Shiite Festival Clashes Injure 20 in Lebanon

At least 20 people were hurt in running street battles between rival Lebanese Shiite Muslim political groups on Saturday during an annual religious festival, witnesses said.

Lebanese soldiers fired shots in the air to scatter members of Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement and fellow Shiite group Amal who hurled rocks and bottles at one another while marking the Muslim holiday of Ashoura in the southern town of Nabatiyeh, witnesses said.

At least one army officer and an ambulance worker were wounded in the clashes, which witnesses said erupted when members of the two groups argued over the assignment of places in a parade organized to celebrate the holiday.

Dozens of cars were damaged in the skirmishes, which drifted into the center of Nabatiyeh and continued to rage an hour after the army tried to break them up.

Ashoura commemorates the death of Hussein, the central figure of Shiite Islam, and is an emotional 10-day event in Lebanon, during which some Shiites beat and cut themselves until the blood runs while chanting devotional songs.

Nabatiyeh has traditionally been the site of the most exuberant celebrations, though Hezbollah and senior Shiite clerics have implored their communities in recent years not to engage in bloodletting.