Syria-fuelled violence kills four in Lebanon's Tripoli

By Nazih Siddiq TRIPOLI, Lebanon (Reuters) - Four people were killed by sniper fire the north Lebanese city of Tripoli on Sunday, security sources said, raising to 10 the death toll in two days of violence fuelled by sectarian tensions over Syria's civil war. The clashes between Tripoli's Alawite minority, which supports Syria's Alawite President Bashar al-Assad, and majority Sunni Muslims who back the Syrian rebels, are the latest round of violence which has killed more than 100 people in the Mediterranean city this year. Gun battles have broken out five times since March, killing dozens of people, and twin car bombs at Sunni Muslim mosques in Tripoli killed 42 people in August. Tripoli residents said the sounds of heavy gunfire and rocket explosions echoed across Lebanon's second city from midnight to 6 am. The city was quieter during the day, they said, with soldiers patrolling otherwise empty streets of the rival neighborhoods, but occasional bursts of gunfire continued.