OUTSKIRTS OF ARSAL Lebanon (Reuters) - The
Lebanese army advanced on Monday into a border town attacked by
Islamists at the weekend in the most serious spillover of the
three-year-old Syrian civil war into Lebanon.
The army pounded areas around the town of Arsal with artillery for
a third day in a bid to expel the fighters identified by the army as
members of the Nusra Front and the Islamic State, which has seized
wide areas of Syria and Iraq.
Advancing soldiers found the bodies of 50 militants, a Lebanese
security official said.
At least 13 soldiers have been killed in the fighting, which erupted
after the Lebanese security forces arrested a Syrian Islamist rebel
commander on Saturday. At least two dozen members of the Lebanese
security services - both army and police - have been taken hostage
or are missing.
The army has described the Islamists' incursion as a long-planned
attack. Local politicians say it marks an attempt to extend the
Islamic State's footprint into Lebanon.
The militants have been beaten back in the border area in the past
year by Syrian government forces backed by Hezbollah, the Lebanese
Shi'ite Muslim political and military movement. Some 3,000 fighters
are estimated to be in the border zone.
Thick plumes of black and grey smoke billowed from the tops of the
hills where Arsal lies. Intermittent bursts of gunfire could be
heard from the surrounding areas as the army sent in reinforcements.
A dozen armoured personnel carriers were seen advancing towards the
town, together with a similar number of other military vehicles
including trucks and Humvees. Soldiers armed with assault rifles and
rocket-propelled grenades sat atop the vehicles as they moved along
the main road towards Arsal.
In a statement, the army said it had taken full control of a school
that militants had seized during the incursion. It said a number of
soldiers had been killed and wounded in the fighting, but gave no
further details.
Arsal is a mainly Sunni town located on the Lebanese side of the
border between Syrian government-controlled territory and Lebanese
Shi'ite areas sympathetic to Hezbollah.
Lebanon has been buffeted by violence linked to the Syrian war
including rocket attacks, suicide bombings and gun battles. But this
weekend's incursion by hardline Sunni militants was the first of its
kind.
More than 100,000 Syrian refugees are estimated to be living in and
around Arsal. Syrian activists in the area say refugee camps have
been heavily damaged during the fighting. "The humanitarian
situation is very bad. There is no place of refuge for the
refugees," said one Syrian activist in the area reached by text
message. "The residents are terrified."
A Syrian doctor in Arsal said on Sunday that 17 civilians had been
killed.
The war in Syria has exacerbated divisions between Shi'ite Lebanese
allied to the Assad government and Sunnis who have mostly been
supportive of the uprising against him. Political divisions have
left the country without a president since May.
Lebanon's most influential Sunni politician, former prime minister
Saad al-Hariri, said Arsal must be "liberated" from the militants
who he said must leave the town.
"They have no choice but to withdraw from the town and neither the
state, nor we, will stand idle in the face of the plots of these
groups," Hariri said in comments to the London-based Al-Hayat
newspaper.
Hezbollah said on Sunday that it stood "shoulder to shoulder" with
the military as it confronted what it said was a threat to the
"unity, sovereignty and stability" of Lebanon.
Its forces are deployed in the area near Arsal but the group has not
said whether they are taking part in the fighting.
(Writing/additional reporting by Tom Perry; Editing by Peter Graff
and Paul Taylor)
