LEBANON
MUSLIM CLERIC HATE!
Lebanon:
Extremist cleric sentenced to 20 years of hard labour
MENA
August 30,
2021
Hardline Sunni
cleric Ahmad Al Assir has been sentenced to 20 years
of hard labour by Lebanon’s Military Court on Monday,
eight years after deadly clashes between his supporters and the army in the
southern city of Sidon threatened to spill into sectarian conflict, state media
said.
Al Assir was convicted for his involvement in a 2014 attack in
north Lebanon that killed two Lebanese soldiers, arming the hit squad that
carried it out and inciting the killings, the National News Agency said.
The military
court stripped Al Assir of his civil rights and fined
him 51 million Lebanese pounds ($124,000 at the official exchange rate but
$2,684 at the current market rate).
He was
sentenced to death in 2017 for inciting attacks on the army in 2013. An appeal
against the sentence is pending.
Al Assir gained prominence after the onset of the Syrian civil
war in 2011 for supporting Syrian rebels and speaking out against Shiite
Hezbollah and its involvement in the conflict. Clashes between his supporters
and the army sparked fears of Syria’s war spilling into sectarian battles in
Lebanon. He accused Hezbollah of instigating the fighting.
Iran-backed
Hezbollah has intervened in the conflict alongside Syrian President Bashar Al
Assad against predominantly Sunni protesters and rebels.
Al Assir became an influential figure in the southern city of
Sidon, the main gate to Hezbollah's stronghold in the south, where his
supporters staged weekly sit-ins that turned deadly.
In 2013
clashes between Al Assir supporters and the army left
18 soldiers dead. He went on the run for two years before he was arrested at an
airport in 2015 while attempting to flee to Egypt in disguise.
Popular
Lebanese singer Fadl Shaker was one of Al Assir's followers. He was last year sentenced in absentia
to 22 years of prison including 15 years of hard labour.
He remains a
wanted fugitive hiding in a Palestinian camp in Saida.
Former
Grand Mufti of Lebanon: No way except jihad to liberate Palestine
September 27, 2015
Ahlul Bayt News Agency - In regard to the Israel
army’s storming of Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa Mosque and its precincts the former
Grand Mufti of Lebanon, Sheikh Muhammad-Rashid al-Qabbani,
said in a statement that the superpowers have supported and continue to support
state terrorism against Palestine and the Palestinian people since the
establishment of the so-called State of Israel as a Western colony on the Arab
lands of Palestine in 1948.
He added that these Zionist terrorist groups, including the Haganah
and the Stern Gang, committed massacres in Deir Yassin and burned and shelled
many Palestinian homes and villages with their tanks and artillery.
Shaykh al-Qabbani added that the Western countries
who established the Zionist colony in Palestine are responsible for the
extermination of the Palestinian people and their expulsion from their homeland
and all the crimes committed by Israel since 1948, which included brutal
massacres and genocide.
The Lebanese Sunni scholar said that the Zionists’ recent acts of terrorism
against the al-Aqsa Mosque and its precincts, which included the storming,
siege and the killing of worshipers at his holy site, should be nothing except
the signs of the beginning of a battle to liberate of Jerusalem and all of
Palestine and completely eliminate this Western colony of terrorism in
Palestine [Israel].
His Eminence stressed that all Arab and Muslim armies must participate in this
battle.
He explained that Israel and all the countries which support it are involved in
schemes to ignite sectarian wars between Arabs and Muslims and divide them in
order to prevent their unity as this will lead to liberation of Palestine.
“Do Arabs and Muslims and their countries realize this apparent and hidden
deception among their people and countries?” he asked.
Sheikh al-Qabbani believes that the foreign mandate which
divided Arab countries after World War II through the Sykes-Picot Agreement
sought to distract Arabs from the Palestine issue by creating internal
differences among them so that they could take over Palestine and establish a
Western Zionist colony for their own imperialist purposes there.
