On July 25, more than 300 people staged a sit-in to...

On July 25, more than 300 people staged a sit-in to protest the rape of 5-year-old Maymouna Mahmoud Alameddine in Minyeh-Dinnieh, demanding that the rapist be executed. The crowd, which included several officials from the North, stood in front of the victim's father's house in the village of Bhenin in Minyeh and called for the accused, Palestinian national Imad Ali Daoud, 24, to be given the harshest sentence possible. Nayla Mouawad, Zghorta MP and head of the Parliamentary Committee for Children's Rights, called on the media to start awareness campaigns to instruct people of the dangers of such tragic incidents. "Everyone - politicians, the media and local associations - should mobilize to fight this crime and punish the rapist to abate the rage that is rising within the victims' parents," Mouawad said. Speaking on behalf of the residents of Bhenin, Sheikh Raslan Malas said that he wondered who could be responsible for such "savagery." "Is it the rapist's parents, society or the Government that is responsible for such a terrible act? I want to say that the responsibility lies with every member of this society," he said. The only solution, claimed Malas, lay in upholding religion and shunning the "corruption of the media." "We ask President Emile Lahoud and Prime Minister Salim Hoss to order the execution of this guilty monster," he said. Meanwhile, the acting public prosecutor of the North, Judge Wael Hassan, referred Daoud to the chief investigating magistrate in the North for questioning under a Penal Code article that carries a sentence of at least 5 years in prison with hard labor.