Lebanese security sources have reported continued weapons smuggling and
insurgency infiltration from Syria into Lebanon.
The sources said Syria has
employed Palestinian fighters to exacerbate tensions with Lebanon.
On Tuesday, a Lebanese Army contractor was killed in a shootout with
Palestinian insurgents near the border with Syria. The civilian contractor
had accompanied a Lebanese Army patrol along the Syrian border near Helweh
in southeastern Lebanon.
On Wednesday, the Lebanese Army brought hundreds of troops as well as 10
M-48 main battle tanks and artillery to Helweh. Lebanese sources said the
army has also surrounded a military camp of the Syrian-sponsored Popular
Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command in the Bekaa Valley.
The Lebanese sources said Palestinian fighters opened fire on the
Lebanese patrol from Syria. They identified the Palestinians as members of
the Syrian-sponsored Fatah Uprising. The group maintains a training base in
Helweh.
Fatah Uprising was established in 1983 as a Syrian-aligned group that
bolted from the movement headed by then-Palestine Liberation Organization
chief Yasser Arafat. The group has been based in Damascus and led by Abu
Mussa, whose real name is Col. Said Mussa.
This was the second death of a Lebanese national along the Syrian
frontier in October. On Oct. 2, a Lebanese farmer was killed by unidentified
Syrian
gunmen in the northeastern Lebanese border village of Aarsal.
The Lebanese sources said the military contractor had been conducting a
survey of Lebanon's border with Syria when he was struck by a bullet in his
chest. Beirut has urged Damascus to delineate their mutual border as part of
an effort to prevent infiltration.
Syria was said to have also masterminded a series of bombing attacks in
the Beirut region in early 2005. Officials said three bombing suspects
claimed they had been hired by Syrian Brig. Gen. Jamaa Jamaa, who was a
leading member of Syria's intelligence network in Lebanon.
Jean Fahd, a government delegate to Lebanon's military tribunal, said
Jamaa, through an unidentified third party, offered to pay the suspects to
plant bombs in Beirut. The suspects said the bombings were meant to delay a
Syrian troop withdrawal, which was completed in April 2005.