Army Targets Gunmen Posts on Outskirts of Arsal

The Lebanese army reportedly targeted on Thursday posts for militants on the outskirts of the northeastern border town of Arsal with heavy artillery, the state-run National News Agency said.

NNA reported that troops shelled with heavy artillery armed men who are entrenched on al-Zamarani and al-Ajram areas on the outskirts of the village.

Voice of Lebanon radio (93.3) said that fierce battles erupted between the army and gunmen and the military brought reinforcements to the area.

Heavy shelling by Syrian warplanes also targeted the outskirts of Ras Baalbek and its thud can be clearly heard in the northern Bekaa.

Earlier on Thursday, NNA reported that Syrian warplanes staged several raids overnight on posts controlled by gunmen on the outskirts Arsal.

The news agency said that gunmen positions in al-Ajram, Khirbet Daoud, and al-Zamarani were targeted with the raids.

The raids inflicted heavy casualties in the ranks of the armed men, NNA added, without specifying further details.

Arsal's peripheries have come under frequent Syrian raids in recent months. Damascus says the airstrikes are targeting “terrorists” fleeing the Syrian region of Qalamoun.

The mountainous area has long been a smuggling haven, with multiple routes into Syria that have been used since the conflict began in March 2011 to transport weapons and fighters.

Jihadists from al-Qaida-linked al-Nusra Front and the Islamic State group are entrenched on the outskirts of the town on the porous Syrian-Lebanese border.

The army engaged in a fierce gun battle in August with jihadists who streamed across the border.

Fighting ended with a truce mediated by clerics, but the jihadists took with them the Lebanese army and police hostages.

At least four have since been executed.