Anti-government protests in Beirut explode into violence
BEIRUT — Riot police used water cannons, tear gas and rubber bullets to clear a large protest camp in the heart of the Lebanese capital Saturday, sparking clashes with demonstrators that wounded scores of people and turned Beirut’s commercial center into a battle zone.
The violence, with tents set on fire and protesters targeting police with stones and fireworks, was the most intense since mass protests against corruption and mismanagement by the country’s political elite erupted three months ago.
Despite continued demonstrations and worsening violence, Lebanon’s politicians have proved unable to take meaningful steps to assuage the protesters’ anger or stop the country’s swift slide toward an economic crisis.
Prime Minister Saad Hariri, facing the mass protests, resigned Oct. 29. His designated successor has failed to form a government while the Lebanese pound, which has been pegged to the U.S. dollar for decades, has been rapidly losing value on the black market, fueling the protesters’ economic grievances.
“Why else would we come to protest? Because there is no work and people are hungry,” said protester Miraz al-Jundi, 35, wearing an industrial face mask and standing amid clouds of tear gas. Nearby,
young men hurled stones at the security forces and a woman fell to the asphalt, choking.
“If the authorities don’t respond, there will be more violence,” he said.
Saturday’s protest, under the banner “We will not pay the price,” was meant to unite people from across Lebanon against the most recent effort to form a new government, by Hassan Diab, an engineering professor and former education minister who was designated premier Dec. 19.
The protesters accuse the leaders in Lebanon’s sect-based political system of widespread corruption that has left Lebanon with poor infrastructure, few services and a sinking economy.
Saturday began with protesters from around Lebanon flooding into Beirut to join marches toward the Parliament building. After they gathered there, clashes broke out, with protesters throwing stones and shooting fireworks and the security forces firing tear gas.
The confrontation spread as the security forces cleared a protest camp in Beirut’s central square, where a number of tents were set on fire. By evening, they were locked in back and forth clashes on a main commercial street in front of the Le Gray hotel, one of the city’s finest.
Protesters lit dumpsters on fire and hurled stones as riot police launched volleys of tear gas and fired water cannons. The booms of fireworks ricocheted off skyscrapers, and ambulances screamed by, ferrying off the wounded.
More than 65 people were hospitalized and more than 100 were treated on sight, George Kittaneh, the head of the Lebanese Red Cross, said in a phone call with LBC, a local television station.
Lebanon’s interior minister, Raya El Hassan, criticized the protesters for attacking security forces.
“I always asserted the right to protest, but for the protests to turn into a blatant assault on the security forces, on public and private property, is condemned and not acceptable at all,” El Hassan wrote on Twitter.
The Internal Security Forces said some of its officers had been wounded by protesters throwing tiles they had broken off walls in a shopping district.
Violence had been building over the last week, as protesters, furious that banks have imposed unofficial capital controls and refused to let customers withdraw dollars, shattered the windows of bank branches and broke security cameras. Human right groups have criticized the security forces for dealing violently with demonstrators.