Militants from the Al-Nusra Front (Jabhat Al-Nusra) carried out an ambush near the Syrian border that resulted in the death of 7 Lebanese Army soldiers in Ras Ba’albak. The ambushed soldiers were returning from the Syrian border where they conducted a series of operations to eliminate the flow of armed militants smuggling weapons from Syria into Lebanon. Lebanese military intelligence has not revealed the identities of the soldiers killed in the ambush; however, they have confirmed the number of men killed-in-action (KIA).
Lebanese security forces have apprehended one of the wives and sons of Sheikh Ibrahim Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi – the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham’s (ISIS) – inside Lebanon. Lebanese military intelligence has claimed that the woman and her child arrived in Lebanon from Iraq, despite no official word from ISIS media outlets and the self-proclaimed caliph himself.
In the ‘Akkaar District of the Tripoli Governorate, the Lebanese Army raided a number of Jabhat Al-Nusra hideouts in the cities of ‘Akkaar and Bab Al-Tabbaneh after receiving tips from local civilians regarding their whereabouts and illegal activity. The Lebanese Army increased the number of raids in the ‘Arsaal and ‘Akkaar Districts when members of the military were taken hostage by Jabhat Al-Nusra in August of this year.