BEIRUT: Officials flocked to offer condemnations and condolences over a suicide attacks that targeted a police checkpoint in Dahr al-Baidar Friday morning.
“[The attack] was aimed at tightening the screws on the security and safety of the Lebanese, and [strived to] take the country down the destructive path overtaking the region,” Hariri said.
The head of the March 14 coalition called on all Lebanese, irrespective of sect, to employee the highest degree of caution, urging citizens to maintain national unity in the face of conspiracies aimed at sparking sectarian feuds in the region.
“Sending young men in to battle, whether internally or externally, will only lead to more divisions and will invite extreme sectarian reactions,” Hariri said.
Hariri also offered condolences to those killed in the blast and hailed security forces for taking the necessary measures to ensure the safety and security of the country.
The March 14 bloc released a statement saying that “we [14 march] have repeatedly warned Hezbollah that interference in Syria would invite terrorism into Lebanon,” stressing its demands for the immediate withdrawal of the resistance party’s forces from the civil war in Syria.
"Everyone is in the same trench to confront terrorism," Industry Minister Hussein Hajj Hassan, from Hezbollah's Loyalty to the Resistance parliamentary bloc, said in a television interview, pointing out that "everyone is against terrorism, and we are in a moment that unites political views.”
Justice Minister Ashraf Rifi said "radical solutions lie in the election of the president of the republic, the withdrawal of Hezbollah from Syria and the closure of our borders in the face of [terrorist] winds in the region."
The U.S. Embassy in Lebanon condemned the attack, noting "the United States will continue to stand with Lebanon [in its fight] against terrorism."
The French Embassy announced its support for local institutions and forces responsible for security in Lebanon. It also called on French citizens in Lebanon to exercise caution today, especially after the bombing, urging them to stay in their houses.
Security chief Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim narrowly escaped the suicide car bombing that killed an ISF officer and wounded 32 people at a Lebanese police checkpoint on the Beirut-Damascus highway in the Bekaa Valley.
Friday morning, security forces also arrested a 17 terrorist suspects in Hamra, after raiding the Napoleon Hotel and other establishments in the west Beirut commercial district.
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