Lebanese Army Faces Jihadist Threat on Syrian Border

International11 SEPTEMBER 30, 2016 FRIDAY, Slain Jordanian writer buried amid tight security FUHAIS, JORDAN: Thousands of people attended the funeral of Jordanian writer Nahed Hattar on Wednesday amid tight security, three days after he was shot dead on the steps of an Amman court. Wrapped in the national flag, his body was buried in his hometown, Fuhais, 20 kilometers north of the capital. Hattar, a 56-year-old Christian, had been on trial for insulting Islam after he shared a cartoon on social media that mocked Islamists. He was shot three times by a bearded assailant who was arrested at the scene. Thousands of people-members of his family and sympathisers-attended the funeral, waving Jordanian flags and carrying signs saying “No to extremism, no to violence, no to killing”. After prayers at a church in the town, his body was buried in the presence of several dignitaries including former prime minister Abullah Nsour. Dozens of police officers also attended the ceremony. Hattar’s family have accused the authorities of failing to protect Hattar despite their appeals after he was threatened. They also called for the resignation of both Prime Minister Hani al-Malki and Interior Minister Salama Hammad. A source close to the family said they had reached a deal with the authorities, who promised to arrest and place on trial everyone who had threatened the writer or called for his murder. Hattar had been arrested on August 13 after posting AMMAN: Jordanian King Abdullah II (2nd-R) and Prime Minister Hani Mulki (R) offering their condolences to relatives of a cartoon on Facebook under the title “God of Daesh” (the Jordanian writer Nahed Hattar yesterday.—AFP Islamic State jihadist group). He was later released on bail. It showing a bearded man in bed smoking with two women lying on either side, and addressing God as a servant. He explained on Facebook that the cartoon made fun of Lebanese army faces jihadist “terrorists and how they imagine God and heaven, and does not insult God in any way”. The leftist writer was known for his support of the regime of President Bashar al- threat on Syrian border Assad in Syria His suspected killer was charged with pre- meditated murder, terrorism and possession of an illegal Frequent fighting firearm. If found guilty, the suspect could face capital pun- ishment.—AFP ARSAL, LEBANON: From a sandbagged Syria’s 30-year military presence in patrols inside Arsal with car bombs, said army post near the border with Syria, Lebanon. That presence ended in 2005, General al-Dik. The army is widely Lebanese soldiers gaze through tripod- but Damascus retained extensive influ- regarded in Lebanon as occupying a mounted binoculars into hills where ence in its smaller neighbour, partly position above the country’s fractured Imam: Pulse shooter jihadist militants are entrenched, a for- through its close alliance with the politics but its senior officers are power- gotten front in Syria’s civil war that has Lebanese Shi’ite movement Hezbollah, ful figures. Posters along the road to prayed at mosque 4 led to bombings inside Lebanon. so the outbreak of its civil war had an Arsal showed the current army chief, There is frequent fighting between immediate impact in Lebanon. Jean Kahwaji, with the slogan “the right days before attack the army and around 1,000-1,200 mili- In the Shi’ite towns of the fertile man in the right place”. tants dug into the hills around Arsal in a Bekaa valley, on the road to Arsal, The army is backed by Western coun- KISSIMMEE, FLORIDA: An imam has released video large pocket of territory straddling the posters for Hezbollah share the sides of tries, including the United States, which footage of Orlando nightclub shooter Omar Mateen border, Lebanese General Youssef al-Dik buildings with portraits of the move- this year gave it $220 million in equip- praying in a central Florida mosque four days before said. Around 30 soldiers have been ment’s “martyrs” killed fighting for ment, including heavy guns like those the attack that killed 49 people and injured 53 others killed. The Sunni militants are members Assad in Syria. Whether to support visible below the position above Arsal. on June 12. of Islamic State and the former Nusra Assad or oppose him is a question that Britain has given over 60 million pounds Imam Helmi Elagha told reporters Wednesday that Front, groups fighting Syria’s President splits Lebanese parties, partly along sec- worth of equipment since 2012, includ- he was unaware that Mateen had visited the mosque Bashar al-Assad. They regard the moun- tarian lines, and has accentuated the ing old border watchtowers once used until FBI investigators contacted him a couple of days tains