Deadly Rock-Throwing Attacks on Beirut Airport Road Spark Deep Security Fears

The visual evidence is stark: a car's front windscreen completely smashed, accompanied by a rock larger than a football resting on the front seat. The tragic assault that killed Muhammad Hamza while he was driving on Beirut's airport road—where an attacker hurled the rock from a bridge—stands out as the most notorious among a troubling wave of similar incidents in Lebanon's capital.

This alarming trend compounds a pervasive sense of lawlessness along the motorway, a vital thoroughfare featuring numerous tunnels and bridges that connects central Beirut to Lebanon's sole international airport, Beirut's southern suburbs, and the southern regions of the country. The National spoke with two taxi drivers who rely on the road multiple times daily, both describing an atmosphere of mounting dread.

“For the last week I've been dreading the airport road,” said Mohammed. “Every time I passed by I would look and check if there's anyone on the bridge to avoid the rocks. In the old days it was only stealing – they parked a car on the side, they would come [and] steal the telephone and the money. But this is a new one to throw a rock.”

The brazen attacks near the Sports City area have ignited widespread outrage across Lebanon, heightened by the exceptionally precarious security and economic conditions. The incidents represent yet another unwanted security crisis on the edge of Beirut's southern suburbs, many of which have suffered devastation in recent Israeli strikes.

Another driver detailed a new tactic employed by the culprits, who would conceal themselves behind a thick tree to hurl rocks and eggs at passing vehicles, predominantly targeting expensive cars under the cover of night. Following the strikes, the attackers would feign an offer of assistance while surreptitiously checking for valuable bags and expensive phones.

“Really, I was scared, I pass this road maybe three times a day,” the driver shared.

The primary suspect in the killing of Mr Hamza has since been apprehended by Lebanon's Internal Security Forces during an operation executed by their principal intelligence unit. Footage published by the ISF depicts two plainclothes officers alongside the detained individual, who reenacts the motion of pushing a rock from the bridge.

According to the ISF, the suspect—a Lebanese citizen born in 1998 who works in scrap collection—had perpetrated similar attacks previously. He routinely fled to the adjacent Sabra neighbourhood after launching the rocks, and “claimed that he was doing so when he felt pain and tension, that he felt relieved after throwing stones and his goal was not to kill,” the ISF stated.

In the wake of the fatal assault on Mr Hamza, the suspect shaved his beard in an attempt to escape detection. While one of the taxi drivers acknowledged the arrest of the suspect, he cautioned that “it's a party, not one person.”

“I hope it will stop. My car is my only business, if anything happens it would be a disaster. Even now that they have captured him, I always look at it [the bridge] to check for assailants,” he told The National.