Middle East File: Bombing kills five in soldier-filled bus in Tripoli, Lebanon, two days after Damascus bombing kills senior Syrian intel figure

- Is Syria Preparing to Re-Invade Lebanon? Damascus' Troops Encircle, Infiltrate Neighbor as Bombings Create Case for Plausible Deniability

- Today's Tripoli Bus Bombing Follows Similar Incident Last Month in which Nine Lebanese Soldiers Were Killed by Briefcase Bomb

The fascist-communist state of Syria has encircled and infiltrated the failed state of Lebanon with its troops and covert operatives. Indeed, Lebanon has been under the control of Hezbollah and its allies in the presidential palace and military command since at least the May 2008 uprising/coup d'etat.

On Saturday a car bomb, detonated near the offices of the Mukhabarat and a Shiite Muslim shrine, killed 17 in Damascus. The Israeli media reports that "London-based al-Sharq al-Awsat newspaper says senior military officer is among 17 fatalities of car bomb which rocked Syrian capital. Attack believed to be meant for city's intelligence services building." Not surprisingly, the Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem quickly blamed Israel as the country that stands the most to benefit from such an assassination.

In light of these events, today's bombing in Tripoli, the largest city in northern Lebanon, near which Syrian commandos have reportedly taken up positions, is particuarly troubling. As the story below relates, the Assad regime is using its war against Lebanese-based, Saudi-backed Sunni Muslim terrorists as a cover to carry out its own nefarious plans for Syrian expansionism and irredentism.

However, if in reality this incident is the work of President Bashar al-Assad's Palestinian allies in the Fatah al-Islam movement, which has previously targetted Lebanese military personnel, then Saturday's Damascus bombing would represent a case of "plausible deniability" to camouflage the softening up of Lebanese defenses prior to a full-blown military re-invasion from Syria. Even BBC News admits this angle: "In Lebanon analysts are linking a bombing in the north of the country to a recent one in Syria, BBC Beirut correspondent Natalia Antelava reports."

After a 29-year occupation, Syria withdrew its army from Lebanon in 2005. Damascus is one of Moscow's most reliable Arab allies and categorized as a state sponsor of terrorism by the US State Department. Ten Russian warships are currently stationed at the Syrian port of Tartus, according to some reports.

4 Soldiers Killed in Lebanon Bombing
September 30, 2008
By ROBERT F. WORTH and GRAHAM BOWLEY

TRIPOLI, Lebanon — A car bomb exploded near a bus carrying Lebanese Army soldiers here on Monday, killing five and wounding 17, security officials said. Four of the dead were soldiers in the bus targeted in the attack, the second on the Lebanese military in a little over a month.

It came two days after a horrific car bombing in neighboring Syria, which the government in Damascus on Monday said was caused by a car that had crossed over the border from a nearby Arab state, although it did not name Lebanon.

Syria has recently warned that hard-line Sunni Islamists are operating just across the border in northern Lebanon, and tensions between Lebanon and Syria have risen as a result.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing Monday in Tripoli. The bomb, in a stationary car, was detonated as the bus was passing near the port area of this northern Lebanese city, the security officials said.

At the site of the explosion, the car was a blackened and shriveled wreck, and investigators were working over the bus, which was badly damaged but not destroyed. The bus had been carrying civilians as well as soldiers.

A witness, Abdel Qadir Shehadeh, 11, who was helping his father on a nearby car lot at the time of the attack, said he ran immediately to the scene. “I saw dead people and blood on the ground,” he said. “The car was burning. I heard people screaming.”

He said glass was broken at a gas station and other buildings nearby.

Former Prime Minister Najib Mikati, a Tripoli politician, was quoted by Reuters as telling Voice of Lebanon radio station, “This is a direct targeting of the military institution.”

The bombing bore close similarities to the attack in Lebanon last month, also in Tripoli, and also on a bus packed with Lebanese Army soldiers on their way to work.

In that attack, a bomb hidden in a briefcase tore through the bus, killing 15 people, including nine soldiers, and wounding more than 40 people.

It was the deadliest attack in Lebanon in more than three years, and occurred after a period of relative political calm here, after a new power-sharing deal among Lebanon’s divided factions in May.

Despite that deal, tensions have lingered in Tripoli, where the Lebanese Army killed many Islamist militants during a battle that raged for months last year in a Palestinian refugee camp.

Some Lebanese political figures said the bombing might have been revenge for the army’s role in Nahr al Bared, the refugee camp. Fatah al Islam, the Islamist group that fought the army there last year, has claimed responsibility for several small attacks on soldiers since then, including one that killed a soldier near Tripoli on May 31. The group’s leader, Shaker al-Absi, was never caught.

The Tripoli bombing on Monday coincided with an unusually detailed announcement from Syria about the Damascus attack on Saturday, including the license plate of the car. The authorities said the car had driven into Syria on Sept. 26 from a neighboring Arab state, the SANA news agency was quoted by Reuters as reporting.

The authorities did not identify the country. But earlier this month, President Bashar al-Assad of Syria issued a warning about the presence of hard-line Sunni Islamists just across the border in northern Lebanon, hinting that they were receiving support from Saudi Arabia.

Subsequently, thousands of Syrian troops were deployed near the border with northern Lebanon, in an intimidating move that was understood as a related gesture, though Syrian officials said it was to control smuggling.

Syria has often been accused of playing a role in the string of political bombings in Lebanon that began with the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri in February 2005. But there were few if any such accusations after the attack in August.

Syria and its Lebanese allies — led by Hezbollah — have strengthened their position here in recent months, and few seemed to think Syria would have any reason to strike at the Lebanese Army.

In the meantime, the rising strength of Hezbollah and its show of force in Beirut in May have infuriated Sunni Muslims in Lebanon and across the Arab world. Some extremists are said to be filtering into northern Lebanon to fight back.

The bombing in Syria on Saturday followed two unusual political assassinations this year in Syria, a police state that generally maintains a tight grip on security, and it contributed to a growing sense of alarm about the possibility of internal subversion or foreign interference.

In the 1980s, the Syrian state, which is secular, battled hard-line Sunni Islamist rebels for years in a struggle that left tens of thousands dead.

The blast on Saturday morning took place near an intersection on the highway leading south to the airport, not far from the Sayyida Zainab shrine. The shrine draws Shiite pilgrims from across the region, including large numbers of Iranians.

About half a million Iraqi refugees also live in the densely populated area; most of them fled Iraq after war erupted there in 2003.

The bomb detonated close to an office of one of Syria’s highly secretive security services, according to a number of shopkeepers and residents in the area. It destroyed or damaged dozens of cars along the highway, and shrapnel scarred building facades and shattered glass through an entire city block.

The interior minister, Gen. Basam Abd al-Majid, told Syrian state television that the people behind the attack were “terrorists” and that investigators were tracking them down, but that “we can’t point the finger at any side.”

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