Nearly 50 killed as Lebanese army fires on Palestinian refugee camp
NAZIH SIDDIQ AND BASSEM MROUE
NEARLY 50 people were killed yesterday as government troops battled Islamist militants based in a Palestinian refugee camp in the bloodiest internal fighting in Lebanon since the 1975-90 civil war.
Twenty-three soldiers and 19 militants died in the clashes, which erupted before dawn on the edge of the Nahr al-Bared camp and in the nearby Sunni Muslim city of Tripoli in north Lebanon.
A cabinet minister said the fighting with Fatah al-Islam, which the government says is backed by Syria, seemed timed to derail moves at the United Nations to set up an international court to try those suspected of carrying out political killings in Lebanon.
Four soldiers were killed in an attack on an army patrol in al-Qalamoun just south of Tripoli. Some 15 militants were killed when troops stormed buildings they had occupied in Tripoli and four in the camp, home to 40,000 refugees. Medical sources in the camp said six civilians, including two children, were killed and 60 wounded.
The army was blasting militant positions in the camp with tank, mortar and machine-gun fire, a military source said. More than 20 soldiers were wounded overall.
Fatah al-Islam, a Sunni group, said the army had launched an unprovoked attack. "We warn the Lebanese army of the consequences of continuing the provocative acts against our mujahideen who will open the gates of fire ... against [the army] and against the whole of Lebanon," it said. The authenticity of the statement could not be verified.
The army had tightened its grip around Nahr al-Bared after four Fatah al-Islam members, all Syrian nationals, were charged with planting bombs on two buses in a Christian area near Beirut in February. Three civilians were killed.
Fatah al-Islam, whose leader is Palestinian, is known to have Lebanese, