WORLD_ SYRIA_ Israeli Warplanes Strike Near the Border of Syria and Lebanon

Israeli Warplanes Strike Near the Border of Syria and Lebanon

By ANNE BARNARD 
FEB. 24, 2014
The New York Times

BEIRUT, Lebanon — Israeli warplanes launched two raids near the Syrian-Lebanese border late Monday, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency, raising speculation that Israel might have targeted a weapons convoy to prevent the Syrian government from delivering missiles to its Lebanese ally, Hezbollah.

Israel has struck Syria at least three times in the past year, according to United States officials, to prevent sophisticated weapons from reaching Hezbollah amid the chaos of Syria’s war. Neither Syria nor Hezbollah has retaliated.

The potential significance of Monday’s strike depended on whether the raids hit Syrian or Lebanese territory, which was not immediately clear. Analysts said it would be politically harder for Hezbollah to refrain from striking back if Israel, its longtime enemy, had struck inside Lebanon.

An Israeli strike inside Lebanon would also represent a further escalation in the regional involvement in — and spillover from — the Syrian conflict. Israel and Hezbollah fought a war in the summer of 2006.

But Syrian rebels near the border, as well as residents of a nearby Lebanese town, said that the strike appeared to have hit Syrian territory. Hezbollah’s television channel, Al Manar, quoted Lebanese security sources as saying that no Israeli raid had struck Lebanon.

Fayez Shukor, a former Lebanese government minister who backs the Syrian government and lives in the Bekaa Valley town of Nabi Chit, near the site of the attack, said that the sound of warplanes was heard about 10:45 p.m. but that nothing had been hit in the town.

The National News Agency described the attack as taking place “between the Lebanese-Syrian borders.” That frontier is mountainous and poorly marked, and in some areas there is a de facto buffer zone that is technically on Lebanese territory.

Abu al-Majd, a Syrian rebel fighter in nearby Yabroud, said that trucks loaded with Hezbollah weapons were hit near the borders inside Syria. He said he believed the convoy was headed into Syria with weapons to back up the Syrian army in its ongoing battles there, in which Hezbollah is participating.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights in London said that Israeli aircraft had bombed a base belonging to Hezbollah forces that had been involved in fighting against insurgents in the Qalamoun area near the Lebanese border. The Observatory added that it did not know whether this was in Syrian or Lebanese territory.

Each side in Syria accuses the other of colluding with Israel, which is deeply unpopular in Syria. The Syrian government accuses Israel of supporting the rebels battling President Bashar al-Assad, while rebels say Israel prefers to keep Mr. Assad in power because he has not tried to retake the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in 1967.

As usual in these cases, Israeli military and security officials refused Monday night to comment on the raid reports. Israel has maintained a policy of ambiguity in all the previous cases of strikes against weapons convoys or facilities in Syria or near the Syria-Lebanon border, refusing to confirm or deny involvement.

Yet Israeli officials have repeatedly warned in recent months that Israel will not tolerate the transfer of advanced weapons to Hezbollah and will act to prevent any such action. American officials say that Syria provides a key route for the delivery of Iranian weapons to Hezbollah and has provided arms to the group itself.

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Hwaida Saad and Mohammad Ghannam contributed reporting from Beirut, and Isabel Kershner from Jerusalem.

A version of this article appears in print on February 25, 2014, on page A3 of the New York edition with the headline: Israeli Warplanes Strike Near the Border of Syria and Lebanon .


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