He called on Muslim scholars and governments to rise up and liberate Palestine,
saying it is the duty of all Arab and Islamic people to support Palestine and
its people and not to fear their weapons.
The former Grand Mufti of Lebanese added that in the Holy Quran, God told us:
“Do not slacken in the pursuit of these people. If you are suffering, they are
also suffering like you, but you expect from God what they do not expect”
[4:104] and added that there is no way to liberate Palestine without jihad in
the way of God and that compromise with the Zionists will only cause further
damage and keep Palestine in the hands of the occupiers.
“God has promised victory over the deceptive Israeli enemy and the promise of
God is the truth,” he added.
Lebanon
arrests wanted militant cleric Ahmad al-Assir
15 August 2015
BBC
Sheikh Ahmad
al-Assir was detained at Beirut airport early on
Saturday.
He had been on
the run since clashes with the Lebanese army in 2013, which left at least 17
soldiers dead.
The cleric organised followers to fight alongside rebels in Syria in
response to Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shia group which backs President Bashar
al-Assad.
Sheikh Assir is wanted over an incident in June 2013 in which one
of his men was caught with unauthorised weapons in
his car at a military checkpoint in Sidon, 40km (28 miles) south of the
capital, Beirut.
Witnesses at
the time said machine guns and rockets were used - and when the army went to Mr Assir's compound, it found heavy
weapons and military-style uniforms.
Lebanese
officials said he was arrested trying to fly to Egypt using a false passport,
having "changed his appearance".
Unconfirmed
reports said he had shaved off his beard and undergone facial surgery.
BBC regional
analyst Sebastian Usher says the media-savvy sheikh has been one of the
fieriest voices in Lebanon, stoking up sectarian tensions as the Syrian war has
raged next door.
Sheikh Assir built his reputation on television talkshows as a self-proclaimed defender of Sunni rights
against the Shia movement, Hezbollah, and its backing of Syria's President
Assad, our analyst says.
Despite being
on the run for two years, he has continued to issue video and audio messages.
Muslim
Clerics: Hand Qur'an Culprits Over To Us or Face Holy
War
BEIRUT -
Lebanon's top Sunni Muslim cleric called on Sunday for an international probe
into a report that U.S. interrogators desecrated the Koran at a military prison
camp in Cuba.
"Every day, the United States commits new follies that deepen the hatred
of the Islamic world toward it and still American officials say 'why do they
hate us?"' Lebanon's Mufti Mohammed Rashid Qabbani
said in a statement.
"The United States must investigate the crime of desecrating the holy
Koran through an international committee with the participation of Islamic
countries to show it understands the danger of the crime carried out by its
soldiers in Guantanamo detention centers, and bring down the severest
punishments on them to prove its intentions toward Islam and Muslims."
Newsweek magazine said in its May 9 edition investigators probing abuses at the
U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay found that interrogators "had
placed Korans on toilets and, in at least one case, flushed a holy book down
the toilet."
Muslims consider the Koran the literal word of God and treat each book with
deep reverence. The report sparked demonstrations in Afghanistan, where 16
people have been killed in the worst anti-American protests since the United
States invaded in 2001.
The United States has tried to calm global Muslim outrage over the incident,
saying disrespect for the Koran was abhorrent and would not be tolerated and
that military authorities were investigating the allegations.
Lebanon's top Shi'ite Muslim cleric said the incident was part of a U.S. policy
to breed hatred of Islam.
"The desecration of the holy Koran in the terrifying Guantanamo detention
center that America created under the title of fighting terrorism against the
Muslims who have been arbitrarily rounded up there, is one of the American
methods of torture," Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah
said.
"This is not an isolated act carried out by an American soldier but is
part of an American program...of contempt for Islam, to disfigure its image in
the minds of Americans."
(Reuters)
Phone-call
brothers charged over assassination of Hariri
Martin Chulov, Middle East correspondent
28oct05
A MUSLIM cleric who telephoned three Syrian and Lebanese spy chiefs in the
minutes before former Premier Rafik Hariri was killed by a car bomb has been
charged in connection with the assassination.
