A Lebanese man armed with a shotgun took hostages at a Beirut bank and threatened to set himself on fire unless he gets his trapped savings, a security official said.
The man, identified as 42-year-old Bassam al-Sheikh Hussein, entered a branch of the Federal Bank in Beirut s bustling Hamra district with a canister of petrol and the gun and took six or seven bank employees hostage, the official said.
George al-Haj, the head of the bank employees syndicate, told local media that seven or eight bank employees and two customers were being held hostage.
The gunman fired three warning shots, a security official said. Local media reported that he had about US $200,000 163,000 stuck in the bank.
Since late 2019, Lebanon s cash-strapped banks have instituted strict withdrawal limits on foreign currency assets, evaporating the savings of many Lebanese. The country is in the worst economic crisis in its modern history, with three-quarters of the population in poverty and the value of the Lebanese pound falling by more than 90% against the US dollar.
The Lebanese army soldiers, police officers and intelligence agents surrounded the area, and officials were talking to the gunman to try to reach a settlement. One hostage was released and left by ambulance.
Video from earlier showed the disgruntled man with his shotgun demanding his money back. In another video, two police officers behind the locked bank entrance asked the man to release at least one of the hostages, but he refused.
A customer at the bank who fled the building after the situation escalated told local media that the man was demanding $2,000 to pay for his hospitalised father's medical bills.
Hussein's brother Atef, standing outside the bank, told the Associated Press that Hussein would be willing to turn himself in if the bank gave him money to help with medical bills and family expenses. My brother is not a scoundrel, he is a decent man, he said. He takes what he has in his pocket to give others. Dozens of protesters gathered in the area, chanting slogans against the Lebanese government and banks, hoping that Hussein would receive his savings. Some people hailed him as a hero.
Dina Abou Zor, a lawyer for the Depositors Union, said that the state failed to resolve the economic crisis and banks and central bank's actions, which are where people can only retrieve some of their own money as if it is a weekly allowance. This has resulted in people taking matters into their own hands. In January a coffee shop owner took $50,000 from a bank branch in eastern Lebanon after holding staff hostage and threatened to kill them.