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Hezbollah Chief Defends Syrian Presence In Lebanon
BEIRUT, April 4 (News Agencies) - The spiritual leader of the Shiite movement Hezbollah on Wednesday defended Syria's military presence in Lebanon, and said most Lebanese supported Damascus' role despite increasing criticism of Syria by Christian leaders.
"We say with all clarity that on the basis of national and not sectarian considerations, we need Syria today even more than in the past," Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah told more than 200,000 people gathered for the Shiite day of mourning Ashura.
"The issue [of the Syrian presence] has been raised forcefully as a national demand, but those who are raising it do not speak on behalf of all Lebanese," Nasrallah told the crowd in Beirut's predominantly Shiite southern suburbs.
"Let those who call for [a Syrian retreat] do so in their name. We others, as the majority political current, have another view and another vision," he said.
Nasrallah said Syria's military presence was even more necessary since the arrival to power last month of hardline Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
The Maronite Church, the largest Christian community in Lebanon, has recently called for a more "balanced" relationship between Beirut and Damascus, which has stationed thousands of troops in its neighbor since the start of Lebanon's bloody 1975-90 sectarian civil war.
The Maronite bishops, at a meeting chaired by Cardinal Nasrallah Sfeir, issued a statement earlier Wednesday saying "Lebanese are not divided" over the presence of Syria's 35,000 soldiers in the country.
"The sectarian atmosphere is artificial," the statement said, adding that, "those who believe that the Lebanese are divided among themselves are not seeing reality."
Nasrallah said, however, that Hezbollah, which is backed by Syria and Iran, "is committed to Islamic-Christian coexistence."
In separate Ashura speeches, two other Shiite dignitaries, Sheikh Abdel Amir Kabalan and Sheikh Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah, also said Wednesday they thought it was inappropriate to raise the issue of Syria's presence in Lebanon.
Sheikh Kabalan, vice-president of the Supreme Islamic Shiite Council, said, "Syrian presence was a national necessity."
Adopting a softer stance, Sheikh Faldallah, the spiritual leader of Shiite Muslims in Lebanon, said it was not the right moment to bring up the issue.
Ashura marks the killing of Hussein, the third imam in Shiite Islam, and his family in 680 AD in Karbala, in what is now southern Iraq.
In Nabatiyeh in southern Lebanon, hundreds of Shiites showed their mourning by cutting their skulls with razor blades, a practice that has been banned by authorities in Shiite Iran and Nasrallah in statement Tuesday.
In the eastern region of Baalbeck, about 30,000 Shiites marched for Ashura.
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