The man, Sheik Ahmed Adel-Al, was charged by Lebanese police along with his
brother Mahmoud, who placed two calls to Lebanese President Emile Lahoud in the minutes before and after the February 14
bombing of Hariri's motorcade on the Beirut waterfront.
The charges
were laid early yesterday morning, less than a week after a UN report into the
slaying that widely implicated Syria as a key conspirator in the attack. The
charges appear to increase pressure on Mr Lahoud, who insists he played no part in the killing and is
refusing to stand down.
The report
concluded there was "converging evidence" of involvement by Syrian
and pro-Syrian Lebanese officials in the plot, following pro-independence
rhetoric from Hariri.
The UN
Security Council stopped short of enforcing sanctions this week against
Damascus, which vehemently denies state involvement, but warned that
international action was not far off if President Bashar Al-Assad's regime did
not begin co-operating with investigators.
Separately, UN
Secretary-General Kofi Annan condemned Syria for allegedly allowing weapons to
be smuggled across its border to Palestinian camps in the south of the country.
The US has
pledged to continue pressure on Mr Assad through the
Security Council, which is considering penalties, including trade embargoes.
Syria has
labelled the UN probe into the Hariri slaying as "politically
motivated". Mr Assad has insisted no Syrian was
involved.
However, the
UN team, led by German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis, has analysed 70,195 phone calls made on February 14, zeroing in
on 10 phone numbers that were not used again after the bomb exploded at
12.56pm.
It says six of
the phones were used by a surveillance team that staked out the Beirut
waterfront, unsure of which way Hariri's convoy would travel once he left a
city reception.
According to
the UN, all the phones had been bought from a company with close links to Sheik
Abdel-Al's benign-sounding company, the Association of Islamic Philanthropic
Projects in Lebanon.
The phone
allegedly used by the cleric was busy from 10.35am on the day of the attack.
Over the next three hours, it was used to call the chief of Lebanese security
in Beirut, a senior Syrian spy, then Syria's pro-consul in Beirut and the head
of Lebanese military intelligence.
Lebanon's presidential
spokesman, Rafic Shalala, said the charges were an
important development.
Sheik Abdel-Al
had been under arrest on weapons charges for the past month along with four
Lebanese generals, one of whom was responsible for the President's private security.
Mahmoud was arrested on Saturday. The UN probe concluded that the bomb used to
kill Hariri was detonated above ground and used at least 1000kg of military
explosives. Forensic experts have not been able to determine which explosive
was used, primarily because one of the generals under arrest ordered the bomb
crater to be filled in the following morning to help reopen the road to
traffic.
Eight months
later, the bombed section of the downtown boulevard is still taped off as a
crime scene.
The Security
Council demanded this week that Syria provide access to its officials
implicated by the probe. It also demanded that Damascus immediately stop
meddling in Lebanon, which it has governed in a virtual overlord role for 25
years.
Syria was
forced to cut and run in the wake of the bombing, withdrawing its 14,000-strong
military and intelligence presence. However, Syria's pervasive role in most
aspects of Lebanon's post-civil-war society will take much longer to shake out,
analysts in Beirut say.
Syria has also
long been accused of doing Iran's bidding by funnelling
weapons to the Shia Muslim Hezbollah group in southern Lebanon, which provides
armed support to Palestinian activists in their campaign against Israel.
The US has
alleged Syrian support for the insurgency has been a key driver in keeping
coalition forces in Iraq weighed down for the past six months by an
increasingly sophisticated hit-and-run bombing campaign.
Lebanon
detains cleric over attacks
14 Nov 2005
11:53:30 GMT
Source:
Reuters
BEIRUT, Nov 14
(Reuters) - Lebanon detained on Monday a Lebanese Muslim cleric accused of
carrying out acts of terrorism on the orders of a Syrian intelligence officer,
a judicial source said.
