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Beirut swamped by protest
01/12/2006 16:51 - (SA)
Beirut - Hundreds of thousands of flag-waving protesters from Hezbollah and its pro-Syrian allies descended on downtown Beirut on Friday in a peaceful but noisy protest to force the resignation of Western-backed Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, who was holed up in his office ringed by hundreds of police and combat troops.
The protesters, which police estimated at 800 000, created a sea of Lebanese flags that blanketed downtown. Hezbollah officials put the number at least 1 million - one-fourth of Lebanon's population.
"This is by far the largest gathering in Lebanese history," Hezbollah official Sheik Hassan Izzedine told The Associated Press.
Saniora, meanwhile, went about his schedule, in what appeared to be a tactic to ignore the throngs outside and as pro-government factions continued to urge supporters for calm.
The Shi'ite Muslim Hezbollah had arranged to buses to carry supporters from all over Lebanon to downtown Beirut and handed out free gasoline coupons to people in remote regions.
Calls for free government
"Saniora Out!" "We want a free government!" protesters shouted through loudspeakers, and the crowd roared in approval amid the deafening sound of Hezbollah revolutionary and nationalist songs. "We want a clean government," read one placard, in what has become the opposition's motto.
Heavily armed soldiers and police closed all roads leading to the sprawling Prime Ministry building that overlooked the massive rally. They unfurled barbed wire and placed barricades to prevent any protests from spilling over into the stone-walled building during what some newspapers have billed as the "great showdown" between the government and the opposition.
Hezbollah's security men formed two lines between the protesters and the security forces to prevent clashes.
Tension already was running high between Sunni Muslims, who generally support the anti-Syrian government, and Shi'ites, who lead the pro-Syrian opposition, and Lebanon's Christians, who are divided between the two.
In a stark sign of the divide, the spiritual leader of Lebanon's Sunnis, Grand Mufti Mohammed Rashid Kabbani, gave Friday prayers at the Prime Ministry in a show of support for Saniora, a Sunni.
Launching a long-threatened campaign to force Lebanon's US-backed government from office, Hezbollah and its allies said a wave of open-ended protests would follow Friday's demonstration.
Saniora defiant
But a defiant Saniora vowed his government would not fall, warning in a nationally televised speech Thursday night that "Lebanon's independence is threatened and its democratic system is in danger."
Hezbollah's deputy leader, Sheik Naim Kassim, made it clear the fight is against "American tutelage" and said the protest action will continue until the government falls.
The United States has made Lebanon a key front in its attempts to rein in Syria and its ally, regional powerhouse Iran. US President George W Bush warned earlier this week that the two countries were trying to destabilise Lebanon.
Lebanon has witnessed a string of assassinations of anti-Syrian figures over the past two years, including a prominent Christian government minister gunned down last week and Hariri's father, former prime minister Rafik Hariri, who was killed in a February 2005 bomb blast.
Hezbollah's leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, called for Friday's protests to be peaceful. From the other camp, the head of the anti-Syrian bloc in parliament, Saad Hariri, urged his supporters should not hold counter-demonstrations.
- AP
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