Lebanese authorities have arrested five militants suspected of involvement in attacks in Syria and Lebanon and of belonging to an Al Qaeda-inspired group, security sources said on Monday. The Lebanese army confirmed in a statement it had detained five people who "are involved in terrorist acts". Army troops and security men made the arrests in the past four days in the northern city of Tripoli and the nearby Palestinian refugee camp of Beddawi. They coordinated with the Palestinian Fatah faction, which captured and handed over a suspect in the southern camp of Ain al-Hilweh, the sources said.
All the militants are said to belong to Fatah al-Islam, a group crushed by the army last year in a 15-week battle in the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in northern Lebanon. At least 430 people were killed, including 170 soldiers and 220 militants. Syrian state television last week showed 12 alleged members of Fatah al-Islam confessing that they helped plan a suicide car bombing in Damascus that killed 17 people in September.
Ahmed Khaled al-Itr, a known militant, was arrested after his name came up in the confessions. Fatah al-Islam sympathisers were linked to attacks on the Lebanese army earlier this year. The militant arrested in Ain al-Hilweh was directly linked to Al Qaeda, the security sources said.