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Subscribe to RSSHundreds were rushed to emergency rooms after an explosion left a 15-foot crater in one of Beirut's nicest neighborhoods. NBC's Stephanie Gosk reports.
Updated at 4:43 p.m. ET: BEIRUT, Lebanon -- A huge car bomb explosion in Beirut on Friday killed a top Lebanese security official whose investigations implicated Syria and Hezbollah in the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik al-Hariri seven years ago.
The rush-hour bomb in the center of the Lebanese capital killed eight people and wounded about 80 others, heightening fears that Syria's war is spilling over into Lebanon.
Among the dead was Wissam al-Hassan, the head of a Lebanese intelligence agency who had also uncovered a recent bomb plot that led to the arrest of a pro-Syrian Lebanese politician, a Lebanese official said.
NBC's Paul Nassar describes the scene after a bomb killed 8 people in Lebanon Friday.
Al-Hassan was a close aide to Hariri, a Sunni Muslim who was killed in a 2005 bomb attack in downtown Beirut. Al-Hassan's investigation into Hariri's death uncovered evidence that implicated Syria and Hezbollah in the killing.
Follow this story at BreakingNews.com
It was also not clear if the explosion targeted any political figure in Lebanon's divided community but it occurred at a time of heightened tension between Lebanese factions on opposite sides of the Syria conflict.
Ambulances rushed to the scene in the Ashafriyeh district, a mostly Christian area, as smoke rose from the area.
The explosion ripped through the street where the office of the anti-Damascus Christian Phalange Party is located near Sassine Square.
Reuters
Phalange leader Sami al-Gemayel, a staunch opponent of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and a member of parliament, condemned the attack.
"Let the state protect the citizens. We will not accept any procrastination in this matter, we cannot continue like that. We have been warning for a year. Enough," said Gemayel, whose brother was assassinated in November 2006.
Several cars were set on fire by the explosion and the front of a multi-story building was badly damaged. Residents ran about in panic looking for relatives while others helped carry the wounded to ambulances, Reuters reported.
Reuters
Huge blast explodes in a central Beirut street injures dozens, kills at least eight.
Pope tells Christians in Beirut: 'Be peacemakers'
Security forces blanketed the area.
Witness Danny Rizkallah told NBC News the blast took place close to the headquarters of a Lebanese opposition political party with links to Syria rebels and close to the scene of the 1982 assassination of then president-elect Bachir Gemayel. The affluent, largely Christian, district is also home to the American University of Science and Technology (AUST).
He said he was having lunch nearby when the blast lifted him from his chair. “It was an incredibly powerful explosion,” he said. “I knew immediately it was a bomb because it has such a different sound to shelling.”
“I rushed around the corner to see what happened there were lots of people injured by broken glass from the windows of nearby stores. It did a great deal of damage to nearby buildings and there was a lot of glass.
Hasan Shaaban / Reuters
Burning cars and damages are seen at the site of an explosion in Ashafriyeh, central Beirut, October 19, 2012.
“For this to happen is shocking because we really thought this sort of thing had stopped in Beirut, and for it to happen in the Christian district is also very unusual. I really don’t know who is behind this, or why. Our politics is very messed-up.”
The last bombing in Beirut was in 2008 when three people were killed in an explosion that damaged a U.S. diplomatic car.
U.S. officials are condemning the attack "in the strongest terms," calling the blast a terrorist attack.
"We condemn this act of terrorism," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.
"There is no justification for such violence," she added. "We obviously express our heartfelt sympathies for the families and the loved ones of those who were killed and injured, and we stand by the people of Lebanon and renew our commitment to a stable, sovereign, and independent Lebanon."
National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said in a statement there is "no justification for using assassination as a political tool." He says the U.S. will stand with the Lebanese government to bring to justice those responsible "for this barbaric attack."
Sunni-Shiite tensions
Tension between Sunnis and Shiites has been rumbling in Lebanon ever since the end of the 1975-1990 civil war but reignited after the Syria conflict erupted.
It reached its peak when Hariri, a Sunni, was killed in 2005. Hariri supporters accused Syria and then Hezbollah of killing him -- a charge they both deny. An international tribunal accused several Hezbollah members of involvement in the murder.
Clashes over Syrian conflict in Lebanon leave ten dead
Hezbollah's political opponents, who have for months accused it of aiding Assad's forces -- have warned that its involvement in Syria could ignite sectarian tension of the civil war.
At least nine people die as Sunni Muslims and Alawites fight for a second day. NBC's Ayman Mohyeldin reports.
However fighting had broken out this year between supporters and opponents of Assad in the northern city of Tripoli.
Reuters, The Associated Press and NBC News' Paul Nassar contributed to this report.
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Hezbollah with traces of Tehran and Quds.
Continuing fallout from a video no one ever saw I suppose?????
Think about this story the next time anybody criticizes Israel.
Readuing this article and the comments and I can only see by racist people. You aer supposdely outraged by this yet in veery breath you attack cutlture and religion. And on top of that the writer notes the religion of every single person. Why they do not do that when they are talking about the US government.
Hezbollah did this out of weakness. They are in full panic mode. When Syria falls, as it surely will, they lose the connection to their sponsor of terrorism, Iran. Pretty soon their logistics, their supply line, will be severed forever.
