Border clashes put Beirut-Damascus relations at a crossroads. As Hezbollah denies any involvement in the hostilities against Syrian soldiers, the Lebanese Army closes three illegal border crossings with Syria, raising the critical issue of securing an unmarked, indefinite border
Just as a revolution does not take place in eleven days, and a transition of merely three months – after eleven years of civil war – cannot be entirely peaceful; just as the resentment of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham’s former militiamen towards the coastal population could not subside overnight, and, as was to be expected, reprisal operations resulted in the bloodshed of hundreds of civilians; just as the election of a President of the Republic and a Prime Minister is not enough to resolve the political crisis in which Lebanon has been navigating for nearly six years – so, too, the diplomatic relations between the two neighbouring countries, periodically enemies, once united in the territories of Bilad al-Sham – then separated by the tracing of a line existing, in fact, only on maps – cannot but suffer from the legacy of a hundred years of administrative split, and eighty of de facto separation; thirty years of occupation – Syrian, of Lebanon; eleven of civil war and forced displacement of millions; six of an unprecedented, ongoing economic and political crisis .
However, although the Lebanese-Syrian border issue has never been definitively closed, blood has begun to flow again from the cracks of that porous, unnatural line.
At least seven people have been killed and 52 wounded in clashes on the border with Syria between the night of last Sunday, March 16, and Monday evening – when a ceasefire was announced by the two countries’ respective Defense Ministers: the Lebanese Michel Menassa and the Syrian Murhaf Abu Qasra. The seven victims – all Lebanese – were killed in cross-border clashes following the abduction and execution, on Saturday, of three Syrian nationals by armed men from northern Beqaa’s clans reputedly close to Hezbollah, which the party refers to as simply ‘the Shiite clans’. And while their members, mainly located in Hermel and the adjacent border areas, claimed they responded to the Syrian Army allegedly crossing the ill-defined border – a claim Damascus has categorically denied -, Lebanon’s Information Minister, Paul Morkos, quoting Menassa’s statement in a Cabinet meeting, said that the three Syrians abducted and later killed – allegedly stoned to death – were instead smugglers. Local sources then reported that a 15-year-old Lebanese boy was also killed by retaliatory Syrian bombing in the border village of Qasr, which reportedly destroyed several homes. Hezbollah, on its side, claimed that “the villagers were defending their land and this has nothing to do with us.”
Beyond the accuracy of each version of the facts – conflicting especially on the matter of Hezbollah’s involvement in the clashes, which the party strongly denied -, what is evident is that the escalation of violence along Lebanon’s north-eastern border with Syria is furtherly complicating the security situation in a country that has just emerged, and is yet to recover, from a large-scale war on the other front, the southern one, still partially occupied by Israeli troops, and where the strikes of their Air Forces has again resumed: to the point that some are questioning the return of compulsory military service in Lebanon, abolished 18 years ago.
In an unprecedented move in years, in fact, with a rapid escalation leading to rocket fire from the Syrian side and prompting Lebanese soldiers to intervene, the Lebanese Army conducted an airstrike on Syrian artillery positions. Stating that “Lebanon will not allow the clashes along the border to continue,” it was President Joseph Aoun to announce, on Monday evening, that he himself ordered the Army to respond to violence at the northern and eastern borders with Syria.
Defining an unmarked border
Interviewed by NOW, retired Brigadier Yaaroub Sakher, specialist in National Security, Strategic and War Studies, claimed that the recent cross-border clashes were somehow expectable. “All indicators lead to that because similar incidents had happened before,” he pointed out, “about forty days ago, on February 9, when a group of tribes affiliated with Hezbollah ignited the front on the border in the northern and north-eastern region.” On that day, for the first time on such a scale since the fall of the Assad regime, the border experienced heightened tensions due to clashes between Syrian security forces and Lebanese Shiite clans: two armed drones launched from Syria were shot down over Lebanese territory, and prisoners were abducted by both sides – until the confrontations prompted the Lebanese Army to bolster its presence along the volatile borders with Syria, aiming to enhance security measures. “What happened was also expected because the dormant cells of the remnants of the Syrian regime and the influences of Iranian militias still exist, particularly in Hermel and the surrounding areas, which is the breeding ground for those that dispersed when the Syrian war began in 2011. They re-emerged recently, trying to reassert their presence, while taking advantage of the unstable situation in the region, specifically after the battles in Syria’s northern and southern fronts,” he continued.
The Lebanon-Syria border spans 375 km – about 233 miles – and features rugged terrain with no clear demarcation in many areas. Moreover, due to the non-demarcated nature of that line, and the presence of villages with mixed populations, there are Lebanese residents inside Syrian territories – settled in border regions before modern boundaries were officially established -, and, respectively, Syrian communities have for decades inhabited Lebanese lands. People in this region moved freely for trade, agriculture, and family ties, without considering the tracing of modern demarcation lines: at the same time, with a carelessness of a very different kind – the colonial one – the French Mandate’s arbitrary division ignored existing communities, splitting villages and tribal lands, leaving some Lebanese families inside Syria, and vice versa.
