BEIRUT, Lebanon -- Lebanese security forces rounded up a group of Islamic militants believed to be responsible for a pair of bomb attacks targeting soldiers in the country's northern port city of Tripoli, authorities disclosed yesterday.

Security officials were tight-lipped about the circumstances of the arrests, the number of suspects detained or the name of the group to which they belonged. One official said the militant cell appeared to be linked to Fatah al Islam, a group inspired by al-Qaida.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the cell probably acted to avenge its 2007 defeat at the hands of the Lebanese army during a monthslong battle at the Palestinian refugee camp in Nahr al Bared, near Tripoli.

"We have uncovered some elements, but this does not eliminate the threats," Interior Minister Ziad Baroud told reporters after a security meeting yesterday. "The security apparatuses will remain highly alert to prevent these threats from materializing."

A bomb targeting a military bus last month killed four soldiers and three civilians near Tripoli. The attack came less than two months after a similar bombing in downtown Tripoli killed 14 people, including nine soldiers and a child. Those attacks, as well as a Damascus bombing last month that killed 17, raised fears of an upsurge of attacks by Islamic militants in Lebanon.

Members of al-Qaida-linked groups are believed to be holed up in Lebanon's semiautonomous Palestinian refugee camps, where they remain mostly out of the reach of government security forces.

Sunday, the Lebanese army said in a statement that it had arrested members of a "terrorist cell" believed to have carried out the latest series of deadly attacks. The statement said "an explosive belt" was confiscated and added that the group was planning "other terrorist attacks."

A leading member of the group, identified as Abdel-Ghani Jawhar, still was being tracked down, the statement said.