The Owner Wants It Back

Most arguments over seized goods are about who owns them. This one is not. Hezbollah says the explosives Lebanese security forces took from a truck this month are its own, and it has asked for them back. The Lebanese state has them, two men from the truck have been referred to its judicial authorities, and no official has said what happens to the cargo.

The truck was stopped at the Dahr al-Baidar checkpoint on the highway between Beirut and the Bekaa Valley in the week of 5 October. It was carrying 780 kg of explosives, including 250 kg of TNT and 250 kg of C4 plastic explosive, judicial officials told the Associated Press. The two men detained with it told investigators they had been asked only to take the material from the Baalbek region to Beirut and hand it to a man south of the capital known by the nom de guerre Zulfiqar, the officials said. The Information Minister, Paul Morcos, said both had been referred to the judicial authorities.

What the government has said

Prime Minister Nawaf Salam spoke on Monday 12 October. He said the government would not hesitate to broaden the investigation to identify “all those involved in this criminal operation and those behind them,” and that it “will not tolerate anyone who dares to tamper with the country’s security, safety, and stability,” according to Mr Morcos, as reported by AP. He noted that C-4 had been used in several “infamous political assassinations” in Lebanon. The same day the army said it had seized a separate 200 kg shipment of explosives being smuggled from Syria into the border town of al-Qasr.

Three days later the owner came forward. On Thursday 15 October the Hezbollah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah told reporters at parliament that the materials were the group’s and were meant for operations against Israel, Al Jazeera reported. He said Hezbollah had immediately contacted the security agencies to clarify who owned the vehicle and its cargo, and had demanded that the materials be returned and the detained men released. A Hezbollah official and a Lebanese security source told Reuters the explosives were intended for explosive drones aimed at Israeli troops occupying parts of the south.

The decision a seizure tests

The demand runs into a cabinet decision. On 2 March, after Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel in the opening days of the US-Israeli war on Iran, the Lebanese government banned the group’s military activities, Reuters reported; AP describes the decision as declaring all of its military activity illegal. Under the US-brokered arrangement that followed, Beirut undertook to disarm Hezbollah and Israel to withdraw its troops gradually. Hezbollah has refused to disarm while Israeli forces remain on Lebanese soil, and Israel has kept striking the south.

A declaration of that kind is general. A seized truck is specific: a named cargo, two named suspects, a file before a judge. Returning the explosives would mean the state handing back to a private armed group materials its own cabinet has said that group may not lawfully hold for military use. Keeping them, and prosecuting, is what the March decision implies. Neither the presidency nor the government has said in terms which it will do.

What Washington asked

Secretary of State Marco Rubio called President Joseph Aoun on Thursday. Mr Rubio urged him to hold accountable those who ordered, financed and directed the shipment and “underscored that returning explosives to (Hezbollah) should be out of the question,” a State Department official said, according to Reuters, as published by Al-Monitor. He also pressed for direct military-to-military communication with Israeli forces “for deconfliction.” The presidency’s account says Mr Aoun told him the army and security forces were fully carrying out decisions to prevent armed displays, confiscate weapons and combat smuggling, and asked him to press Israel to stop attacking southern towns and villages. Neither account says what Lebanon will do with the cargo.

The other ledger

Hezbollah is also paying. On 13 October it announced payments of $14,000 to families in Beirut and its southern suburbs whose homes were destroyed in the war, and $12,000 to those elsewhere, plus a furniture allowance, Al Jazeera reported on Monday. Reuters has reported that Iran gave the group $200m; a State Department official denied that Iran was able to transfer the money. “The Lebanese government is facing a real test and challenge to build and win the trust of the international community, and particularly the United States,” said Dania Arayssi of the New Lines Institute.

The test is narrower than trust. It is 780 kg in state custody and a request from the people who say it is theirs.