Plane Carrying Lebanese Victims of Istanbul Attack Arrives in Beirut

A Middle East Airlines plane carrying the bodies of three Lebanese killed in Istanbul's nightclub massacre and five of the wounded arrived Monday evening at Beirut's Rafik Hariri International Airport.

The plane carried the corpses of Elias Wardini, Rita Chami and Haykal Musallem as well as the wounded Lebanese nationals Melissa Papalardo, Nidal Bsherrawi, Francois al-Asmar, Nasser Beshara and Jihad Abdul Khaleq.

The plane also carried some of the Lebanese who escaped the attack unharmed, including Hassan Issa, Dania Murad Issa, Nermine Ghalayini and Mayez Mobayed, the National News Agency said. Relatives of the victims and a Lebanese delegation that had headed to Istanbul were also on the plane.

Bushra Doueihi, the wounded daughter of Zgharta MP Estephan Doueihi, meanwhile stayed in an Istanbul hospital due to her serious injuries.

Prime Minister Saad Hariri, Foreign Minister Jebran Bassil, Interior Minister Nouhad al-Mashnouq, State Minister for Planning Affairs Michel Pharaon, State Minister for Combating Corruption Nicolas Tueini and MP Emile Rahme received the dead and the wounded at Beirut's airport alongside the grief-stricken families of the victims and a large group of Lebanese citizens.

Ten Lebanese Red Cross ambulances transported the bodies and the wounded to several Lebanese hospitals.

Thirty-nine people, the majority of them foreigners, were killed and around 70 others were wounded when a gunman went on a rampage at Istanbul's luxurious Reina nightclub where revelers were celebrating New Year's Eve.

The jihadist Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was in response to Turkey's military intervention against the jihadists in war-ravaged Syria where Turkish troops are pressing on with a four-month incursion to oust IS jihadists from the border area.