Rafehi after Aide Held: We Won't Hesitate to Wage Jihad if Yabrud People Urge
Tripoli-based Salafist leader Sheikh Salem al-Rafehi stressed Friday that the northern city's Islamists will not hesitate to go to jihad, or holy war, in support of the regime-besieged Syrian town of Yabrud.
“A lot of those who are collecting extortions in the city are still on the loose and a lot of criminals are still at large, while the free men were arrested, such as Omar al-Homsi, Sheikh Omar al-Atrash, Dr. Abdul Nasser Shatah and others,” Rafehi said outside al-Salam Mosque in Tripoli, after the director of his office Jalal Kalash was arrested at the Rafik Hariri International Airport.
According to state-run National News Agency, Kalash was released prior to the cleric's televised address. Rafehi said the man was freed due to “popular pressure.”
“Why are our young men being arrested when they go to Syria and when they return? Why doesn't this apply to Hizbullah's fighters?” the cleric asked.
“If they (Lebanese authorities) are afraid of the West, they can rely on the remarks of (Hizbullah chief Sayyed Hassan) Nasrallah, who had said 'let us go fight in Syria',” Rafehi added.
“We say it loud and clear: we won't back down from supporting our people in Syria, whatever that may cost us. When our people in (Syria's) Qusayr pleaded to us, we heeded their call, and today if Yabrud's people urge us to act, we won't hesitate to wage jihad with them,” the Islamist leader vowed.
He called on “Lebanon's rulers” to “draw lessons,” stressing that Syrian President “Bashar Assad's rule will not last for long.”
“Do not stand by the tyrant,” Rafehi went on to say.
He voiced surprise that “an army force is still protecting (Arab Democratic Party leader) Ali Eid's house in Hikr al-Daheri until the moment.”
Rafehi revealed that Army Commander General Jean Qahwaji had allegedly promised him to capture Eid once an arrest warrant is issued for him in the case of the deadly bombings that hit Tripoli's al-Taqwa and al-Salam mosques.
“When the policy statement faced a deadlock, the Arab Democratic Party was ordered to bombard Tripoli and it is unacceptable that an entire city be punished over the behavior of one young man,” Rafehi said, referring to the deadly clashes that erupted Thursday in Tripoli in the wake of the killing of a Jabal Mohsen man.
“When this cabinet was formed, we were surprised by the raids and Tripoli was turned into a military barracks and people became afraid to be on the streets,” Rafehi noted.
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