Even today, some areas along the border remain poorly defined, somehow overlapped – with disputed or loosely controlled regions including Wadi Khaled – a Lebanese region with many connections to Syria, Al-Qusayr – a Syrian town with historical Lebanese presence, and Hosh Al-Sayyid Ali – an area where the border was never clearly demarcated, with Lebanese families owning land while living under Syrian control, and recently on the news for having become yet another source of tensions between the two armies, who finally agreed to withdraw from the village, allowing displaced Lebanese residents to return.
“At the same time,” Brigadier Sakher affirmed, when asked about the porous, undefinable nature of that border, “the Syrian authorities did not solve the issue from their side. What happened is a lesson for both Lebanon and Syria to control the borders decisively and prevent the recurrence of this issue.” According to the retired General, “the Lebanese shortcoming is that it did not keep control of the frontier because there are four border patrols of the Lebanese Army whose job is to secure the line. Clearly,” he continued, “they did not perform their duties properly, or alternatively the Lebanese authorities did order the Army to use all their available means and elements.” Which amounts, he specified, to around 4,000 guards whose job is to secure that line.
“What happened this week made the Lebanese government aware of this danger, therefore, from now on, they will do as much as they can to control it. And this can only be done through coordination between the Lebanese and the Syrian armies and authorities, because the incidents occurred in a loose area where borders and populations intersect, as we mentioned, and there are about twenty smuggling crossings for weapons, people, money, drugs, etcetera.”
Conflicting versions of facts
On the same matter, Colonel Abdel Moneim Daher, the Commander of the First Brigade of the 52nd Division of the Syrian Army, reported that the Syrian Ministry of Defense has successfully thwarted several smuggling attempts, confiscating numerous smuggled weapons and destroying large quantities of narcotic substances, especially Captagon. “The Ministry of Defense is working at full capacity to ensure the security of the border strip between the two countries, Syria and Lebanon, which was the largest source of smuggled contraband under the former regime, causing ongoing instability and anxiety in neighboring countries,” he told NOW. “As long as there are outlaws attempting to tamper with border security in that area, clashes with them are likely, until the border is fully controlled,” Colonel Daher added.
Quite surprisingly, the opposite sides’ official versions are matching when mentioning, undoubtedly, the actors igniting the front on the Lebanese side – armed groups affiliated with Hezbollah, despite the party’s firm denial through its spokesperson Youssef Zein. It is not a surprise that the Iran-backed party might benefit from the deteriorating situation across the northern and north-eastern border, especially given that its movements in southern Lebanon have become increasingly restricted. Yet the two accounts diverge when addressing the Syrian side’s reality.
According to Daher, in fact, when asked about who were the actors involved in the fighting, “for sure it was the Syrian Ministry of Defense that clashed with Hezbollah militias. There are no groups or forces outside the Syrian Ministry of Defense,” he stated. On the contrary, he added, “as a fact, they are armed groups affiliated with Hezbollah, working to smuggle weapons in cooperation with some remnants of the former regime, as well as to trade and smuggle drugs, and they were dealt with firmly.”
However, following the declaration of the Lebanese Ministerial Committee – chaired by Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, flanked by the Ministers of Interior, Defense, Finance, Public Works and Justice, and established to “propose the necessary measures to monitor and secure the borders” – claiming that the three Syrians abducted and later killed were smugglers, Salam also emphasized the “need for better cooperation from the Syrian authorities to prevent any unexpected security incident or gunfire from the Syrian side, as has occurred recently.” Officially, thus, the Lebanese government has avoided pointing fingers at Hezbollah without reiterating the accusations made against Syria.
Despite Daher’s claims, therefore, what stands clear is that there was a failure in coordination between the Lebanese authorities, as there should have been, the Syrian Army, and the Lebanese Ministry of Defense, to manage the borders from both sides through political and diplomatic means, before the situation escalated. However, as Brigadier Sakher highlighted, these groups and militias – from both sides – might attempt to act again. “Therefore,” he stated, “plans must be put in place to prevent recurrence and to effectively secure the borders, by the tools we all know, which is the firm implementation of UN Resolution 1701, calling for disarming armed militias and dismantling their infrastructure, and the number 1680, on Lebanon’s political independence, which calls on the Lebanese government to control the borders and then finalize their demarcation.”
The question, thus, is fundamental: and it is whether the interest of the two countries – who, on the official line, only seem to convey on the matter of Hezbollah’s involvement in the disorders – is to secure the borders’ issue, calming things down before everything changes, or instead to definitely fill the holes of that porous line.
Until now, the Lebanese Army announced that it had closed three illegal crossings in the Qaa region, as well as in the Mashrafeh and Doura-Hermel areas, “as part of the fight against infiltration and smuggling across the northern and eastern borders,” it stated on X. On Thursday, the ministerial committee tasked with examining border security and combating smuggling recommended “enhancing the Army’s capabilities in equipment and manpower, to enable it to more effectively combat smuggling and arrest smugglers.” It remains to be seen how effective this measure will be, how disguised, or how temporary.
