Lebanese authorities have seized a large shipment of explosives headed for Beirut, triggering security concerns and raising suspicions that the consignment may have been linked to Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militant group.
The seized explosives weighed 780 kilograms, including 250 kilograms of TNT and 250 kilograms of C-4 plastic explosives, according to Lebanese judicial officials cited by the Associated Press.
The explosives were secured as Israeli military operations continue in southern Lebanon and the Lebanese government presses to bring all weapons under state control. The government has also adopted measures banning military and security activities of Hezbollah, which the United States designates as a terrorist organization.
Several days ago, a Lebanese security forces checkpoint stopped and detained two men transporting the shipment in the Dahr al-Baidar area as they traveling west from the Bekaa Valley toward the capital, Beirut.
The subsequent investigations, initially handled by the judicial police, have expanded to include army intelligence and the Information Branch of the Internal Security Forces.
On Monday, Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam stressed the need to identify everyone involved in the shipment and the parties behind it, establish their plans and objectives, and refer them to the judiciary.
Youssef Diab, a Lebanese journalist specializing in judicial and political affairs, told MBN that the two detainees belonged to Hezbollah and that the shipment was the group’s property. He said they received the explosives in Baalbek from a person known as “Sajed” and were transporting them to Beirut’s southern suburbs, where a man known as “Dhu al-Fiqar” was expected to take delivery.
MBN could not independently verify this information. Hezbollah has not commented on the allegations about the case reported by media outlets.
Diab said he believed the operation extended beyond the two detainees, given the large quantity of explosives seized.
Retired Lebanese Army Maj. Gen. George Shrem shares that assessment. Speaking to MBN, he said the detainees’ role appeared to have been limited to transporting the materials. According to the information available to him, the explosives had not been prepared for detonation or assembled into bombs but were being transported in their original packaging.
The identity of the intended recipient remains a crucial element in determining the shipment’s final destination and intended purpose.
Lebanese lawmaker George Okais suggested that the explosives might be connected to an earlier act of sabotage involving surveillance cameras along the route the shipment was expected to take. The damage occurred several months ago.
At the end of March, Okais revealed that 16 surveillance cameras belonging to the municipality of Chtaura had been shot at, along with six cameras in Jalala and another six in Marjiyat.
Following the seizure of the shipment in Dahr al-Baidar, Okais suggested in a post on X that the cameras had been sabotaged in preparation for smuggling the explosives.
While the intended use of the explosives remains unclear, the discovery that the shipment contained C-4 and TNT has revived memories of a spate of political assassinations in Lebanon.
Lebanese lawmaker Najat Aoun told MBN that similar explosives had been used in attacks targeting political and media figures, including journalist Samir Kassir and former Lebanese Communist Party Secretary-General George Hawi. They were also used, she said, in an attempt to assassinate journalist May Chidiac.
Speculation that the detainees may be linked to Hezbollah has also brought to mind the case of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, who was killed in Beirut alongside 21 other people on Feb. 14, 2005, in a bombing targeting his motorcade.
The Special Tribunal for Lebanon convicted Hezbollah members of intentional homicide in connection with Hariri’s assassination.
Shrem outlined two possible purposes for the seized explosives, based on their nature and composition. The first was military: placing large quantities along potential advance routes for Israeli forces in southern Lebanon. The second, which he described as “more dangerous,” involved security operations inside Lebanon, including bombings and assassinations.
Diab dismissed the possibility that the explosives were intended for use against Israel as “unrealistic.” There was no direct engagement between Hezbollah and the Israeli military that would warrant the use of such materials, he said.
On Monday, amid the investigation into the Dahr al-Baidar shipment, the Lebanese Army said it had also seized approximately 200 kilograms of explosives allegedly being smuggled across the Lebanese-Syrian border near Qasr. The smugglers reportedly fled toward Syrian territory, while the seized materials were handed over to the relevant authorities for further investigation.
The incident could offer clues about the source of the larger Dahr al-Baidar shipment, which Shrem, the retired general, suggested may have also entered Lebanon from Syria. According to information available to him, those explosives were headed toward Beirut’s southern suburbs, a Hezbollah stronghold.
Calls are growing for authorities to go beyond arresting those transporting the explosives and trace the shipment to its source, as well as identify the party that was waiting to receive it.
“We hope the investigation will not stop with the two men who were driving the truck, only for the case to be closed,” Aoun told MBN.
Adapted and translated from the original Arabic.
