This article was published on Now Lebanon on February 17, 2014, and reposted with permission.
By Alex Rowell
Since the outbreak of the Syrian crisis in early 2011, Lebanon has witnessed a multifarious deterioration in security, as tensions between domestic supporters and opponents of the Bashar al-Assad regime have sporadically broken out into armed clashes, assassinations, rocket attacks and roadside bombings.
Since October 2012, the violent fallout from the civil war next door has increasingly taken the form of deadly vehicle explosions
Moreover, since October 2012, the violent fallout from the civil war next door has increasingly taken the form of deadly vehicle explosions, including suicide bombings. These attacks have recently increased in frequency, with five in the first five weeks of 2014 alone, compared to eight in 2013 and one in 2012. Many of the latest bombings have been claimed by extremist Islamist groups with links to al-Qaeda, such as Jabhat al-Nusra in Lebanon, who have declared their intention to continue targeting predominantly Shiite civilian population centers until Lebanese Hezbollah fighters withdraw from Syria; a demand the pro-Assad group has repeatedly rejected. All in all, a total of 129 people have been killed so far by 16 explosions.
Below are two graphics illustrating the timing, location, and outcome of each of these vehicle explosions.
