{"id":45158,"date":"2021-04-13T03:22:45","date_gmt":"2021-04-13T03:22:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=45158"},"modified":"2021-04-13T03:22:45","modified_gmt":"2021-04-13T03:22:45","slug":"iran-admits-nuclear-plant-hit-by-blast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=45158","title":{"rendered":"Iran admits nuclear plant hit by blast"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\nBEIRUT: As Lebanon marks the 46th anniversary of its bloody civil war on April 13, public figures are warning that the country\u2019s worsening crisis could lead to new conflict.<\/p>\n

\nThough the regional and international situation is now different, Lebanon still faces the same fault lines that lead to the eruption of war in 1975.<\/p>\n

\nThe country\u2019s unprecedented economic and social crisis, coupled with political gridlock, presents a situation that some are warning is reminiscent of pre-war Lebanon.<\/p>\n

\nIn 1990, fighting stopped after the signing of the Taif Agreement, which established a political settlement that has remained until today.<\/p>\n

\nThe brutal 15-year war killed more than 150,000 people and left 300,000 others with long-term injuries. On top of that, 17,000 people were missing by the end of the conflict, while more than 1 million Lebanese \u2014 one-third of the population \u2014 were displaced.<\/p>\n

\nIn March 1991, a general amnesty law was issued for all war crimes, with the exception of kidnappings, which were considered persistent crimes.<\/p>\n

\nMilitias were disbanded, except for Hezbollah, which kept its weapons under the rubric of resisting the Israeli enemy. Today, Hezbollah holds the largest arsenal of weapons in the country, an amount 10 times larger than that of Lebanon\u2019s army.<\/p>\n

\"\"
\nCivil war survivor Jean Saliba is pictured in front of buildings damaged by the Aug. 4 Beirut port blast in the Karantina district of the Lebanese capital. (AFP)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\nNizar Saghieh, a laywer and representative of the Committee of the Families of Kidnapped and Disappeared, told Arab News: \u201cThe war was based on the logic that the strong party rules by force of arms.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWe are still being ruled this way. No one is being held accountable and there is no recognition of the law.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nHe added: \u201cIt is true that military and war actions stopped with the end of the civil war, but in practice, the post-war system is one that restored all war values \u200b\u200bto control the country and reduced public policy to war leaders, and now we live in the midst of a system in which no one is held accountable.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWe are living in disaster after the Aug. 4 explosion and we are experiencing an economic collapse.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cThis means that we are in the stage of systematic destruction of the state. The strong do not feel that there should be a law that embraces equality.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nThe fate of those who disappeared during the war remains relevant today, Saghieh said. \u201cThose in power try to push people to forget the past and they want us to live by the same trick.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cTherefore, the mass graves were not revealed so that the system would not be exposed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nSaghieh added: \u201cClosing the file of the missing requires determining their fate in order to know whether their murder was committed before or after the issuance of the general amnesty.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nProgressive Socialist Party Secretary Zafer Nasser said that a political settlement must be reached if Lebanon is to avoid repeating history.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cOur reality may take us to what is more dangerous than a war, and that is a state of chaos that makes it impossible to control where the country is headed,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cTherefore, the party calls for and insists on the proposal of a settlement to avoid entering into chaos.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cAs for the discussion about foreign interference in Lebanon and the possibility of it leading to war, what can be said is that Lebanon is so fragile that regional influences may pull it right or left.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nOn Hezbollah\u2019s weapons arsenal, Nasser told Arab News: \u201cIt is being debated and, in our opinion, will be resolved through a defense strategy and an internal dialogue among the Lebanese, because any other formula will lead to a problem.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cI do not think that disarming Hezbollah will happen soon, given the regional equation controlling a path of this kind.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nAntoine Zahra, a former Lebanese Forces member who took part in the civil war, ruled out \u201cany scenario for a new civil war in Lebanon.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nHe told Arab News: \u201cThe conditions Lebanon is going through today are not similar to those of the previous war, but we are in a situation that may lead us to something worse than a military war, and that is chaos.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cHezbollah\u2019s weapons cannot be used inside Lebanon, but these weapons remain as a result of Hezbollah\u2019s regional links, as it is part of a project to control the region.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cEven if Iran is heading to negotiations, it still keeps Lebanon as a bargaining chip. And Hezbollah needs the Israeli enemy and will not abandon the argument of fighting the enemy.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cIn my opinion, the solution is to end the Iranian project in the region, and until this is done, we are not able to devise solutions at home.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BEIRUT: As Lebanon marks the 46th anniversary of its bloody civil war on April 13, public figures are warning that the country\u2019s worsening crisis could lead to new conflict. Though the regional and international situation is now different, Lebanon still faces the same fault lines that lead to the eruption of war in 1975. The…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spotlight_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45158\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}