Security Forces Arrest Sheikh and Fugitive in North, 11 Syrians in Bekaa

Several people were arrested Friday during raids by the army and the Internal Security Forces in the North district and the Bekaa region.

“The ISF Intelligence Bureau arrested Sheikh Osama Antar, aka Abu Ibrahim, during a raid in the al-Hawooz Street in Abi Samra” in the northern city of Tripoli, state-run National News Agency reported.

It said two computers belonging to him were seized during the operation.

Meanwhile, Voice of Lebanon radio (100.5) pointed out that Antar is the imam of al-Taqwa Mosque, in which prominent Salafist cleric Sheikh Salem al-Rafehi “used to deliver sermons.”

Also in Tripoli, the army raided the house of fugitive Islamist militant Shadi al-Mawlawi in the al-Qobbeh neighborhood without finding him there, LBCI television said.

Elsewhere, army forces cracked down on the residence places of several wanted men in the Akkar town of Bhannine.

Troops arrested Ali Hussein Akkoush on charges of “involvement along with others in opening fire at army troops,” an army statement said, referring to recent deadly clashes between the army and Islamist gunmen in Bhannine.

The army statement also said 11 Syrians were arrested in the Bekaa area of Anjar for “moving inside Lebanon without carrying legal identification papers.”

The army has been carrying out a major crackdown in Tripoli and the North in recent weeks, following unprecedented clashes with Islamist militants in Tripoli's old souks and Bab al-Tabbaneh and the nearby town of Bhannine in the Minieh region.

Eleven troops, five civilians and an unknown number of gunmen were killed in the fierce gunbattles.

Y.R.