7 People Charged with Killing Soldier, Civilians in Tripoli Gunfight

Government Commissioner to the Military Tribunal Judge Saqr Saqr on Friday charged seven people with engaging in a deadly gunfight in the northern port city of Tripoli a week earlier.

Saqr Saqr charged the seven suspects with forming armed gangs, exchanging gunfire with unlicensed arms, and killing a soldier and several civilians.

If convicted, they could face the death penalty.

Al-Mustaqbal daily reported earlier in the week that people affiliated with the deputy head of the Arab Democratic Party, Rifaat Eid, were behind the clashes between Sunnis and Alawites that left seven people dead.

The newspaper said there is “tangible proof” that a group of men affiliated with Eid were behind the eruption of violence between Tripoli’s districts of Bab al-Tabbaneh that is mainly Sunni close to former Premier Saad Hariri and Jabal Mohsen whose residents are Alawites allied with Hizbullah and Syria.