Lebanon warily watches its Salafis | csmonitor.com

Lebanon warily watches its Salafis | csmonitor.com: "Lebanon warily watches its Salafis
While the small community of adherents to strict Islam are being courted by Sunni and Shiite rivals, many worry they could bring Al Qaeda into the Lebanon conflict.
By Nicholas Blanford | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor

from the September 24, 2008 edition
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Pat Murphy talks with
Monitor correspondent Nicolas Blanford about the Salafis of Lebanon being courted by both Hezbollah and Lebanese Sunnis.
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Tripoli, Lebanon - In the hilltop Abi Samra neighborhood of this northern city, black banners inscribed with Koranic verses adorn crowded streets. Young men advertise their religious devotion by wearing white dishdashas, long beards, and short hair.

This is where many of the country's small Salafi community, the adherents to strict Islam who aim to emulate the 7th-century practices and ideals of the prophet Muhammad and his followers, can be found and where they now find themselves under close scrutiny in politically divided Lebanon. Ideologically, Salafis shun man-made laws and politics, choosing instead to embrace only sharia (Islamic law) and believe in some of the same rigid ideals that Al Qaeda espouses.

Militant Shiite Hezbollah h"