Qabbani files lawsuit before Public Prosecution against Sheikh assaulters

           
Grand Mufti of the Lebanese Republic Sheikh Mohammad Rachid Qabbani filed a lawsuit before the Public Prosecution on Monday against those who were involved in the assault against the two Sunni clerics in Beirut; Mazen Walid Hariri and Ahmad Mohammad Fekhran.           

The complaint was filed on the basis of threats against national security and inciting sectarian strife as per the second chapter of the Lebanese penal code.            
Qabbani stressed that the aim of the charges was not one of reprisal but one of accountability, stressing that the case should be referred to the Justice Council “due to the gravity of the crimes committed in terms of threatening civil”.             

Four Sunni Muslim scholars were beaten up in two separate attacks in Beirut on Sunday night [March 17], testing a fragile peace between the sects and factions in Lebanon.                

Mazen Hariri and Ahmed Fekhran, both scholars at Lebanon's highest Sunni seat of learning, Dar al-Fatwa, were attacked by a group of men in Khandak al-Ghamik area after they left the Mohammed al-Amin mosque in downtown Beirut, security sources said.                   

Ibrahim Abdul-Latif and Omar Imani, also Sunni scholars,  were assaulted in Shiyah, a district in southern Beirut.                   

The extent of the injuries inflicted on the Sunni sheikhs was not clear, but a photo of two of them posted on Facebook showed one in a neck brace and the other with a bruised face.           

The two-year-old conflict in neighboring Syria - which pits mainly Sunni Muslims against President Bashar al-Assad, who comes from the Shi'ite-derived Alawite sect - has deepened divisions in Lebanon between some Sunnis and Shi'ites.