Lebanon exchanges 400-plus IS fighters for soldiers’ bodies

BEIRUT — Lebanon began transporting an estimated 400 armed Islamic State group fighters and family members from its northern border to the militants’ stronghold in eastern Syria on Monday, according to official sources in Lebanon and Syria.

The militants were transferred as part of a deal between the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, and its Syrian and Lebanese enemies. Under the agreement, the bodies of eight people believed to be Lebanese soldiers were to be returned, while Islamic State militants were to receive 17 air-conditioned buses, 11 ambulances and a free pass through territory held by the Syrian government.

Hezbollah, the Shiite-dominated group whose militia was among the parties to the deal, announced through its War Media Center that the transfer of the Islamic State fighters had begun Monday morning. First to go were 25 wounded fighters in ambulances, followed by busloads of fighters and others.

The Syrian state news agency, SANA, also confirmed that the transfer of fighters was underway.

Maj. Gen. Abbas Ibrahim, the Lebanese intelligence chief who was the government’s chief negotiator in trying to win the return of Lebanon’s captured soldiers, defended the arrangement.

“The return of Daesh militants in air-conditioned cars to their countries is permissible because Lebanon adheres to the philosophy of a state that does not exact revenge,” he said in a radio interview, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State, according to the Lebanese newspaper The Daily Star.

Former President Michel Sleiman was among the Lebanese leaders who declared the deal a win for the government.

“Military victory must be supplemented by chasing down those who executed the soldiers and prosecuting them before international and Arabic tribunals,” Sleiman wrote on Twitter.

Nine Lebanese soldiers were taken prisoner during fighting in the Arsal area of northeast Lebanon in 2014. Since then, there had been little information on their fate, even though relatives have staged numerous protests in Beirut, the capital.

Just over a week ago, the Lebanese army launched an offensive in the border area to pressure Islamic State militants into negotiating the soldiers’ release. Simultaneously, Hezbollah and their allies in the Syrian government began an offensive in the same area, from the Syrian side of the border. That the operations coincided was unplanned, they said.

Both sides declared a cease-fire with the Islamic State on Sunday to allow for the recovery of the service members. Ibrahim said it appeared that the eight bodies handed over were those of the missing soldiers, although DNA identification is pending. No information about the ninth missing soldier was provided, but there have been reports that one may have joined the Islamic State militants during his captivity.