Authorities scramble to avert clash over anti-Assad protest

Government officials scrambled Friday to avert a possible clash between supporters and opponents of Syrian President Bashar Assad as a controversial Sunni preacher vowed to go ahead with a planned rally in central Beirut in support of the Syrian people. Sheikh Ahmad Assir said only death can stop him from staging the anti-Assad sit-in in Martyrs Square in Downtown Beirut Sunday and held Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah responsible for any harm against the protesters. Assir said he has received a verbal approval from the Governor of Beirut, Nassif Qaloush, for the sit-in designed to show solidarity with the residents of the devastated Syrian city of Homs which has come under heavy bombardment by Syrian troops for nearly a month. However, Qaloush denied having given such approval. “We have received several requests for sit-ins in Beirut from Sheikh Assir and [pro-Syria] parties. But we have not yet decided on whether or not to give the go-ahead,” Qaloush told The Daily Star. State Minister Ali Qanso also said no final decision has been made yet on whether to authorize any protest Sunday. “The government is making efforts with Sheikh Assir and [pro-Syria] parties in a bid to head off the possibility of political escalation and a security breakdown,” Qanso told The Daily Star. Qanso, who belongs to the pro-Damascus Syrian Social Nationalist Party, said security authorities were contacting Assir and parties allied with Syria to avoid any protest or sit-in Sunday. “The contacts are aimed at preventing any gathering that threatens stability and security in the country,” he said. “National parties are keen on not jeopardizing the country’s stability. Civil peace is a red line.” Assir, a harsh critic of Assad whom he described as “a butcher,” issued his call for the protest last week. “I call on all of you to tell your brothers in Sidon, Iqlim al-Kharroub, Beirut, Tripoli and the north of the gathering in Martyrs Square,” Assir said. He urged his supporters to gather first near the Bizri Mosque in Sidon at 10:30 a.m. Sunday and travel to Beirut together by bus. He made the call during a sit-in held in support of a year-long uprising in Syria and in solidarity with Islamist detainees in Lebanese prisons, which was held at Bilal Bin Rabah Mosque in Abra, east of Sidon, where Assir leads prayers. Speaking at a news conference at his house in Abra Friday, Assir said Sunday’s sit-in will go on as planned, refuting rumors that the protest has been canceled or its location changed. “Contacts have been made with security agencies since last Saturday. They have informed us that there is no problem. We have also contacted the governor [of Beirut] who gave us a verbal response, saying that there is no problem,” Assir said. He called on the government to protect the participants in the sit-in, warning that some pro-Syria March 8 parties wanted to block roads and stir up trouble in Martyrs Square on the day of the planned sit-in. “We are living in a state and not in the jungle and the state must protect us. We are planning to demonstrate peacefully and I call on security agencies and the government to strike with an iron fist against anyone who tries to carry out riots even if he was among those participating in the sit-in,” Assir said. Earlier in his Friday sermon, Assir held Nasrallah responsible for the safety of the protesters. “Nothing in the world except death can prevent us from heading to Martyrs Square in central Beirut to stage a sit-in to show solidarity with Syria and Al-Aqsa [Mosque],” Assir told around 700 worshippers at Bilal Bin Rabah Mosque. “Nasrallah is responsible for any harm against the protesters,” he said. In a clear reference to the Hezbollah-dominated government of Prime Minister Najib Mikati, Assir called Nasrallah “the head of the Baath Party’s government in Lebanon.” He urged his supporters to avoid carrying arms during the protest. Meanwhile, some 300 people, including Syrian refugees, demonstrated after Friday prayers in the Qibbeh neighborhood in the northern city of Tripoli to show solidarity with the Syrian people. During the procession, which was led by religious leaders, the protesters carried placards condemning the bloody crackdown against the Syrian revolution and pictures of the victims of the massacres committed in Syrian cities. They also chanted anti-regime slogans and demanded Assad’s departure. The protesters collected donations for the Syrian revolution and Syrian refugees in Lebanon. In his Friday sermon, the Imam of Hamza Mosque Sheikh Zakaria Abdel-Razzaq Masri said: “We tell the Baath Party in Damascus and its supporters in Tehran and Baghdad and the southern suburbs in Lebanon that the entry of the Syrian army into Baba Amr in Homs will not change anything in the continuation of the Syrian people’s glorious revolution against their treacherous regime and the outdated Baath Party.” – With additional reporting by Mohammad Zaatari and Antoine Amrieh