Two Rockets Hit Baabda Area, One near Presidential Palace
Two rockets fell in the Baabda area on Thursday evening, one of them near the presidential palace, in the third such incident in less than two months.
“A rocket fell near the (army's) Command and Staff College in al-Rayhaniyeh as another rocket hit the garden of Elham Freiha's house, and both were fired from al-Mwanseh area in Dhour Aramoun,” state-run National News Agency reported.
MTV said the rockets were fired from “a barren area in Souk al-Gharb” near Aley.
A security source told MTV the attack caused no casualties among military personnel or civilians.
“One of the rockets fell around 50 meters away from the defense ministry” in Fayyadiyeh, a suburb of Beirut, MTV reported.
Al-Jadeed television said a rocket fell around 100 meters away from the presidential palace as Agence France Presse said it landed around 100 meters away from the palace's back entrance.
“The house of the army's intelligence director (Brig. Gen. Edmond Fadel) is close to the house of the Freiha family where one of the rockets landed,” al-Jadeed said.
MTV said one of the rockets landed near the house of the Saudi ambassador but failed to explode.
Earlier in the day, Lebanon marked the 68th Army Day, with President Michel Suleiman saying it was time for the Lebanese state and the army to be the sole decision-makers on the use of the nation's capabilities.
“It has become urgent to approve a defense strategy after the resistance's arms went beyond Lebanon's borders,” Suleiman said during a ceremony marking anniversary of the Lebanese army’s founding, in an allusion to Hizbullah’s military intervention in Syria.
On June 21, two rocket launch pads were found in the Kesrouan area of Ballouneh after a rocket exploded in the Baabda town of Araya. The second rocket failed to launch.
Sources told Naharnet back then that the relevant security and military authorities and the Presidential Guard were scouring the area, without ruling out that the presidential palace could have been the target of the rocket.
In May, two rockets slammed into the Hizbullah stronghold of Beirut's southern suburbs, wounding four people.
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