Hizbollah has been accused of intervening directly in Syria’s civil war by launching rocket attacks over the border from Lebanon in support of President Bashar al-Assad’s forces.
By Daily Telegraph correspondent, Hermel, Lebanon 17 Oct 2012
In a worrying sign that Lebanon is getting drawn further into the Syrian conflict, the Iran-backed Shia militant group is accused of using its military bases in the Bekaa valley to shell rebel positions in Syria.
“They are concentrating on hitting the villages where the Free Syrian Army are, to weaken them before launching a ground attack,” said Abu Obeida, a Lebanese resident of the border town of al-Qaa. “I have seen the rockets firing; they pass over your head.”
Driving across the Hermel plains of the northern Bekaa, 10 miles from the frontier with Syria, The Daily Telegraph could hear the sound of rocket fire. The salvoes came in waves – the dull thuds of the launchers shattering the stillness of the night air as they released their loads. Half an hour later, the tempo quickened to a near constant onslaught, filling the valley with the sounds of warfare until the early hours of the morning.
Hermel is Hizbollah’s most loyal heartland. It is the territory of Shia villages, agriculture and the group’s closed-off military zones.
“You are deep in Hizbollah’s country here,” said Mr Obeida, driving down a dusty track that had been cheerfully signposted as leading to a canoeing centre, but that quickly brought us up against the fence of a Hizbollah fighters’ camp.