Ibrahim Vows Anti-Terror Victory despite 'Worrisome Security Situation'
General Security chief Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim has stressed that Lebanon will win the battle against terrorism although he described the current security situation in the country as “worrisome.”
“We will emerge victorious from the anti-terror fight, because defeat means the end of Lebanon,” said Ibrahim in an interview with General Security Magazine.
“We fought the toughest confrontations against terrorism and tougher challenges await us,” he added.
“The current situation is worrisome and it ranges from critical to dangerous,” the major general warned.
Separately, Ibrahim cautioned that the naturalization of refugees in the country would be equivalent to an “immediate war,” calling on politicians to “end their bets on foreign developments and their attempts to import solutions from abroad.”
He also noted that security agencies are seeing to build “a secure state, not a police state.”
The country has been on high security alert since the unprecedented suicide bombings that hit the Christian border town of al-Qaa in late June.
Scores of people have been arrested in a major crackdown on Syrian refugee encampments and gatherings and security agencies have upped their measures across Lebanon.
Al-Qaa's blasts occurred after the arrest of several Islamic State-linked cells plotting bombings in the country and amid a flurry of media reports about possible attacks during the holy month of Ramadan.
In the latest developments, the army carried out raids Friday in al-Qaa's outskirts and searched Syrian encampments in the area a day after a special forces raid in the outskirts of the nearby town of Arsal that resulted in the death of a senior IS militant and the arrest of three others.
Militants from IS and Fateh al-Sham Front, formerly al-Qaida affiliate al-Nusra Front, are entrenched in rugged areas along the undemarcated Lebanese-Syrian border and the army regularly shells their posts while Hizbullah and the Syrian army have engaged in clashes with them on the Syrian side of the border.
The two groups briefly overran the town of Arsal in August 2014 before being ousted by the army after days of deadly battles.
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