Nusra Threatens Force to Free Prisoners as Hostages Families Say Breakthrough Expected within 10 Days
Al-Nusra Front threatened Monday to use force to “liberate” its prisoners in Lebanon's jails, warning that the fate of the captive Lebanese security personnel would be at stake should Hizbullah wage an attack on the Syrian Qalamun region.
Meanwhile, Interior Minister Nouhad al-Mashnouq described Nusra's threat to kill the troops as “not serious,” telling a delegation from their families that their liberation is “a duty, a commitment and a national responsibility that has no room for leniency or procrastination and that won't be subject to bargaining."
A high-ranking Nusra leader earlier told Turkey's state-run Anadolu news agency that “Hizbullah is preparing an assault on Qalamun to obstruct the negotiations to release the captive security personnel who are in our custody.”
He warned that any such scenario would lead to the hostages' “death.”
“We kept the captive security personnel in Arsal until we withdrew to Syria,” the Nusra militant noted, adding that “honest negotiations” are “the only solution.”
But he threatened to “resort to the military option to liberate our captives in Lebanese prisons.”
But Mashnouq told the abducted troops' families in the afternoon that the Lebanese authorities “will not dodge their responsibilities or relinquish national dignity.”
He said “the ongoing efforts must remain under wraps” to avoid “any uncalculated step” that could “put the lives of the hostages in danger.”
In remarks to MTV, the minister noted that “the threat to kill the security personnel is not serious because they (the abductors) won't give up the only card they have in their hands.”
He pointed out that “the efforts of the Muslim Scholars Committee were very fruitful.”
“I appreciate what it did, but its retreat was not the right thing to do,” he added.
Speaking on behalf of the families' delegation, Ali Taleb said they were “relieved” by Mashnouq's remarks.
Taleb also called on the Muslim Scholars Committee to resume its mediation with the abductors.
He quoted the minister as saying that “the negotiations are serious and vigorous although away from the media spotlight” and that “progress will be made within 10 days.”
Nine security personnel held captive since early August had appeared Friday in a video posted by Nusra on social media, in which they urged Hizbullah's withdrawal from Syria in return for their release.
The nine men -- apparently eight policemen and a soldier -- are among around 34 security forces still in the hands of jihadists from al-Nusra Front and the Islamic State after fighting erupted with the Lebanese Army in and around Arsal earlier this month.
The battle erupted after soldiers arrested a top Syrian jihadist, prompting extremists to open fire on army positions and storm a police station.
Several days of fighting in the area, which lies on the Syrian border, killed 19 soldiers, 16 civilians and dozens of jihadists. It ended with a truce negotiated by Lebanese Sunni clerics, but the jihadists withdrew from the area taking their hostages with them.
The clerics who negotiated the truce had been seeking the release of the hostages, but they announced in a statement on Friday that they were suspending their mediation efforts.
They said the decision was taken "to allow other parties that are more able to deal with this issue." Lebanon's As Safir newspaper said Saturday that the governments of Turkey and Qatar were now involved in negotiations to free the security forces.
Hizbullah says it is fighting in Syria to prevent extremists from entering Lebanon, and the group dispatched thousands of fighters to Syria's Qalamun in particular, just across the border from Arsal.
The group's fighters helped regime forces recapture most of Qalamun earlier this year, with opposition fighters taking refuge in mountains along the border.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitoring group, said Saturday that fierce clashes between Hizbullah and rebel groups including al-Nusra erupted overnight.
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