Beirut: Four suicide bombers killed at least five people and wounded 19 more in a series of attacks in a Lebanese Christian village at the border with Syria on Monday, security sources said.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack at 4 am (0100 GMT) in the village of Qaa. Security sources said they believed Daesh was responsible.
The mayor of Qaa, Bashir Mattar, told Voice of Lebanon radio that all those killed were civilians.
The Lebanese army said four soldiers were among the wounded. They were part of a patrol that had headed to the location of the first blast. The first of the bombers had blown himself up outside a house, followed by the others in an adjoining street.
The army had imposed a security cordon in the area and was searching the village and nearby areas for suspects.
Lebanon has been repeatedly jolted by militant attacks linked to the five-year-long war in neighbouring Syria, where Hezbollah is fighting in support of President Bashar Al Assad.
Security sources had earlier put the death toll at six.
Meanwhile, Daesh claimed responsibility for last week’s deadly suicide attack on a Jordanian army post on the Syrian border, posting a video online on Monday which it said showed the car bomb blast.
The video, which was posted on the Facebook page of the Daesh news agency Amaq, shows a vehicle kicking up dust as it speeds across flat desert toward what appears to be the Jordanian base. An orange ball of fire rises in the air, followed by a cloud of thick black smoke and the sound of an explosion.
The video was released after Amaq published a statement by an unidentified “source” that the attack “was carried out by one of the fighters of the Islamic State [Daesh]”. It said the target was an “American-Jordanian base” in a border area known as Ruqban.
The June 21 blast killed seven members of the Jordanian security forces and wounded 13.
Jordan has vowed a tough response.
After the attack, it sealed the border area, cutting off tens of thousands of Syrian refugees stranded in the area from international aid delivery. Aid officials have said no food and little water have reached the area since last week.
The website Hala Akhbar affiliated with the Jordanian military carried a statement on Monday from what it said was an “official source” pledging retaliation.
“Jordanians need to know they are being targeted by these dark criminals, and the means used by this terrorist organisation show its criminality and brutality,” said the statement, adding: “It will not affect Jordan’s determination to eliminate it.”
“The fate of this gang is either Jordanian jail or being killed,” the statement also said.
