Gunmen Kill 3 Lebanese Soldier At Checkpoint

Lebanon check

Three Lebanese soldiers were killed by armed men at an army checkpoint in the eastern Bekaa Valley who then fled towards the Syrian border, Lebanese officials say.

It was not clear who carried out Tuesday’s attack, which is the latest incident in a frontier region which has been increasingly drawn into the violence in neighbouring Syria.

The shooting took place before dawn near Arsal, in an area used by Syrian rebels and their Lebanese backers to smuggle arms and fighters into Syria.

In February, four Lebanese soldiers and two fighters were killed in a gun battle near Arsal.

Lebanon is sharply divided over the war in Syria and violence in the majority Sunni Muslim village of Arsal is a particular flashpoint as refugees from the uprising and fighters hostile to the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad traverse the border.

The situation has put the Lebanese army under extra pressure to keep a lid on sectarian tensions.

“Soldiers at the checkpoint confronted the attackers and a clash ensued which resulted in the martyrdom of three soldiers,” an army statement said.

The military was searching for the assailants, who may have fled into neighbouring Syria, Fayez Ghosn, Lebanon’s defence minister, said after Tuesday’s attack.

Three mortar shells fired from Syria on Monday killed at least one woman and wounded two people near the eastern Lebanese town of Hermel, about 30km north of Arsal, the Lebanese army said.

Hermel is a bastion of Hezbollah, the armed Lebanese Shia group.

Most Sunni groups in northern and eastern Lebanon blame the country’s army for hindering their efforts to support rebels in Syria with guns and fighters and at the same time failing stop Hezbollah from sending fighters to support Assad.

Hezbollah has been battling alongside Assad’s forces to drive rebels from the Syrian border town of Qusayr, while many pro-rebel Sunni fighters have slipped across to join the uprising.