(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - In Beirut’s southern suburbs, people gather to hear stories of suffering. Dotted along the area’s thoroughfares are images of a blood-streaked white horse belonging to the Prophet Mohammed’s grandson Hussein, whose death at the battle of Karbala 13 centuries ago is mourned by Shia Muslims each year in rituals culminating in Ashura this week.This year, however, new posters sit alongside the traditional tributes to Hussein. They show the faces of young men killed fighting in the civil war in Syria. “It’s a special Ashura this year – we had a lot of martyrs,” said an official from Hizbollah.“Our blood is boiling now because of the martyrs in Syria and Karbala.”The conflict raging next door in Syria has lent a new poignancy to Ashura in Lebanon, and reinforced a sense among those who observe it that they are beset by enemies.According to the Hizbollah official, who gives his name as Abu Ali, Ashura processions will be policed this year, for the first time, by fighters from the group’s military wing because of the threat of suicide bombers from Salafi extremist groups such as al-Qaeda.A Lebanese security official, meanwhile, says extra soldiers are being deployed in the south of the country, where a massive Ashura procession is expected to take place.“We are living in very sensitive days. The Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, and Jabhat al-Nusra, are a real threat,” he says, referring to the two al-Qaeda affiliates fighting in Syria. “We are obliged to take maximum measures.”Since Hizbollah publicly entered the Syrian war – against mainly Salafi rebels who receive strong support from the [Persian] Gulf Arab states, Unite States and some Europe countries, rockets and car bombs have targeted Shia areas of Lebanon, killing more than 20 people. Ashura processions are seen as particularly attractive targets for Sunni extremists, and they have frequently been attacked in Iraq.Further fuelling concerns about an Ashura attack in Lebanon this week are twin blasts at mosques that killed dozens of Sunni Lebanese in late August, stoking sectarian tensions.Abu Ali says small amounts of explosives, coming across the border from Syria, have been intercepted in recent weeks.He adds that Hizbollah’s tight grip on security at Ashura rituals in Lebanon means they are unlikely to be turned into the kind of bloodbaths seen in Iraq. But he admits that it is impossible to guarantee that every plot will be foiled. “You can never say security is 100 per cent. We do what we can,” he said.Hassan, a young man who works in a phone shop in the southern suburbs, is undaunted by the possibility that he may come under attack when he takes part in this year’s Ashura processions. “This year is different because of threats of bombs, but we’re going to walk the streets more and more – that’s our challenge to them,” he said, sporting a bright green armband, wristband and scarf to show his devoutness.“We take pride in what they did to us in Iraq.”Though Hizbollah’s opponents see its intervention in Syria as helping a cruel despot crush a popular uprising, for Hassan it is the Shia who are under threat, and for him the growing power of Sunni extremists in the Levant resonates with the story of Hussein’s martyrdom at the hands of a larger army at Karbala.“They tried in Qusair to do like what they did in Karbala,” he says, referring to a Syrian border town captured by Hizbollah after a bloody battle this summer. “Now it’s escalating in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon.”Rodger Shanahan, author of the book The Shia of Lebanon, says that while the Shia are now in a strong political position in Lebanon, the rise in regional sectarian tensions makes analogies between the present day and the battle of Karbala “really easy to draw” for members of this historically persecuted sect.“It’s part of the subconscious of the Shia,” he explained. “They think historically people are against them and that though on the surface things may change, actually nothing’s changed for 1,000 years.” /129
