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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran | ||
| Suleiman rejects intimidation after attack | ||
| 2013-08-03 | ||
Lebanese President Michel Suleiman said on Friday that a rocket attack near the presidential palace will not intimidate or make him change his convictions regardless of the party behind it.
“Repeated rocket messages, regardless of the sender or the target ... cannot alter national principles or convictions that are expressed freely and sincerely,” the president said in the statement issued by his office. The statement did not say whom officials believed were behind the attack Thursday night. The assault came the same day that Suleiman gave a speech criticising the involvement of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah in Syria’s conflict in supporting forces loyal to embattled President Bashar Al Assad. In his speech marking Army Day on Thursday, Suleiman suggested Hezbollah’s weapons be folded into that of the national Lebanese army. The president said that “resistance weapons have trespassed the Lebanese border,” in a reference to Hezbollah. The rare criticism by Suleiman, a Maronite Catholic, angered Hezbollah and its allies. A pro-Hezbollah newspaper put a picture of Suleiman on its front page Friday with a bold-headlined single word: “Irhal,” Arabic for leave. It was not clear who fired the two rockets near the presidential compound.
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| Posted by:Steve White |