Beirut Bomb Explosion Rocks Hay Al-Sellom District

Beirut Bomb Blast Rocks Hezbollah Stronghold
Lebanese riot police stand guard in front of the government palace behind a barbed wire barricade decorated with the national flag by anti-government protesters in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Oct. 22, 2012. Lebanese troops launched a major security operation on Monday to open all roads and force gunmen off the streets, trying to contain an outburst of violence set off by the assassination of a top intelligence official who was a powerful opponent of Syria. Sectarian clashes killed at least five people. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo)
Lebanese riot police stand guard in front of the government palace behind a barbed wire barricade decorated with the national flag by anti-government protesters in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Oct. 22, 2012. Lebanese troops launched a major security operation on Monday to open all roads and force gunmen off the streets, trying to contain an outburst of violence set off by the assassination of a top intelligence official who was a powerful opponent of Syria. Sectarian clashes killed at least five people. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo)

BEIRUT, Jan 28 (Reuters) - A bomb planted under a car exploded in a southern suburb of Beirut late on Monday, a Lebanese security source said, rocking a Shi'ite Muslim area that is a stronghold of the militant group Hezbollah.

The bomb destroyed the car and damaged buildings in the residential area of Hay al-Sellom but there were no casualties, the source said.

It was not immediately clear what the target of the bomb was but the car was parked near a office for Shi'ite Hezbollah-aligned Amal political group.

Lebanon is still recovering from an October car bomb which killed Wissam al-Hassan, a security official who was leading an investigation that implicated Syria and Hezbollah in the 2005 assassination of former prime minister Rafik al-Hariri, a Sunni.

During the country's 15-year civil war which ended in 1990, tit-for-tat assassinations of prominent political figures were common and many fear sensitivities around the war in neighbouring Syria could lead to further instability in Lebanon. (Reporting by Laila Bassam; Writing by Oliver Holmes; Editing by Louise Ireland)

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