Pro-Hezbollah TV station accuses Shia rival of 'van attack'

According to reports from Lebanese newspaper The Daily Star, local security guards rushed to Al Jadeed's studio in the Wata Moseitbeh neighbourhood of the capital after an explosion-like sound was heard at around 3:15am.

Upon arriving they found a van, containing equipment used in live broadcasts, ablaze.

Al-Jadeed posted video footage of the attack and called for solidarity under the Arabic hashtag  #SolidarityWithAlJadeed.

— قنـــاة الجـــديـــد (@ALJADEEDNEWS) 11 May 2017 " style="color:#fff;" class="twitter-post-link" target="_blank">Twitter Post بالفيديو- موظفو الأمن في "الجديد" يروون لحظات الاعتداء #متضامن_مع_الجديدhttps://t.co/LFri4B2qOL pic.twitter.com/1QoKOEkbVN — قنـــاة الجـــديـــد (@ALJADEEDNEWS) 11 May 2017

While the perpetrators of the attack were not identified, Al-Jadeed’s deputy chief editor accused supporters of the Amal movement of being behind the attack in an interview with 
LBCI News.

"Every time we criticise Nabih Berri, we are attacked,” she said.

Although the Amal Movement - which draws supporters mainly from Lebanon's Shia population - is viewed as politically aligned to Hezbollah in support of the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad, domestically it is not uncommon for supporters of the two Shia parties to clash, or for members of both parties to criticise one another.

Nabih Berri, the head of the Amal Movement, and also the Lebanese parliamentary speaker, has denied that supporters of his party were responsible for the attack.

He dismissed such claims as "fabrications and lies which are becoming more frequent".

In February around 300 Amal supporters attempted to storm al-Jadeed's headquarters after the TV channel aired a documentary deemed offensive to the movement's founder Imam Musa al-Sadr. 

At that time al-Jadeed denied the charges, with Khayyat notably calling the protests which saw demonstrators throw eggs, rocks, and fireworks, at the TV stations headquarters, an insult to al-Sadr's memory.

Sadr, a charismatic figure who helped mobilise Lebanon's Shia population into a political force, dissapeared on a diplomatic trip to Libya in 1978, during the early years of Lebanon's civil war (1975-1990). 

He is presumed dead, while the regime of former Libyan president Muammar Gadhafi is widely viewed as having played a role in his killing.