Lebanon Thwarts 3 ISIS Attacks Targeting Shi’ite Religious Sites

Lebanon has thwarted a triple-suicide attack planned by the Islamic State group and meant as “homage” to the late ISIS leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi, who was killed in a US raid on his home in northwestern Syria last month. ISIS’s intended targets were three Shiite religious compounds in Beirut’s southern suburbs, the Interior Ministry said Wednesday. “A terrorist group had recruited young Palestinian men in Lebanon to carry out major bombing attacks using explosive belts” and other munitions, Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi said at a press conference. “Three separate targets were to be hit at the same time,” in a high-profile action that would have caused a large loss of life, the ministry said. An ISIS operative in the Ain al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp who was in touch with Sunni extremists in Syria gave the orders for the bomb plot, according to Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces.