Security Sources: Haret Hreik Blast Similar to One that Killed Majzoub Brothers
Mystery shrouded Saturday night”s explosion which left three people killed, including two Hamas members, in Hizbullah”s stronghold in Beirut”s southern suburbs.
Different versions of the same incident were given.
State-run National News Agency said military court judge Rahif Ramadan visited Dahiyeh on Sunday to examine the explosion site.
It said Ramadan instructed Lebanese army explosive experts to examine the findings at the site.
NNA said Ramadan also tasked criminal investigators to conduct a probe into the blast after experts inspected the place, took pictures and lifted fingerprints.
It said inspection determined that the bomb was packed with 15 kilograms of TNT placed in a basement that housed Hamas offices.
Hamas spokesman Ayman Taha said the explosion had killed two members of his movement and wounded three people.
"The circumstances of the explosion are unclear and it is too early to name the party" responsible, Taha said.
Attacks are rare in Hizbullah”s southern suburbs stronghold.
Other reports, however, said that the explosion took place between 8 and 9:30pm Saturday in a car that was part of Hamas representative in Lebanon Mustafa Hamdan”s convoy parked outside Hamas headquarters in Haret Hreik.
Another story said the blast was likely to have been caused by explosives concealed in a parcel.
Security circles, meanwhile, told pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat that the explosion was similar to the one that killed the Majzoub brothers in Sidon in May 2006.
Nidal and Mahmoud Mazjoub, members of the Islamic Jihad group, were assassinated by a car bomb.
Mahmoud Qassem Rafeh, a 62-year-old retired Internal Security Forces official, confessed after his arrest to having "collaborated with Israeli intelligence agents" between 1993 and 2006 and admitted to having transported car parts from Israel to Lebanon which were used in the bombing that killed the Majzoub brothers.