Comments

You have commented 358 times on Rantburg.

Your Name

Your e-mail (optional)

Website (optional)

	My Original Nic Pic-a-Nic Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Foto

Submit your comments on this article

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Hezbollah said to have helped Assad officials flee to Lebanon, sparking furor in Beirut

2024-12-14

[IsraelTimes] Newspaper opposed to terror group bemoans cost to Lebanon, risk of Israeli strikes; analyst says Israel apparently refrained from shooting down 4,000 evacuating Iranian troops

An anti-Hezbollah Lebanese newspaper reported that the terror group helped hundreds of Syrian intelligence officers flee to Leb
Leb

...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
in the days before forces opposed to Syria’s strongman Bashir al-Assad captured Damascus on Sunday.

The Nidaa al-Watan newspaper this week seethed at the price Lebanon was paying to keep some of the brass hats safe, and expressed fears that the presence of Assad’s allies in Lebanon could draw Israeli strikes.

Some Lebanese leaders also expressed concern over the report, which followed the discovery of a large secret tunnel in Syria’s Qalamoun Mountains, a Hezbollah stronghold near Damascus and the border with Lebanon, apparently used to store and transfer arms. However,
some people cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go...
the officers who escaped to Lebanon were said to travel via overland border crossings.

Citing two security officials — whose nationality was unclear — Nidaa al-Watan on Monday reported that Hezbollah had given Lebanese license plates to Assad officials who entered Lebanon via the Masnaa border crossing. The newspaper also said that thousands of Syrian security officials were estimated to have crossed into Lebanon illegally via the Hermel crossing, farther north.

ِAccording to the officials cited in the report, the smuggling of Syrian officers was facilitated by bribes to members of Lebanon’s General Security Directorate. Among the latter, the newspaper singled out Hezbollah ally Ahmed Nakad, a senior Directorate border patrol officer said to have close ties with Ali Mamlouk, head of the National Security Bureau of Assad’s Ba’ath party.

Nidaa al-Watan said Mamlouk, whom Lebanon has accused of carrying out "terrorist acts" against two mosques in the country, was in hiding in Hezbollah’s stronghold in Beirut’s southern Dahiyeh suburb. Video circulating on social media, which could not be independently verified, purported to show Mamlouk fleeing Syria on a rubber boat.

WATCH⚡️

The dramatic escape of Ali Mamlouk, head of Syria’s secret service and security advisor to President Assad. Just a rubber boat, a suitcase, and a getaway…

Via @inside_IL_intel pic.twitter.com/7bQdbnrj5T
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) December 12, 2024

Also said to be in Beirut — reportedly at the five-star Phonecia Hotel — was Ghada Adib Mhanna, Assad’s aunt by marriage and mother of his close ally, telecom magnate Rami Makhlouf; and — in the Movenpick, another luxury hotel — Firas Issa Shaleesh, nephew of Dhu al-Himma Shalish, Assad’s late cousin and presidential security chief who had been implicated in massacres carried out under Assad’s father and predecessor, Hafez.

Khaled Qaddour, a Syrian businessman under US sanctions for his ties to Maher al-Assad, the dictator’s brother, was also reportedly staying at the Movenpick Hotel.

According to Nidaa al-Watan, both luxury hotels were being patrolled by Lebanese state security.

The newspaper editorialized that Lebanon, which Hafez and Basher al-Assad’s forces occupied for some three decades until 2005, would end up "bearing the cost of facilitating the hiding of those wanted by the Lebanese state."

They could all join dear Bashar al Assad and the fam in Moscow. He reportedly made off with a good chunk of the treasury…

"Also, the presence of Assad’s lackeys in the suburbs and Beirut exposes the capital to the risk of Israeli strikes," the newspaper said.

A similar warning was voiced by Lebanon’s Progressive Socialist Party, which is led by the Jumblat family, a prominent Druze clan that is generally aligned with Hezbollah. Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said Tuesday that he was working with the judiciary and the General Security Directorate to address the issue in a manner that would "serve Lebanon’s interests and maintain relations with the Syrian people."

Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate ~~Jews~~ ~~Zionists~~ Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
said this week that it had evacuated some 4,000 of its own troops from Syria following Assad’s ouster.

Channel 12 Arab affairs analyst Ehud Yaari, who on Thursday cited the Assad officials’ reported escape to Lebanon, noted that Israel had apparently refrained from shooting down the Iranian air convoy.

As long as they’re off the playing board, who cares what they do?

Posted by:trailing wife

#1 Israel didn't shoot down the Iranian troop planes because the troops were LEAVING SYRIA

Posted by: Lord Garth 2024-12-14 20:32

00:00