a car packed with explosive detonated outside one of his homes.

The blast in the predominantly Christian quarter of central Beirut resulted in scenes reminiscent of the dark days of Lebanon's civil war.

Ambulances ferried scores of dead and wounded to several hospitals, where doctors struggled to cope with the influx of bloodied victims.

Within an hour Sunni Muslims took to the streets in protest, burning tyres in strongholds throughout the capital and in the eastern Bekaa valley region.

"We accuse Bashar al-Assad of the assassination of Wissam al-Hassam, the guarantor of the security of the Lebanese," former prime minister and opposition chief Saad Hariri told a Lebanese TV station.

Hariri's father, Rafik al-Hariri, was killed seven years ago in a bombing which an international tribunal has blamed on Damascus and Hezbollah.

Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, a longtime critic of Damascus, said: "I openly accuse Bashar al-Assad and his regime of killing Wissam al-Hassan." The prospect that Syria's war might spread to Lebanon has increased after fighting broke out in February between supporters and opponents of Assad in the northern city of Tripoli.

Now, Lebanon is a patchwork of more factions than you can shake a stick at with Sunni Muslims, the Shia Hezbollah, the Christians and of course, the Druze - it's been a country that has literally been ripped apart by civil war in the past - perhaps on the bright side, this might just spur some Sunnis in Lebanon to retaliate not at Assad in Syria but at his little puppets in Lebanon...Hezbollah.  One can hope.

Beirut bomb blast kills Lebanon's most senior intelligence official


Gen Wissam al-Hassan, head of Lebanon's internal security forces and a known thorn in the side of the Bashar al-Asssad's Syrian regime, was fatally injured when a car packed with explosive detonated outside one of his homes.

The blast in the predominantly Christian quarter of central Beirut resulted in scenes reminiscent of the dark days of Lebanon's civil war.

Ambulances ferried scores of dead and wounded to several hospitals, where doctors struggled to cope with the influx of bloodied victims.

Within an hour Sunni Muslims took to the streets in protest, burning tyres in strongholds throughout the capital and in the eastern Bekaa valley region.

The prospect of violence exploding Lebanon sparked international appeals for calm.

French President Francoise Hollande's office released a statement saying: "The head of state calls on all Lebanese politicians to maintain unity in Lebanon and protect it from all destabilisation efforts no matter where they come from." The Vatican condemend the attack adding that the attack was "contrary to efforts and commitments to maintaining peaceful coexistence in Lebanon." Last night some Lebanon's most senior politicans openly accused the Assad regime of carrying out of an assasination plot.

"We accuse Bashar al-Assad of the assassination of Wissam al-Hassam, the guarantor of the security of the Lebanese," former prime minister and opposition chief Saad Hariri told a Lebanese TV station.

Hariri's father, Rafik al-Hariri, was killed seven years ago in a bombing which an international tribunal has blamed on Damascus and Hezbollah.

Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, a longtime critic of Damascus, said: "I openly accuse Bashar al-Assad and his regime of killing Wissam al-Hassan." The prospect that Syria's war might spread to Lebanon has increased after fighting broke out in February between supporters and opponents of Assad in the northern city of Tripoli.

The war in Syria has pitted mostly Sunni insurgents against Assad, who is from the Alawite sect linked to Shia Islam.

Amid rising tension in Lebanon, Shia fighters with the Hezbollah group have been fighting on Assad's side, while Syrian rebels have used Lebanon to supply forces fighting the Syrian regime.

Yesterday's huge bomb rocked the central Beirut district of Ashrafiyeh at the rush hour time of 2.45pm, as parents went to collect their children from school.

The force of the explosion blew away the windows of almost every home and business along the narrow street. Entire balconies were sheared off the apartment buildings near the explosion, crushing vehicles below.

Residents staggered shell shocked around the scene as firemen worked to put out the flames that licked the buildings and ambulance workers dragged away the dead.

"My daughter! My daughter! My God where is my daughter!" a woman screamed, sobbing heavily as she searched through the wreckage of a building for her three-year-old child.

An elderly man sat alone in one of the damaged buildings, staring silently at his devastated living room as blood ran down his face from a cut on his forehead. The balcony on his third story home had crumbled away and the force of the blast had smashed all the French windows, his coffee glass table and television.

"The bomb exploded on a street outside one of his homes. He had been travelling and arrived there late last night," a personal friend of Gen Hassan told the Daily Telegraph.

The blast occurred only 200 meters from the headquarters of the Christian party, the Phalange which is outspoken against the Syrian regime. It was also just a few streets away from the home of the former Lebanese information minister, and key Damascus ally Michel Samaha.

Gen Hassan's Internal Security Forces had arrested Samaha earlier this year and accused of transporting up to 20 bombs into Lebanon from neighboring Syria with the intention of wreaking havoc across the country.

A close alley of the anti-Syrian regime 14 March bloc Gen Hassan had also lead the investigation of the 2005 assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri that implicated Syria and Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

Khattar Abou Diab, a Middle East expert at the University of Paris, said the attack was clearly linked to the Syria crisis.

"This is now revenge against a man who confronted the Syrians and revenge against a district, a Christian district in the heart of Beirut. Regional powers are fighting in Syria and now also want to fight in Lebanon," he said.

Omran al-Zoabie, Syria's information minister rejected the accusations: "We condemn this terrorist explosion and all these explosions wherever they happen. Nothing justifies them." Syria had long played a major role in Lebanese politics, siding with different factions during the civil war. It deployed troops in Beirut and parts of the country during the war and they stayed until 2005.

The prospect that its civil war might spread to Lebanon has long been a source of concern for Lebanese politicians and citizens alike.

Clashes have frequently erupted in the Sunni majority town of Tripoli since February, escalating into a violence that has seen dozens killed.

But this is the first time that the violence has seriously reached Beirut.

The last serious assassination by car bomb to occurred in 2005 when Prime Minister Hariri was killed.

Tension between Sunnis, Shi'ites and Christians in Lebanon has continued after the civil war but has increased with the Syria conflict. Friday's event further polarized Lebanons multi-sect community, that is already divided between those supporting Assad and those backing the rebels trying to overthrow him.