Why the Antellias Explosion Was Suspicious

Yesterday’s explosion in Antellias that prematurely went off and killed its two bomb makers is probably not a “financial and personal dispute between several people”, as our Minister of Interior helpfully explained. Here’s why:

• The bombers are not from Antellias. One is from Jezzine and one is from Tyre, (both in south Lebanon). So Antellias is not exactly their backdoor. They came all the way here to do what they wanted to do
• There was an uncharacteristic official silence on the nature and circumstances of the explosion and technical details of the explosive device
• The explosion took place at the same day the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) was summoning high-profile victims of the 2005 bombings to share with them details of their cases and their relatedness to Hariri’s assassination
• The President rushed to arrange a meeting for Lebanon’s Higher Defense Council on Friday. This could be unrelated, but it didn’t ease the suspicion
• Politicians are warning us that we’re entering a “dangerous period” as the STL is becoming more and more concrete

Does the government know something we don’t? Could this be a botched assassination attempt? If so, who was the (Christian) target? Was this intended to mark a new period of instability and assassinations? Is it to scare the Lebanese off the Tribunal? Does that mean the Tribunal is on the right track?

One thing is for sure: Anxiousness is running high in Beirut today..

Update: More salient points from Shiwa7ad’s comment:

• The two people who died lived in the Madi neighborhood in Dahieh
• *According to the minister* the explosive device consisted of a hand grenade, surrounded by explosives with metal balls, with a mechanism to cause the device to explode when a door is opened or some other movement takes place
• According to some witnesses one of the victims was kneeling behind a car, and the minister confirmed that the wounds of one of the two victims were the most important at the torso level, while the wounds of the other victim were at the hand and leg
• Future TV, MTV, and New TV mentioned that the brother of one of the victims alleged that his brother was a Hezbollah member, and Hezbollah, while deploring that that some media were throwing the name of the Hezb left and right, did not deny explicitly deny that those two people were Hezbollah members.
• Al Manar was the first news source to allege that the explosion was the result of a financial dispute.
• The identity of the alleged target of the assassination attempt was not disclosed.