Lebanon Border Residents Fearful after Syria Shootout

Residents fearfully ventured back to Lebanon's northern border with Syria on Saturday after troops loyal to President Bashar Assad raked the area with gunfire, wounding three people.

"I've come back to check on my shop today but my family is still with our relatives in another village," said Abu Saado, a shop owner in the village of Jisr al-Gharbi which straddles the border in the Wadi Khaled district.

Abu Saado was among dozens of terrified families who fled their homes in the district on Friday after shooting from the Syrian side of the border wounded two men and a woman.

Lebanese troop reinforcements deployed along the border overnight but pulled back on Saturday.

An army statement said the three Lebanese were wounded by stray bullets from "armed clashes" in Syria.

But witnesses in Wadi Khaled said Syrian troops had intentionally opened fire on a crowd that had gathered on the Lebanese side of the border to protest against a bloody crackdown in the Tal Kalakh district on the Syrian side.

Mahmoud Khazaal, former mayor of the border town of Mouqaybli, told Agence France Presse that troops began to "shoot randomly" when the crowd of Syrian refugees formed on the Lebanese side of the Kabir River, which separates the two countries.

Several riverside homes were riddled with bullet holes on Saturday and three had all of their windows shattered.

A few children roamed among the abandoned houses collecting spent bullets to play with.

Some 30 families chose not to return to their homes in Jisr al-Gharbi for fear of fresh gunfire across the border, officials said.

In recent months, thousands of people have fled into Lebanon from border districts of Syria such as Tal Kalakh as Assad's troops have resorted to mounting violence to crush anti-regime protests launched in March.

Now many of them are seeking refuge further into Lebanon.

"Yesterday, out of the blue, bullets started raining down on us out of nowhere," said Khaled Azmi, a Lebanese citizen who lived in the Syrian village of Qusayr with his wife and eight children for years before fleeing four months ago.

"We've heard conflicting reports and we still don't know why or exactly what the source was.

"We spent last night in fear and we're afraid this could happen again," said Azmi, adding that he was now moving to the village of Mashta Hassan, farther from the border.

"Worse still, we're afraid clashes could start in Lebanon too," he said.

Lebanon is bitterly divided between pro- and anti-Damascus camps, and there are growing fears that the bloodshed in Syria could spill over the border.