Hezbollah did this at the behest of their superiors in Syria. The target was tracking Assad operatives in Lebanon, and he was killed. I agree with the rest of your comments.
So very sad to see this. It is so important that we remember we are ALL in this together. Killing only begets more killing. At the end of the day, does it matter who started what or who said this thing or the other? In order to have peace, each of us must be the peace we want to see in the world. Simple but not necessarily easy. Namaste.
one tomahawk cruise millile strategically placed up Assad's rectum could have ended all of this long ago.....is only a matter of time before that whole sheeethole powerder keg muslim terrorist middle east erupts now. Oh well, muslims killing muslims, a win win for the civilized world.
Except that the car bomb was placed in a christian neighborhood killing mainly christians, not muslims.
I bet if Romney were president whoever set off that bomb would have had second thoughts. He knows the Mittster would send in his son Taggart to take a swing at him.
Keep the dancing horse off the White House lawn - vote Obama/Biden.
Fortune is knocking at Israel's door. It seems, Israel will achieve peace without wars. Let these cockroaches kill each others. Israelis should smell roses and stay calm, while its enemies shed blood. Time will produce wonders for Israel; which even wars can't produce.
*srug* Arabs killing Arabs. I say keep up the good work
wake up this was the jews trying to destablise the region why we support them is beyond me they spy on us steal from us if we just let the middle east grind them up things would be much better for all you cant go to a country and say 3000 years ago this was ours and kick the people out if some one did that to us we would be boming them right now
Please, they are a tiny country with a small population you give them way too much credit. Take responsibility for yourselves. The blame game is for the weak minded and lazy.
Just another day in the life as a Muslim. You would think with all the propaganda with the US and Israel there would be enough hate to satisfy their insatiable hunger but its not they even have hate each other.
Sorry to say, but we (USA) should just sit on the side-lines and watch! Let them all kill themselves and if they try anything against USA just NUKE'em and be done with this. As these crazies will fight themselves for centuries!
This is not optimal! It's a bump in the road.
More of that fabulous "peace and love" delivered daily by the patently demented paramilitary Satanic cult of death, destruction, and hate called "Islam" and its Muslim cockroach members, really . . .
Really! :-o
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I pray with the families who lost their loved ones. There is no excuse for taking innocent lifes, any Gov should take full responsibility for the safety of their people. Beirut have gone through a lot since day one. We can t go back now but we can work together make it better today and work for the next better day.
More Arab spring support and American appeasement should stop this problem.....NOT
Banning cars would help prevent spontaneous protests like this.
It's too bad we can't take any good peace loving people out of there, put a radiation barrier around the whole area and leave all these mental midgets just to kill each other. It's all they do anyway.
We do the same sh i t here but in a different way like what just happened recently in Colorado Movie theater massacre. Can we put a radiation around US? IT S WHAT WE DO ANYWAY!!! RIGHT! HAVE ANYTHING CHANGED WITH US? BUT WE LOVE TO CRITISIZE OTHER.
What so scary here in US, people kill without motives or a reason!
Yeah here we call the killers loonies. There they call them "Holy Warriors"...... -.-
Ah. Figures, hezbollah at it again.
Has anybody heard what the official Lebanese government response to this bombing is yet. Is this because of another riot about a movie insulting Mohammad? I bet not. The Lebanese government is smart enough to know that their citizenry would think they were being lied to. Seems like there is a large population of our citizens that are not as smart as the Lebanese. I mean, most Democrats believed the Obama Administration's story about the terrorist attack on our consulate in Benghazi and the murder of 4-Americans was because of a riot over a movie. Worse yet, some of them still do.
Why cant we just move the Entire middle east to mars?
They want to drive the Christians out of Lebanon, which just a short while ago was the last Christian-run country in the ME.
They drove the Lebanese Jews out a long time ago, who'd lived there since Biblical times, long before the "Prophet Mohammed" was a twinkle in his daddy's eye.
Any entity that has a vested interest in having chaos and turnmoil in Lebanon could be behind the bombing, including the tentacles of mossad.
Oh, yeah. The Israelis want a fundy Muslim government in Lebanon. It would make things so much better for them to have Hamas have a full ally.
Go peddle your Muslim-apologist, anti-Semitic, "von Dorf" crap elsewhere.
yah right, Der Treue Heinrich, it was obviously Iranian-backed Hezbollah working with the Syrians.
The Syrian regime has been striking out in all directions as they go down, which we saw in the recent cross-border spat with Turkey. Now, they're trying to kill off the guy who proved their involvement in the terrorist killing of the Lebanese president 5 years ago......probably to help Assad post-war in his criminal trials. Get rid of all evidence of his crimes.
Bigots and morons always equate comments unfavourable to their pay master as anti-semitic. Bravo sis.
If israelis want a fundy government in Lebanon, why the hack they invaded Lebanon in 2006 caused massive destruction and death. Ironic isn't sis.
No you stupid pig. They wanted to help the Maronites survive. Only a Muslim like you would want anything different, hating Jews and Christians--and other infidels--as you do.
As you well know, Israel is the only ME country where Christians are welcome and immigrating, not fleeing.
Dead wrong sis, I am not a Muslim and neither I believe in any region.
I am a pig as much as you are a slutty whore.
Such rude people like you have no place in this vine.