Lebanon detains 103 Syrians after blasts
AP, Beirut Tuesday, 28 June 2016
Lebanese troops detained 103 Syrians for illegal entry into the country in a security sweep Tuesday, a day after a series of deadly bombings struck a village near the Syrian border, the military said. The government warned of a mounting challenge in tiny Lebanon, which abuts the war-torn Syria, underlining the magnitude of Monday’s attack that saw nine bombings, eight of them from suicide attackers, strike in the small Christian village of Qaa, killing five people. “The attack on the Lebanese national security and the unfamiliar manner in which it was executed usher in a new kind of phase in the state’s confrontation with the dark forces of terrorism,” a Cabinet statement said. The bombings triggered fear and panic among Qaa’s residents and a deepening sense of foreboding in Lebanon, which has grappled for over five years with spillovers from Syria’s civil war.Tuesday was declared a national day of mourning and authorities postponed funerals for the five killed in Monday’s bombings, citing security reasons. A major religious event scheduled in the capital, Beirut, by the militant Hezbollah group was also postponed. Also citing security concerns, the ministry of culture postponed the opening of the Bacchus Temple, part of the famed ruins of Baalbek. A troupe of Syrian actors roaming the Bekaa Valley with a performance about refugee woes postponed its tour. A limited curfew was imposed in Qaa and the surrounding area. The army said it carried out security raids in six areas in the Baalbek region, which has many informal Syrian refugee settlements. It said nine motorcycles and two vehicles were confiscated and two Lebanese were arrested with illegal weapons. Monday’s explosions, four in the early morning and five at night, also wounded nearly 30 in Qaa. Later in the day, two bombers blew themselves up outside the village church as people gathered for funerals of those killed earlier Monday. The army said one of the suicide bombers detonated his explosives as he was chased by troops, while the other blew himself up near a military post when guards fired at him. No one was killed but the two blasts wounded 13 people.
Minister of Interior Nouhad Machnouk said initial investigations indicate most of the bombers were from inside Syria and not refugees. He didn’t elaborate. Private Lebanese OTV aired what it said was footage from security cameras in Qaa, purporting to show a young man involved in the attack. The footage shows the young man with a backpack heading to a gathering outside the church, apparently to blow himself up. Qaa and the nearby Ras Baalbek are the only two villages with a Christian majority in the predominantly Shiite Hermel region, where the Shiite Hezbollah group holds sway. The group has sent thousands of its fighters to Syria to bolster President Bashar Assad’s forces against the predominantly Sunni rebels trying to topple him. Hezbollah’s Al-Manar TV blamed Monday’s attack on the Islamic State group. Al-Mustaqbal daily, which is owned by Hezbollah’s rival group, suggested the army was the target of the attack.No group has claimed responsibility for the bombings.Sunni extremists have carried out several attacks in the border area since Syria’s conflict began in March 2011, leading the Christians of Qaa to set up self-defense units for their village.
Lebanese Army Raids Syrian Refugee Encampments after Suicide Blasts Naharnet/June 28/16/Lebanese troops raided makeshift refugee camps near a predominantly Christian village on the border with Syria on Tuesday a day after two waves of suicide attacks. “We are worried that there are more terrorists, so the Lebanese army is searching the area,” said Bashir Matar, mayor of al-Qaa, which lies in a hilly border area shaken by violence since the civil war erupted in Syria in 2011. Five people were killed and 15 wounded when four suicide bombers attacked the village before dawn on Monday. A second wave of attacks hit al-Qaa on Monday night. Another four suicide bombers wounded 13 people. Al-Qaa lies on a main road linking the Syrian town of al-Qusayr to Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa valley. Its 3,000 residents are predominantly Christian, but the Masharia al-Qaa district is home to Sunni Muslims and some 30,000 Syrian refugees live in a makeshift camp on the edge of the village. “The army has deployed a large force to Masharia al-Qaa and is carrying out widespread searches in the displacement camps, looking for weapons or wanted people,” the state National News Agency reported. In Baalbek, an eastern city known for its ancient ruins, soldiers “carried out raids in the refugee camp… and arrested 103 Syrians who were on Lebanese territory illegally,” an army statement said. Lebanon is host to more than one million Syrian refugees, roughly a quarter of the small Mediterranean country’s population. Hizbullah, which has sent thousands of fighters to Syria to back President Bashar Assad, has set up informal checkpoints along the road between the Bekaa valley and the area of Baalbek “to search cars,” a Hizbullah official told AFP. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Monday’s attacks which bore the hallmarks of jihadist organisations like the Islamic State group or al-Qaida. Suicide blasts in the area have typically targeted checkpoints or military installations and rarely include more than one attacker.
In August 2014, the army clashed with the IS and Al-Nusra Front, al-Qaida’s affiliate in Syria, in the border town of Arsal.
