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Beirut: powerful explosion in Hezbollah stronghold Beirut: powerful explosion in Hezbollah stronghold
(35 minutes later)
A powerful explosion in Shia group Hezbollah's southern Beirut stronghold killed at least five people on Thursday. An explosion has rocked a stronghold of the Shia Hezbollah group in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, killing at least five people, setting cars ablaze and sending a column of black smoke above the Beirut skyline.
Television footage showed the twisted and blackened remains of several cars being doused with hoses by emergency services. The blast also tore off the facades of several nearby buildings in the Haret Hreik neighbourhood. The nature of the explosion that hit during rush hour in the Haret Hreik neighbourhood was not immediately clear, but a Lebanese security official said it appeared to be caused by a car bomb.
At least 20 people were wounded, the Lebanese health ministry said. If confirmed as a bombing, then it would be the latest in a wave of attacks to hit Lebanon in recent months as the civil war in Syria increasingly spills over into its smaller neighbour. The attacks have targeted both Sunni and Shia neighbourhoods, further stoking sectarian tensions that are already running high because of the war next door.
The Lebanese capital has been hit by a series of bombs in recent months, including one last week which killed a former minister and political adversary of Hezbollah. Lebanon's health ministry said at least five people were killed and 20 wounded in the explosion, which left the mangled wreckage of cars in the street and blew out the windows of store fronts.
In November 25 people were killed by suicide bombers at the Iranian embassy in southern Beirut, and explosions have also hit other nearby Hezbollah districts and Sunni mosques in the northern city of Tripoli. Images broadcast on Hezbollah's al-Manar TV showed firefighters putting out the smouldering hulks of several cars that had been set ablaze. The footage showed at least one building that had part of its facade blown off, and several neighbouring buildings were also damaged.
Conflict in neighbouring Syria has polarised Lebanon and increased sectarian tensions. Al-Manar said the explosion occurred "a few hundred meters from the politburo of Hezbollah". It said the political office was not the target of the blast.
Hezbollah has sent fighters to Syria to join the forces of President Bashar al-Assad, who is from the Alawite offshoot of Shia Islam, while Sunni Muslim fighters have gone to Syria to fight for rebels trying to topple him. Hezbollah security agents as well as Lebanese troops were trying to cordon off the area to keep crowds away from the blast site.
"Suddenly, the whole area went bright and we started running away," Ali Oleik, an accountant who works in a nearby office building, said. "I saw two bodies on the street, one of a woman and another of a man on a motorcycle who was totally deformed."
Authorities brought out bomb sniffing dogs, and at one point announced that there might be another bomb, setting the crowd scattering in panic from the area.
The explosion comes a week after a car bombing in downtown Beirut killed a prominent Sunni politician who had been critical of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad and his Hezbollah allies.
Hezbollah's once seemingly impenetrable bastion of support Beirut's southern suburbs also has been hit several times in recent months.
The Haret Hreik neighbourhood where Thursday's explosion took place is close to the Beir al-Abed district where a powerful car bomb in August killed nearly 20 people.
The attacks raise the spectre of a sharply divided Lebanon being pulled further into the Syrian conflict, which is being fought on increasingly sectarian lines pitting Sunnis against Shias. Syrian-based Sunni rebels and militant Islamist groups fighting to topple Assad have threatened to target Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon in retaliation for intervening on behalf of his regime in the conflict.
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