Arrest warrants issued for 2 Lebanese in connection with targeted Arouri killing

Judicial officials in Lebanon said an investigative judge has issued arrest warrants for two people on suspicion of giving information to Israel including the digital mapping of a Beirut southern suburb street where a top official with the Palestinian Hamas group was killed in January.

The officials said Thursday that Fadi Sawwan, the investigative judge at the military tribunal, issued the arrest warrants earlier this week for the two Lebanese citizens weeks after they were detained while using sophisticated digital mapping equipment.

The Israeli military did not immediately return requests for comment.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations, said the two men had earlier mapped streets in different parts of Lebanon including Beirut’s southern suburbs that are home to the leadership of the militant Hezbollah group. They said the men said they thought they were sending the information to a U.S.-based company that does virtual tourism business.

The two officials said among the streets that they mapped was the one where the deputy leader of Hamas, Saleh Arouri, was killed along with six other militants in a January strike that hit an apartment. They said the street was mapped nearly two weeks before Arouri was killed.

The officials said the two are in custody and were charged with spying for a foreign country and obtaining information that should remain secret because of national security. The officials said the two could get a sentence of up to life in prison.