2015 Beirut bombings | |
---|---|
Part of the Syrian civil war spillover in Lebanon | |
Location | Bourj el-Barajneh, Beirut, Lebanon |
Date | 12 November 2015 |
Target | Shia civilians |
Attack type | Suicide attacks |
Deaths | 46 (Including 3 perpetrator) |
Injured | 200–240 |
Perpetrator | ISIS |
On 12 November 2015, two suicide bombers attacked Bourj el-Barajneh, a southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, that is inhabited mostly by Shia Muslims.[1] Reports of the number of fatalities concluded that 43 people died directly from the detonation.[2][1][3] Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) claimed responsibility for the attacks.[2][1]
The bombings were the worst terrorist attack in Beirut since the end of the Lebanese Civil War. They came twelve days after the bombing of a Russian airliner over the Sinai Peninsula that killed 224 people and a day before attacks in Paris that killed 137.[4] ISIL claimed responsibility for these attacks as well.
Around 48 hours after the attack, Internal Security Forces arrested eleven people, mostly Syrians, over the attack. It later announced the arrest of two other Syrian and Lebanese suspects. They were arrested in a Palestinian refugee camp located in Burj al-Barajneh and a flat in the capital's eastern district of Achrafieh, which had allegedly been used to prepare the explosive belts. The initial plan was apparently to send five suicide bombers to a hospital in the neighbourhood, but heavy security forced them to change the target to a densely populated area.[5]