BEIRUT: Two Syrian nationals have been kidnapped and two more are missing and believed to be kidnapped, with the incidents having taken place in various parts of Lebanon.

Security sources said Rahaf Hasan Mashhadani informed police in Baalbek that masked men snatched her husband, Mohammad Mashhadani, after midnight as he stood outside their home in Bidnayel, east Lebanon.

Rafah said four men were involved in the kidnapping of her 30-year-old husband, who hails from the city of Idlib, northwest Syria.

Security forces have launched an investigation to determine the motive behind the kidnapping.

In a similar incident, Syrian national Aisha Abdel-Razzaq informed police that unknown individuals in a four-wheel drive kidnapped her husband, Ibrahim Ahmad al-Yehya, 27, from the Beirut southern suburb of Mraijeh Sunday afternoon.

She said the kidnappers took Ibrahim to an unknown destination after threatening his life.

Police also received a report that two Syrian men – Jumaa al-Hajij and Mohammad Masoud – went missing in Hay al-Seryan, in the Ashrafieh district of Beirut, Sunday.

Security sources told The Daily Star Monday the two are feared to have been kidnapped by unidentified men in a four-wheel drive.

The fresh abductions could not immediately be linked to the Meqdad clan, which recently announced it had suspended its revenge kidnappings to give diplomacy a chance.

The Meqdads claim that they are holding more than 20 Syrian nationals in addition to a Turkish citizen in an effort to swap them for kinsman Hassan Meqdad.

The Free Syrian Army kidnapped Hassan in Damascus last week.

Several abductions of Syrians and others have taken place in Lebanon recently, fueling fears that the conflict in Syria is spilling over into Lebanon.