Hezbollah shifts attention from Syria fight to battle virus

BEIRUT (AP) — In the streets of Beirut's southern suburbs, Hezbollah paramedics and volunteers on trucks and on foot sprayed disinfectants on shops and buildings. At a hospital where it once treated its wounded fighters, the group's medical staff set up beds for a center to deal with coronavirus patients.

Hezbollah says it is turning the organizational might it once deployed to fight Israel or in the civil war in neighboring Syria to battle the spread of the virus pandemic in Lebanon.

It wants to send a clear message to its supporters in Lebanon's Shiite community that it is a force to rely on in a crisis. The Iranian-backed guerrilla group and political powerhouse is under pressure to send that message after a series of blows to its prestige.

Opponents have angrily accused Hezbollah of helping bring coronavirus to Lebanon. It took more than three weeks for the country to halt flights from Iran after a woman who had just returned from Iran emerged as Lebanon's first confirmed case on Feb. 20. Critics claim Hezbollah was behind the delay, ostensibly to give its members and supporters time to return home, an accusation it denies.

Since then, Lebanon has recorded nearly 480 cases and 12 deaths.

"Until when are we going to remain the victims of Hezbollah's bullying?" former Cabinet minister May Chidiac said in a tweet during the weeks before flights were stopped. "This is new proof they control the fate of the nation," added Chidiac, who later tested positive for the virus after returning from Paris.

In the past few years, Hezbollah angered many in Lebanon for intervening in Syria's civil war to back the Iranian-allied government in Damascus. During Lebanon's wave of protests late last year, some protesters denounced Hezbollah as part of a ruling elite they wanted removed. The U.S. increased sanctions on the group,...