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Olde Tyme Religion
Heavy Gunfire during Funeral of Teen Killed in Khalde Clash
2020-08-29
It’s that time of year when Sunnis particularly target Shiites.
[AnNahar] Gunshots were fired heavily in the air Friday during the funeral of a 14-year-old teenager killed in Thursday’s sectarian festivities in Khalde.

"During the firing in the air at the funeral, some gunshots were fired at the Chebli Center, the site of yesterday’s clash, as the army sought to contain the situation," the National News Agency said.

NNA said the army was still staging patrols in the area and erecting surveillance checkpoints.

The heavy gunfire erupted as the body of the teenager, Hassan Zaher al-Ghosn, arrived at the al-Arab neighborhood, where leaders of Arab tribes and residents of the area performed a prayer for the dead at the town’s mosque.

The body was later laid to rest at the family’s cemetery in Khalde.

Ghosn and a Syrian man were killed and three members of the Ghosn family were maimed during Thursday night’s festivities between supporters of Hizbullah
...Party of God, a Leb militia inspired, founded, funded and directed by Iran. Hizbullah refers to itself as The Resistance and purports to defend Leb against Israel, with whom it has started and lost one disastrous war to date, though it did claim victory...
and Sunni rustics in the area.

The festivities only stopped after the army sent major reinforcements and political contacts were held at the highest levels. The fighting briefly closed the main highway linking Beirut with southern Leb
...an Iranian colony situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozeen flavors of Christians. It is the home of Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
During Ghosn's funeral, anti-Hizbullah slogans were chanted as young men fired their weapons in the air.

The confrontation had reportedly erupted over the hanging of Ashoura
...also spelt Ashura, it’s the tenth day of Muharram, the first month in the Islamic calendar, and marks the day that Husayn ibn Ali, the grandson of the prophet Muhammad, was murdered in the Battle of Karbala. Shiites mark the day with pilgrimages wherein they cut themselves with swords while Sunni jihadis try to massacre them...
religious banners.
Al Ahram adds:
A deadly battle between Lebanese Sunnis and Shias overnight prompted warnings of more violence as the country is pushed to breaking point by a financial meltdown and political tensions.

Two people - a 13-year-old Lebanese Sunni boy and a Syrian man - were killed in the Khaldeh area south of the capital in the shootout on Thursday night.

Machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades were used in the fighting which witnesses said lasted four hours.

A Sunni Arab tribe to which the boy belonged accused members of the powerful, Iran-backed Shia group Hezbollah of opening fire. Hezbollah categorically denied having anything to do with the incident.

The Lebanese army, which was heavily deployed in the area on Friday, said the problem spiralled out of a row over a poster put up by Shia to commemorate Ashura, the 7th century martyrdom of Imam Hussein.

The army statement said the problem that erupted was between members of the Arab Khaldeh tribes and residents of the area, without identifying them.
Related:
Ashoura: 2019-11-16 Lombard gang leader accused of trying to send money to Islamic State
Ashoura: 2019-10-04 IRGC's intelligence unit thwarts Arab-Israeli plot to assassinate Gen. Soleimani
Ashoura: 2019-09-11 Lebanon Shiites Mark Ashoura in Show of Anti-Israel Defiance
Related:
Ashura: 2020-08-24 At least four civilians wounded in Kirkuk IED attack
Ashura: 2020-06-30 2 tribes - 1 shia one sunni fight each other with heavy weapons in Pakistan
Ashura: 2019-12-02 Houthi forces shoot down 2nd Saudi military aircraft
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