Rocket fire kills 2 Lebanese soldiers near Syrian border
Attack follows arrest of suspected terror cell in region that has seen fierce fighting between Lebanon army, Syrian rebels
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Lebanese security officials say attackers fired a rocket at an army patrol near the Syrian border on Friday, killing two soldiers and wounding three.
“We can confirm that a military vehicle patrolling the outskirts of Arsal was targeted, probably by a rocket-propelled grenade, and that two soldiers were wounded,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The attack came after the army detained a Lebanese and two Syrians alleged to be part of a “terrorist cell” near Arsal. On Wednesday, jihadi gunmen crossed from Syria and snatched a Lebanese soldier. Gunmen snatched around 20 soldiers and police in August.
Arsal, close to the border with Syria, was the scene last month of a major battle between the Lebanese army and jihadists who had streamed across the frontier.
Extremists in Lebanon view the army as backing Shiite Hezbollah, which has sent thousands of fighters into Syria to support President Bashar Assad’s forces against rebels trying to oust him.
At the end of the Arsal battle in August, the jihadists took with them some 30 Lebanese soldiers and policemen captured in the fighting, and two of them have since been beheaded.
Arsal has a majority Sunni population that generally backs the revolt against Assad, but it is in the Bekaa region, where the majority are Shiites who support Hezbollah and Assad’s regime.
The Times of Israel Community.