5 Hizbullah Captives Return Home as Refugees, Nusra Militants Reach Central Syria

Al-Qaida's former Syria affiliate al-Nusra Front on Thursday handed over five Hizbullah captives to the Lebanese party as part of a ceasefire agreement that also involved the evacuation of thousands of militants and refugees from northeast Lebanon to Syria.

The five captives – Ahmed Mezher, Moussa Kourani, Hassan Taha, Mohammed Mahdi Shoaib and Mohammed Jawad Yassine – were handed over at the al-Saan crossing in Syria's central Hama province.

A Hizbullah convoy then carried the five fighters to Lebanon via the Joussiyeh border crossing. A celebration was to be held later in their honor in the Lebanese border town of al-Qaa.

Thousands of Syrian refugees and militants evacuated from the outskirts of the northeastern Lebanese border town of Arsal meanwhile arrived in central Syria in territory held by rebel and jihadist fighters.

They were bussed out of the restive border area between Lebanon and Syria as part the ceasefire deal with Hizbullah.

An AFP correspondent said the freed Hizbullah fighters arrived in Syrian Red Crescent vehicles in Hama's al-Saan area.

A total of 7,777 people -- a vast majority of them civilians but also including militants -- were transported back into Syria from Lebanon's Arsal region on Wednesday in line with the ceasefire.

The agreement ended six days of fighting in the border area between Hizbullah and al-Qaida's former Syrian affiliate Fateh al-Sham Front, previously known as the al-Nusra Front.

On Thursday, buses carrying three groups of Syrian jihadists and refugees arrived in an area of Hama under the control of rebels and jihadists, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Two more groups arrived later in the day.

The five Hizbullah fighters were captured in central and northern Syria in 2015 and 2016.

Another three Hizbullah fighters were released as part of the deal late on Tuesday. They had been captured during the latest Arsal offensive after losing their way in a mountainous region.

Arsal's outskirts had been used for years as a hideout by Syrian militants, but was also home to an unknown number of refugees seeking shelter from Syria's six-year war. 

Al-Nusra Front was al-Qaida's affiliate in Syria until mid-2016 when it broke off ties, before going on to found a new jihadist-led alliance called Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which now controls large swathes of Syria's northwestern Idlib province.

Hizbullah launched the offensive on the Syrian militants on July 21 and had cornered rival fighters in a small pocket of territory when it announced the truce.

The deal also saw the release of three detainees held in Lebanon's Roumieh prison.

The first phase of the deal took place on Monday, when Hizbullah and HTS exchanged the bodies of nine Syrian fighters for the remains of five Hizbullah fighters.

Tens of thousands of Syrian refugees live in the town of Arsal, adjacent to the border region, and an unknown number are also thought to have taken shelter in the surrounding mountains.

More than one million Syrians are registered with the United Nations as refugees in Lebanon, a country of just four million people.