BEIRUT: A retired Lebanese general was arrested on suspicion of spying for Israel, a senior Lebanese security official said yesterday.

The ex-general from the General Security Department of the Interior Ministry’s detention is among several arrests in recent months that appear to be part of a stepped up campaign in Lebanon against those suspected of gathering information on Hezbollah fighters for Israel.

The security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case, said the retired general told interrogators he had worked for Israel for more than 10 years and regularly met with his Israeli contacts at European destinations. He also allegedly used the business he owned, which managed foreign domestic workers, as a cover for intelligence work, the official said.

Israeli government officials would not comment on the allegations. The man’s identity was not immediately clear. The Lebanese security official said the ex-general had been under surveillance for three months and was arrested on Saturday. His wife also was questioned, he said. No other details were provided. Lebanon considers itself at war with Israel and bans its citizens from having any contact with the Jewish state.

Israel and Hezbollah fought a brutal 34-day war in Lebanon in 2006. More than 1,200 people in Lebanon — most of them civilians — and 159 in Israel died in the conflict.

Since the end of the fighting, Lebanese officials have alleged Israel continues to recruit and operate spies. Several arrests were disclosed in November and February.

Meanwhile, in another and unrelated development, the Lebanese Army cordoned off parts of the eastern Bekaa Valley yesterday as troops hunted down suspected drug lords implicated in the killing of four soldiers.

The soldiers were killed when their vehicle was raked with bullets and blasted with a grenade in an apparent drugs-related ambush in the Bekaa, a lawless region ruled by clans and long known as a fertile drug-producing area.

Extra troops deployed throughout the Bekaa and military helicopters flew over the area yesterday, an AFP correspondent reported.

The Lebanese Army also cordoned off Al-Sharawni, a neighborhood in the main Bekaa town of Baalbek, and surrounded the home of Hassan Ali Jaafar, a main suspect in the ambush.

Jaafar is the brother of Ali Abbas Jaafar, a drug baron who was killed by the army last month after refusing to stop at a checkpoint.