Authorities have arrested five people, including a bodyguard to Free Patriotic Movement leader Jebran Bassil, in connection with an alleged security cell operating across the Lebanon-Syria border.
An aide to Deputy Jebran Bassil who worked in the State Security apparatus was arrested on Wednesday, September 2, according to security officials. He and his brother, a former member of the Internal Security Forces who was dismissed in 2016 after allegations he kidnapped Syrian opposition defectors and handed them to Syrian intelligence at the border, were among five detained in the operation.
Three of the five detainees are Syrian; the two Lebanese are brothers. Intelligence branch operatives became suspicious of the younger brother and a Syrian man linked to former regime elements after observing the latter's movements in Tripoli. Both were detained on instructions from the Cassation Court prosecutor Ahmad Rami al-Hajj.
Investigators identified an active communications channel between the detainees and a senior Syrian officer now in Moscow, a brigadier from the Jaber family who previously commanded the Desert Division of the Syrian military, responsible for the Syrian coast.
The elder brother was arrested from his home in Tal Bireh, Akkar. The Syrian suspect was later apprehended in Bikfaya in the northern Mount Lebanon after fleeing Tripoli and moving to Chekka.
Security forces recovered detonators and explosives during the operation. One detainee told interrogators he threw explosive devices into the Kabir River in northern Lebanon, though investigators have not yet located them.
Initial findings suggest the cell worked to recruit individuals from the Syrian coast and facilitate their entry into Lebanon, with Hezbollah allegedly providing logistical support, including funds and transport to training sites in the northern Bekaa valley, specifically Baalbek, where they learned to use explosives and construct devices.
Investigators are currently working to identify and arrest two people with alleged Hezbollah links whom network members were in contact with, security officials said.
