Gunbattles erupted on the streets of Beirut yesterday as a general strike turned into a violent confrontation between the Government and the opposition, led by the militant Shia group Hezbollah.

The rattle of automatic weapons and the crump of exploding rocket-propelled grenades echoed around the streets of the Lebanese capital as thick plumes of smoke rose from barricades of burning tyres.

In scenes grimly redolent of the 1975-1990 civil war, gunmen were seen inching down empty streets and firing rifles at windows to a backdrop of burning cars.

The strike was called by the leading Lebanese trade union in protest at rising prices and over a demand for an increase in the minimum wage.

But it was overshadowed by the worsening crisis between the Western-backed Government and Hezbollah, which many Lebanese fear is about to reach a showdown after 16 months of political gridlock.

“This is a turning point. There can be no more cohabitation between the Government and the opposition. All trust is gone,” said Amal Saad Ghorayeb, a Lebanese political analyst and expert on Hezbollah.

The latest crisis erupted over the weekend when Walid Jumblatt, the leader of Lebanon's Druze and an outspoken critic of Hezbollah, launched an attack on the Shia party, accusing it of monitoring Beirut airport with security cameras for a possible attack or kidnapping.

He also accused Hezbollah of setting up its own private telecommunications network to eavesdrop on calls made in Lebanon.

On Tuesday the Government said that Hezbollah's telephone network was “illegal and unconstitutional” and referred the dossier to the judiciary.

Hezbollah has installed an elaborate fibre-optic telephone system that it uses to maintain contact between its headquarters in the southern suburbs of Beirut and its cadres in south Lebanon and elsewhere. It enabled Hezbollah to maintain communications during the month-long war with Israel, defeating Israeli attempts to jam cellphone signals and monitor the national telephone system. Hezbollah said that its internal telephone system was an integral component of its military wing, and that anyone attempting to shut it down would be treated as an Israeli spy.

Hezbollah and its Shia ally, the Amal Movement, have been infuriated by the Government's decision to dismiss General Wafiq Shuqeir, the head of security at Beirut airport, on charges of failing to halt Hezbollah's alleged monitoring of the airport's runways. General Shuqeir is close to Nabih Berri, the parliamentary speaker and Amal leader.

Hezbollah and Amal supporters took to the streets at dawn, setting up barricades at key junctions. The airport road was blocked. More than 20 flights were cancelled.

Hundreds of green-bereted troops were deployed in the streets and at junctions, although they did not intervene to break up the roadblocks. The army closed off some streets to keep rival factions apart. Troops in riot gear struggled to separate rival groups of stone-throwing youths in the mixed Sunni-Shia Mazraa district.

Christian areas were calm, with opposition supporters staying at home.

A trade union rally in support of the strike was called off after protesters were unable to meet because of blocked streets. But the violence worsened in the afternoon. Opposition gunmen used rocket-propelled grenades to destroy an office belonging to the pro-Government Future Movement. Weapons and ammunition stored inside the building were seized by opposition gunmen.

“They call themselves resistance against Israel, but all they are doing is trying to take over the country,” said Anwar Salem, 44, a shopkeeper in the mixed Sunni-Shia Basta area.

Hopes that the violence would ebb by the evening faded as Hezbollah gave warning that it would increase the street action in 48 hours unless the Government withdrew its investigation into the party's telephone network and reinstated General Shuqeir.

Militant tendency

1982 Hezbollah founded to represent Shias of Lebanon

299 US and French soldiers killed in Hezbollah suicide attack on Beirut military bases in 1983

33,000 rockets claimed to be in its arsenal

14 seats, out of 128, won by Hezbollah political arm in 2005 Lebanese poll

10m estimated daily viewers worldwide for Hezbollah TV channel al-Manar

Sources: Jerusalem Post; Times archives; Globalsecurity.org; Middle East Quarterly

Times Recommends

• 'New York has lost its edge'
• Copenhagen will fail – and quite right too
• More than 17,000 new underwater species found