By Oliver Holmes
BEIRUT, Oct 19 (Reuters) – A huge car bomb exploded in a
street in central Beirut during rush hour on Friday, killing at
least two people and wounding 46, witnesses and security
sources said.
It was not immediately clear if the explosion targeted any
political figure in Lebanon’s divided community but it occurred
at a time of heightened tension between Lebanese factions on
opposite sides of the Syria conflict.
The bomb exploded in the street where the office of the
anti-Assad Christian Phalange Party is located.
Ambulances rushed to the scene of the blast near Sassine
Square in Ashafriyeh, a mostly Christian area, as smoke rose
from the area. It occurred during rush hour, when many parents
were picking up children from school.
The security source confirmed two dead. At least 46 people
were wounded, another security source said.
Several cars were destroyed by the explosion and the front
of a multi-storey building was badly damaged, with tangled wires
and metal railings crashing to the ground.
Residents ran about in panic looking for relatives while
others helped carry the wounded to ambulances.
Security forces blanketed the area.
The war in neighbouring Syria, which has killed 30,000
people so far, has pitted mostly Sunni insurgents against
President Bashar al-Assad, who is from the Alawite sect linked
to Shi’ite Islam.
Tension between Sunnis and Shi’ites has been rumbling in
Lebanon ever since the end of the 1975-1990 civil war but
reignited after the Syria conflict erupted.
It reached its peak when former Prime Minister Rafik
al-Hariri, a Sunni, was killed in 2005. Hariri supporters
accused Syria and then Hezbollah of killing him – a charge they
both deny. An international tribunal accused several Hezbollah
members of involvement in the murder.
Hezbollah’s political opponents, who have for months accused
it of aiding Assad’s forces – have warned that its involvement
in Syria could ignite sectarian tension of the civil war.
The last bombing in Beirut was in 2008 when three people
were killed in an explosion which damaged a U.S. diplomatic car.
However fighting had broken out this year between supporters
and opponents of Assad in the northern city of Tripoli.
