BEIRUT: Deputy Kataeb Party leader and Labor Minister Sejaan Azzi Monday called for the ousting of north Lebanon MP Khaled Daher from the March 14 bloc after controversial remarks over the removal of religious banners.
Angry over the removal of Islamic banners in the northern city of Tripoli, the Salafist-inspired Daher told followers Sunday that Christians should be the first to remove their religious emblems from public spaces.
“How can a deputy who attends Future Movement meetings, and even March 14 meetings, make such sectarian and offensive remarks against Christians?” Azzi, who is also a part of the March 14 coalition, said in comments published by local newspaper Ad-Diyar.
“The least we can ask for is a decision to remove this MP from all cadres of the Future Movement and the March 14 coalition,” he stressed, adding that Daher does not resemble March 14 or the Future Movement in any way.
Daher strongly condemned the removal Sunday of religious banners from the northern city of Tripoli, saying the measure was offensive against Islamic symbols that have decorated the city since the 1980s.
“If they want to remove [religious banners] let them start with the Christ the King statue and posters of [Christian] saints,” Daher said from Tripoli’s Nour Square Sunday.
The removal of religious banners and political posters in Tripoli as in line with an agreement reached during dialogue sessions between the Future Movement and Hezbollah to defuse sectarian tensions in the country.
The Muslims Scholars Committee, a gathering of Salafist sheikhs, and Tripoli’s Dar al-Fatwa also contacted Sunday Interior Minister Nouhad Machnouk, demanding the preservation of religious banners in the Al-Nour Square.
In response, Machnouk vowed that no religious banner would be removed from the area.
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