[Jerusalem Post Middle East] A Lebanese military prosecutor charged on Wednesday six people accused of collaborating with Israel, judicial officials said, in what has become the latest espionage tug-of-war between the two countries.
In Lebanese legal jargon, collaboration often means spying - a crime that can carry a death sentence in this country. Lebanon considers itself at war with Israel and bans its citizens from having any contact with the Jewish state.
The charges come after Lebanon recently announced the arrests of at least 14 suspects accused of spying for Israel but it was not immediately known if the six charged are part of that group.
The judicial officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with judicial regulations, said the six included a police staff sergeant. The officials would not say if all the six were Lebanese.
On Monday, Lebanese police displayed sophisticated devices they claimed were seized from Palestinians living in the country and from Lebanese recruited by Israel to spy on the Hizbullah.
The arrests, mainly in southern Lebanon, appeared to be part of a stepped-up campaign against those suspected of gathering information on Hizbullah terrorists for Israel's Mossad intelligence agency. The Iranian-backed Hizbullah fought a 34-day war with Israel in 2006 that killed 1,200 people in Lebanon and 159 in Israel.
Most of the recent arrests were based on information from a retired Lebanese general, who was charged with spying for Israel last month along with his wife and his nephew, who was a government security agent, Lebanese officials have said.
Israeli officials have refused to comment on the arrests. Last week, Israeli government spokesman Mark Regev reiterated that it is not Israel's practice to comment on such allegations.
Hizbullah's TV station lauded the arrests as the result of coordinated efforts between the militant group's security branch and the police and military intelligence.
[Jerusalem Post Middle East] In what seems to be a stark change in policy, Hizbullah has admitted to not only providing Hamas with "every type of support," but also to having done so for some time. "We have always said that we supported the resistance in Palestine, but we have not mentioned how or given details of such support," Naim Qassem, the deputy leader of the Lebanese organization, said in an interview published by the Financial Times on Wednesday.
"But Egypt has now revealed that we have given military support to Palestine. We have done so for a while, but we have not talked about it," he continued.
In April, Egyptian authorities arrested 49 people suspected of plotting attacks against Israeli targets in the country, as well as against Egypt itself, of trying to smuggle weapons into Gaza, and of spreading Shi'ite ideology on behalf of Hizbullah. The incident quickly escalated into a war of words between Hizbullah and Egyptian officials, in which the latter accused the former of using Egypt as a "playground" for terrorism.
Israel has long suspected Hizbullah of assisting the Palestinian with arms and training, but the recent public feud with Egypt led the organization to its first public admission of such activities. "What he [one of those arrested by Egypt] really did was a kind of logistic work to help Palestinian brothers in transporting men and equipment for the resistance inside Palestine," Hizbullah chief Hassan Nasrallah said at the time. However, he categorically denied that the activities were aimed at harming Egypt or spreading the group's ideology.
Without addressing the latter allegation, Qassem reiterated Nasrallah's point to the Financial Times. "It is one of the secrets of the resistance that we don't talk about the details of our support, but suffice to say that we are giving them every type of support that could help the Palestinian resistance. Every type that is possible," he said. "We leave this to be seen in time to come," Qassem added when pressed on whether the group was providing arms and training.
Hizbullah's deputy leader also took the opportunity to blast US policy in the Middle East as hypocritical. "We are asked about our specific and limited support for Gaza, while nobody questions the US about their total and unflinching support for Israel," he said. "We are always questioned but nobody questions the US."
Continued on Page 47
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that we supported the resistance in Palestine, but we have not mentioned how or given details of such support," Naim Qassem, the deputy leader of the Lebanese organization, said in an interview published by the Financial Times on Wednesday. 