The source
said the Syrian officer had ordered Sheikh Hassan Mazloum to carry out bomb
attacks and shootings in Lebanon, but did not give details on the attacks.
Lebanon
detained six men on the same charges last week and the source said other
suspects were still on the run.
A string of
bombings and assassinations has rocked Lebanon since the February killing of
former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri, fuelling fears
the country was sliding into chaos.
Syria ended
its three-decade military presence in Lebanon in April, bowing to world
pressure and mass protests over Hariri's killing. Many Lebanese blame Hariri's
murder on Damascus and fear it is also behind other attacks. Syria denies any
role.
Syria's
intelligence agencies were key enforcers of Damascus's grip on Lebanese
politics and security from the days of the 1975-1990 civil war.
Military
magistrate Rasheed Mizher issued the arrest warrant
after questioning Mazloum, the source said.
SIDON, Lebanon, Feb. 6 (UPI) -- Security forces seized weapons from the
house of a Sunni extremist cleric in south Lebanon suspected of involvement in
attacks on army troops.
A security source said police broke into the house of Ahmed Ansari in the
southern port city of Sidon Monday and confiscated explosives, guns, automatic
rifles and fliers inciting Islamic extremism.
Ansari was arrested last week as part of investigation into dynamite
attacks on army checkpoints outside the Palestinian refugee camp of Ein el-Hilweh, a haven for outlaws and Muslim extremists wanted by
the Lebanese authorities.
The source, who spoke to United Press International on condition of
anonymity, said Ansari maintains close relations with extremist Palestinian and
Lebanese groups based in Ein el-Hilweh, which is
outside the control of Lebanese authorities.
In another development, Muslim clerics and political groups in Sidon held a
meeting during which they denounced the riots that swept a Christian
neighborhood in Beirut during a demonstration to protest against slandering
Prophet Mohammed in the Danish media.
The rioters who set ablaze the Danish consulate in Ashrafieh,
smashed cars and shop windows and attacked a church, sparking nationwide
condemnations by Christian and Muslim politicians.
Police arrested at least 200 of the rioters, who included a majority of
Syrians and pro-Syrian Palestinians, prompting many Lebanese politicians to
point an accusing finger at Syria.
Many of the arrested Palestinians have reportedly come from Ein el-Hilweh.
Muslim cleric
fails in bid to return
Fri Jul 21, 2006
LONDON
(Reuters) - A hardline Muslim cleric barred from Britain for glorifying
violence said on Friday he tried to get on board a British warship to flee
Beirut but was turned back.
"The
answer was, 'unless you have a British passport you are not entitled to come on
board'," Omar Bakri told Sky News on Friday.
Syrian-born
Bakri left Britain for Lebanon last August, saying he was going on holiday,
after Prime Minister Tony Blair pledged to silence Islamists glorifying violence.
Bakri, who had
lived in Britain for 20 years, said he had shown his British driving licence and his cancelled British passport.
"I know
myself I am not welcome in the UK ... but I have the right like everyone else
to safety," he said. "It is better to try and fail."
Britain barred
him from returning to the country as part of a government crackdown on Islamic
preachers who it says inspires suicide bombers like those who attacked London's
transport system last year, killing 52 people.
The Home
Office said he had been barred because his presence was "not conducive to
the public good."
In an
interview with Reuters in Beirut last August, the bearded cleric said he had no
intention of returning to Britain because of the way Muslims there were being
treated.
Shiite cleric hails Hezbollah militants
Thursday, August 3, 2006
BEIRUT,
Lebanon -- Lebanon's top Shiite Muslim cleric hailed Hezbollah militants
Thursday as "the soldiers of the Arab and Islamic nation" on their
way to triumph over the U.S. and Israel.
Grand
Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah saluted the
fighters in a video aired on Hezbollah's Al-Manar
television.
"You are
moving ... to reach a new victory for the nation and to defeat the American and
Zionist political pride and all the enemies of freedom in the region and the
world," Fadlallah said.
"You are
the soldiers of the Arab and Islamic nation and your struggle will bring
victory to Arabs, Muslims and the oppressed," he said.
Fadlallah, whose house and office in south Beirut were
flattened by Israeli airstrikes last month, urged the guerrillas to continue
fighting the "new battle of Khaibar." At Khaibar, the name of an oasis in what is now Saudi Arabia,
Islam's prophet Muhammad won a battle against Jews in the year 629.
Fadlallah was believed to be the spiritual leader of
Hezbollah in the 1980s, and still has a huge influence with the militant group.
It was not clear where Fadlallah
was speaking from or when the video was recorded.
Top Lebanese
Muslim cleric: U.S. offering Lebanon military base or face new strife
The Associated
Press
October 21,
2007
BEIRUT, Lebanon: Hezbollah's deputy leader warned the United States on Sunday against
setting up a military base in Lebanon, threatening that the Iranian-backed
guerrilla group would consider such a move "a hostile act."
Also Sunday,
Lebanon's top Shiite Muslim cleric said the administration of U.S. President
George W. Bush wants the Lebanese to choose between having their country turn
into an American military base or face a new strife.
The allegation
by Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah and the
warning from Hezbollah's deputy leader, Sheik Naim
Kassem, came days after a senior Pentagon official said the U.S. military would
like to see a "strategic partnership" with Lebanon's army to
strengthen the country's forces so that the militant Hezbollah group would have
no excuse to bear arms.
Eric Edelman,
U.S. undersecretary of defense for policy, spoke about a "strategic
partnership" with Lebanon's army in an interview aired on Lebanese
television Thursday, two days after he held talks in Beirut on military cooperation
with Western-backed Prime Minister Fuad Saniora and
other officials.
Edelman did
not say that the U.S. government wants to build a military base in Lebanon, but
a pro-opposition newspaper reported Washington was offering a treaty that
provides for bases and training. Hezbollah and the opposition seized on
Edelman's comments as subtle confirmation of their accusations.
"We
consider any American military base in Lebanon a hostile act," Kassem told
a group of supporters. He would not elaborate, adding: "Let them
(Americans) interpret things as they wish."
Suicide
bombers who killed some 270 American military personnel and diplomats in Beirut
in 1983-84 were linked to Hezbollah by Western intelligence agencies, but the
group has denied any involvement. The attacks helped drive the U.S. military
out of Lebanon, ending its peacekeeping efforts during 1975-90 civil war.
Hezbollah has
argued that Washington's attempts to boost military ties with Lebanon's army
are a ploy for domination and could turn the country into another Iraq. Some in
Lebanon have expressed fears that a foreign military presence in the country
could attract al-Qaida and other militants, as has happened in Iraq.
Fadlallah, the top religious authority for Lebanon's
1.2 million Shiites, expressed similar fears Sunday.
"We warn
that the U.S. administration is offering the Lebanese a choice either to accept
their country being turned into a (U.S.) military, security and political base,
or to expect a new strife," Fadlallah said in a
statement faxed to The Associated Press.
He said the
Lebanese army was aware of attempts to link U.S. military aid to Lebanon to
confronting the guerrilla group and was determined in "rejecting strife
and rejecting any restrictions on its armament."
Since last
year's war between the Shiite militant group Hezbollah and Israel, the United
States has sharply increased its military assistance to Lebanon to US$270
million in 2007 — more than five times the amount provided a year ago — in a
show of support to Saniora's government.
Fadlallah was skeptical about U.S. military aid to the
Lebanese army.
"The
Lebanese, who have seen the American failure in Iraq and felt the American
involvement with Israel in last year's war against Lebanon ... must be aware
that what the administration of President Bush is aiming at is something else
other than supporting the Lebanese army," Fadlallah
said.
"It (U.S.
Administration) is working to make Lebanon a new base for chaos and another
position for NATO in order to exert pressure on regional and international
powers which disobeyed its decisions and policies," the cleric added in a
clear reference to Iran and Syria.