Al-Qaeda leader held in Lebanon raised funds for anti-Assad militants, say experts

The Saudi leader of an al-Qaeda spinoff group arrested in Lebanon this week was a key fundraiser in the Gulf for militants fighting to oust Syrian President Bashar Assad, official and private experts say.

The Lebanese army arrested Muhammad al-Majid, who leads the Lebanon-based Abdullah Azzam Brigades which claimed a double suicide attack on the Iranian embassy in Beirut last November.

That attack was part of a spiral of sectarian violence in Lebanon that appears to be a spillover from Syria's civil war. In the latest incident, a car bomb killed at least five people in a Shi'ite Muslim stronghold in southern Beirut on Thursday. (Reuters)