Lebanon’s judicial and security apparatuses geared up Tuesday to uncover the identity of two armed groups, one claiming its support of former minister Wiam Wahhab and threatening to assassinate Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri and director general of the Internal Security Forces, Gen. Imad Othman, while the other called “Branch of Martyr Rafik Hariri,” claiming to take revenge from Wahhab and his supporters.
A judicial source told Asharq Al-Awsat on Tuesday the “security apparatuses currently seek to determine the identity of members belonging to both groups and their location, to later arrest them and drive them to court.”
Last Sunday, an armed group dubbed “Salman al-Farisi-Special Unit” spread a video footage on social media networks threatening to assassinate Hariri and Othman. The group claimed to be located in the Druze-majority Suweida province in Syria.
The threats came following tension in Mount Lebanon two weeks ago when gunmen loyal to Wahhab, who was summoned to court on charges of inciting strife and civil peace, prevented security forces from escorting him from his Jaheliyeh area, leading to an armed clash and the killing of Wahhab’s bodyguard Mohamad Abu Diab.
Quickly after the first video went viral, an armed group named Branch of Martyr Rafik Hariri-Tariq Jadideh released another video threatening Wahhab and other March 8 figures.
Those videos produced confusion at the Lebanese scene and drove fears of their repercussions.
A security source told Asharq Al-Awsat that security apparatuses were exerting efforts to uncover the identity of those armed groups that appeared in the videos.
“The content of the two videos is close to playing with fire, and it is eminent for us to arrest those who issued the threats,” he said.
The source said that investigations would reveal in the coming few days whether the group threatening Hariri and Othman was located in the Suweida area, in addition to the identity of the group claiming to be from the Tariq al-Jadideh area in Beirut.