along the Lebanese border as a country’s political deadlock. in Northern Ireland. strategic base and also consider after the June 12 shooting at Pulse nightclub. Lebanon to be under the thumb of Danger Heavy fighting The imam showed reporters a grainy, freeze-frame Assad’s ally, Shi’ite Hezbollah. “The Many Lebanese Sunnis resent the In August 2014, when Islamic State image of a man he identified as Mateen walking into clashes are ongoing day and night. We dominance of Shi’ite Hezbollah, saying it was rapidly expanding across Iraq and the mosque about 10:30 p.m. on June 8. He said target any gathering, activity or any- has cut them off from power and per- Syria, insurgents loyal to it and the Mateen “kept his head down” and went to a corner, thing we sense day or night with all petuated Syrian influence. Some of Nusra. Front, then an official al Qaeda where he prayed for about 10 minutes. He says he kinds of weapons,” he told Reuters dur- them accuse it of instigating the politi- branch, crossed the Lebanese border doesn’t believe anyone exchanged words with him. ing a visit last week. cal crisis and compromising the neutrali- and overran Arsal, regarding its refugee “I’m just thinking, ‘How are you praying? ... You were For Lebanon’s army, seen as a rare ty of the army. camps as a base for cross-border attacks. contemplating killing people in a couple of days,’” neutral institution in a state riven by sec- In recent years that anger has caused After heavy fighting, the Lebanese Elagha, executive director of the American Muslim tarian divisions, fighting that jihadist protests and even some attacks on army army, and in some places Hezbollah, Leadership Council, said at a news conference. presence in a staunchly Sunni Muslim patrols in traditionally Sunni cities. restored control over the town and Mateen stopped at the mosque, which is located in area also means treading delicately to Diplomats say such sensitivities mean strategic points around it, but militants a tourist strip not far from Walt Disney World, during avoid prompting a new domestic politi- the army has learnt to tread carefully in remained in the hills nearby. Islamic Ramadan, which is Islam’s holy month. His wife and cal crisis. A series of bomb attacks have policing mostly Sunni Arsal. State still holds nine Lebanese soldiers child were with him, but they entered the building struck Lebanon since the beginning of Supporters of Hezbollah have said hostage. Across the frontier, advances by from a different entrance, Elagha said. It’s common Syria’s civil war in 2011, some of them such concerns have tied the army’s the Syrian army, backed by Hezbollah, for tourists to stop in at the mosque, Elagha said, linked by the security forces to militant hands and stopped it rooting out mili- last year cut off the militants from the groups based in their neighbour who tants more actively. But the diplomats east, leaving them surrounded in an area adding that the FBI told him it was the only time seek to widen the region’s sectarian vio- said a campaign to crush them would be straddling the border. Both Islamic State Mateen visited. lence. They are just one way the conflict difficult because they occupy well and the Nusra Front, which in July cut its At first, Elagha said, he didn’t release the video threatens to destabilize already fragile defended positions. al Qaeda links and changed its name to clips but changed his mind after the recent stabbings Lebanon, where the political system is in In the army post above Arsal a cease- Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, are still there, in Minnesota and bombings in New Jersey and New near-permanent paralysis and where the less wind swirled fine dust, stinging the General al-Dik said. They live in caves, York, and because of the backlash against American sectarian fault lines of its own 15-year eyes and catching at the back of the ramshackle houses and other makeshift Muslims. “We’re not associated with this terrorist,” he civil war, which ended in 1990, are still nose. The soldiers here face real danger. dwellings, he added, standing in a sand- said of Mateen. “We’re not associated with this mur- raw. On the road from Beirut to Arsal Militants in the hills opposite carry bagged emplacement surrounded by a derer.” The mosque is located in Kissimmee, about 25 stand abandoned houses where weeds assault rifles but also medium-sized coil of barbed wire, and saying that in miles from Orlando.—AP grow from old shell holes. Nearby is a weapons like mortars and anti-tank mis- winter a meter or more of snow covers former Syrian army post, evidence of siles. They attack hilltop posts and target the hills.—Reuters.

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