Equipment US provided to Lebanon used by Hizbollah — Israel

TEL AVIV — Armoured personnel carriers provided by the United States to the Lebanese army have been used by Hizbollah forces in Syria, a senior Israeli military official said on Wednesday.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Israel “recognised these specific APCs... as those given by the US to Lebanon”.

Israel shared the information with the United States “a few weeks ago”, the official told reporters. He did not specify how many armoured personnel carriers were involved.

Israel fought a devastating war with Lebanese Shiite militia Hizbollah in 2006, and closely monitors the group’s activities. 

The militant group has been fighting alongside President Bashar Assad’s forces in Syria’s civil war.

The APCs were probably handed by the Lebanese army to Hizbollah as part “of a deal”, the Israeli official said, asserting that the militant group had “tightened its grip” over central Lebanese institutions.

Images shared on social media in recent weeks showed Hizbollah staging a military parade in the Syrian town of Qusayr, which it retook from rebels in 2013 in its first major victory after it intervened in support of Assad’s regime.

Photographs of tanks, armoured vehicles and anti-aircraft batteries displaying the movement’s yellow flag could be seen.

Washington said last month that the United States would be “gravely concerned” if military equipment it supplied to the Lebanese army ended up in Hizbollah’s hands.

Lebanon’s armed forces denied that the vehicles in the pictures had belonged to it.

According to the Israeli official, Hizbollah has “about 8,000 people in Syria”, estimating that 1,700 of its fighters have been killed there since the war began in 2011.

Watchtowers built by the Lebanese army on the Israeli border were also constructed according to Hizbollah instructions, with the country’s military and Iran-backed Shiite militiamen conducting joint patrols, the Israeli official said. 

Israel has sought to limit its involvement in the Syrian conflict, but has carried out sporadic sorties against Hizbollah inside Syria.

Israel says it reserves the right to stop the group acquiring sophisticated weapons from Syria and Iran, and threatening the country from both its Lebanese base and positions in Syria.