Gas cylinders and a charred vehicle on March 20, 2025, three days after clashes between Lebanese clans and Syrian forces in the Lebanese village of Qasr, near Hosh al-Sayed Ali, in Hermel. (Credit: Emmanuel Haddad/L'Orient Today)
There was a calm Friday along the Lebanese-Syrian border following a nighttime drone attack by Syrian security forces on Hosh al-Sayed Ali, a border village in northern Bekaa, according to information from L'Orient Today's correspondent. The attack injured at least six displaced Syrians.
In a brief statement released on Friday, the Lebanese army said that an "exchange of fire" took place Thursday night in the Hermel region at the border between the two countries, after artillery was fired from the Lebanese side into Syrian territory, following disagreements related to "smuggling activities." This situation prompted the Syrian side to retaliate, the army said on its website, specifying that they arrested the person responsible for the fire, a Lebanese identified by the initials A.A., involved in smuggling activities.
Following these tensions, the army deployed units in the area, implemented security measures, and "intensified its contacts with the Syrian authorities." No retaliation was recorded on the Lebanese side.
According to al-Mayadeen, the explosive drone was allegedly launched from the rural region west of Homs, Syria.
Syrian authorities then accused Hezbollah on Thursday night of firing shells from Lebanon, claiming to have immediately retaliated. Citing a source in the Syrian Ministry of Defense, the state-run Syrian news agency SANA reported that "Hezbollah militiamen fired several artillery shells from Lebanese territory towards Syrian army positions in the Qussayr region, west of Homs." "Our forces immediately retaliated by targeting the sources of the fire, after locating the sites from which the five shells were launched," reported SANA. "We are in communication with the Lebanese army to assess the situation, and we have stopped targeting the sources of fire within Lebanese territory at the request of the Lebanese army." Hezbollah did not immediately comment on these accusations.
In February and March, sporadic clashes had already pitted clans, reportedly close to Hezbollah, against the new Syrian authorities. At the end of March, the Lebanese and Syrian defense ministers met in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. They agreed to strengthen security and military coordination along their common border, which is 330 kilometers long and known to be porous, and signed a preliminary agreement for its demarcation.
On April 14, Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam visited Damascus, where he met with the new Syrian president, Ahmad al-Sharaa, to discuss, among other things, border security.
