Tripoli, Where a Cleric Decides on Security and Where State Generals Lead Hooligans

Ghassan Saoud - al-Akhbar newspaper*

In the northern city of Tripoli, the poor don't take to the streets to voice support for the freedom of Syrians. In Tripoli, love is not documented, recounted in romantic movies, neither in the vast sea where fishermen queue, nor in the many college faculties. You must park your car at the entrance of the "Muslim Sunnis' capital" and then rove the city, walking, to rediscover it.

The city has redrawn its facet: Abdul Hamid Karami Square has turned into that of Shadi Mawlawi, whose arrest for investigation fueled an armed disobedience, shutting down the city and closing roads for four days. An ambulant bread merchant presents a buyer with a booklet on the obligation to implement the Islamic code, known as Sharia. The remnants of a live broadcast van, which irate protesters had earlier set ablaze, were removed. Yet the seared trace of flames can still be seen nearby an army checkpoint that was not spared gunmen's bullets.

Here is the building where journalists hid from incensed vandals until lawmaker Khaled Daher intervened to evacuate them. The girl you come across in the street is probably that very woman who had soldiered on her gun and opened fire, as shown in pictures on news sites. The flag of al-Nusra Front covers the window of a huge toy store. Here is Ezzeddine Building, into which gunmen have once tried to break under the pretense that it is affiliated with Prime Minister Najib Mikati's association. Next to it, the premises of Minister Mohammad Safadi's association also received their share of attacks. Here, gunmen were about to kill Minister Faisal Karami.

A sidewalk book seller despondently tells about what happened to his books and money when some passengers saw a publication on President Hafez Assad. There, young civilians have tied an unfortunate Syrian by his neck and dragged him into Menshiye garden because he was a "Syrian intelligence officer." Here, a spiritual beverages store was red sealed. The lot of taxis that routed to Banias, Tartous, and Latakia was moved to outside the city. The CD merchant no more dares to raise the volume of George Wassouf singing.

 This charred, scourged place was a vegetable store of a Alawite man. The shreds of glass of a nearby barbershop window cover the floor and the chair was stolen from inside. "Who would let a Alawite shave their heads and beards?" a neighbor asks. Here, fire has ravaged tens of shops and depots. Buses no more transport students from the Christian towns of Akkar to the Lebanese University faculties in the city. Only few from Zghorta are still attending the classes. Beirut has become closer to them than Tripoli.

An evangelist priest has moved his church after he's had enough as his neighbors were hurling stones on him and his family; security forces claimed kids had thrown gravels. In the back street, the bus that used to transport workers from Jabal Mohsen, whose colleagues "had sold" them to their neighbors in Bab-al-Tabbaneh, has pulled over. The owner of that shop in the Souks has closed it in objection to the coercive payments imposed by the men of General Ashraf Rifi "who are defending the dignity of the city." This other store, owned by a supporter of Mikati, was ransacked and vandalized, and about to be burnt, when the army arrested Hatem Janzarli who had opened fire on military men.

Here and there, and in nearly nine other spots, young men have fallen on their feet, because who shot them thought they could castigate the Alawite sect and deter Jabal Mohsen through a field "trial." In almost thirty corners, gunmen have opened fire on the army to hinder its move. As to the lottery crier you loved, he was attacked by two hooded men. They mercilessly beat him after they learned his sect. The blind old beggar, who has stood off Azmi Street for twenty years, has been as well beaten on the sidewalk because of his sect. At the train station, which you would gladly photograph, groups of thieves gather, with security forces not daring to raid them. There, former member of Future parliamentary bloc, Mustafa Alloush, was cussed, when they remembered that his mother was from the Alawite sect. And here at the seaport, where the colorful fishing boats queue up, Lutfallah II was supposed to anchor to discharge an arms cargo.

The office of Tawhid Movement was closed here after the staff was evicted in a swift military operation. Here, Saadeddine Ghayyeh was killed, after Hossam Mouri and Sheikh Abdul Razzaq Asmar, for political reasons. In the vicinity of al-Jinan University, a weapon depot blew off. Here are Taqwa and Salam mosques. And voilà, the fight fronts between Bal-al-Tabbaneh and Jabal Mohsen. Moreover, here is the photo of Bilal Mehrez, an inmate of Qobbeh jail whom the Arab Democratic Party said he was beaten and tortured by his cell fellows just because he is Alawite. Furthermore, al-Nusra Front leader, Abu Mohammad Joulani, shows on a TV interview, as jubilation fire is opened in the city for seven minutes. Happy gunshots and chants of Takbir accompany the coffin of the terrorist who had killed civilians in Dahiyeh as it passes in Mallouleh. Last of all, a library was just burned. Its owner Father Ibrahim Srouj estimates that the fires have destroyed third of the books.

The MPs and dignitaries of Tripoli can be seen dashing in an orchestrated scene to illuminate a giant tree and then to belie news that it was set to arson after it had been decorated. Future Movement can keep alleging that it was all perpetrated by the Syrian intelligence services which have apparently nothing to do nowadays but distort the image of Tripoli in the heads of the Lebanese. People wise, a moderate dignitary notes an unbalance. From office to another, in the milieus of lawyers, physicians, and some traders, what he meant got clearer: only few in the city do understand Hizbullah's local and regional stances.

The majority, on the contrary, does not, and even lobs the most strong-worded rhetoric against the party. When lawmaker Mohammad Kabbara's speech against Hizbullah hit a climax, the city was with him. When Sheikh Salem Rafei's voice overpassed Kabbara's he became the top leader. And when General Ashraf Rifi spoke louder than them, the entire city followed him. Just a year ago, no one in the city accepted talking about Rifi as a tough card in the legislative polls.

But today, he is the toughest according to those who had previously lampooned him. Two years ago, no one accepted to mention Dahi al-Islam Shahhal as one of the city's clerics. But today, he is in the front row. The city does deprecate some hooligans' deeds; yet a reason to curb them is still lacking. In fact, leading those into defeat will be explained as an additional victory for Hizbullah. And this cannot happen! An informed side murmurs that the deeds are still spontaneous in the form, adding they are not organized within a plain clear Takfiri frame. Therefore, showdowns similar to those taking place between Takfiri groups and the milieus supporting them in Syria are just farfetched.

The sit-in that was staged in solidarity with Assaeh (The Tourist) library did not witness the expected popular turnout. It only gathered NGOs activists, a number of journalists and politicians, and a small group of Islamists, despite a previous tremendous mobilization and a stern condemnation of the arson. The city is actually living in another place. It was a Salafist group that had incited against Father Srouj before burning his library. The group often distributes flyers criticizing Shia's "enjoyment marriage" or the rituals of Ashoura. This group is practically the first religious rival of Sheikh Salem Rafei. Notwithstanding, no matter how names vary, all these groups are spinning in the orbit of Sheikh Rafei's dogma and are tracking General Rifi's armament method. This is why, according to an informed source, Rafei insisted on punishing instigators and not perpetrators.

What was more hideous than burning the library was the press conference held at the office of the Internal Security Forces to tackle the repercussions of the arson. Security forces then made of Sheikh Rafei the epitome of all judicial and security authorities, courts, and Dar-al-Fatwa. What was shown on TV cameras broadcasting the news conference, held in presence of an official Lebanese apparatus, alluded that Father Srouj could go home if Rafei, to whom attacking the priest and his library is [religiously] permitted, pardoned him. All this took place live on air, amid ISF's General Bassam Ayoubi's eating his heart out to obtain a religion-based green light to chastise assailants and not just instigators.
And voila, this is Tripoli!

*Translated by website team