ISF members in front of a detention center in Beirut, Aug. 7, 2022. (Credit: Anwar Amro/AFP)
BEIRUT —Two detainees escaped from the Maghdousheh police station in southern Lebanon on Wednesday evening and are still on the run, security sources told L'Orient Today's correspondent in the south, Muntasser Abdallah.
The fugitives have been identified as Mohammad Shehadeh, a Palestinian born in 1982 and arrested for theft, and Mohammad Ali, a Syrian born in 1993 and currently detained for cannabis consumption, illegal entry into the country, and theft. They fled on Wednesday evening, but their disappearance was not noticed until Thursday morning. Security forces are still in pursuit.
Lebanon's socio-economic and financial crisis has worsened conditions in prisons and detention centers, where overcrowding, poor food supply, and lack of medical care regularly provoke riots.
In August 2023, several prisoners escaped from a police station in the border village of Wadi Khaled in Akkar, after a gunman burst into the station and opened fire.
In October 2023, a fire broke out during a mutiny at a police station in Ehden, northern Lebanon, leaving two inmates dead and two injured.
Additional reporting by Muntasser Abdallah.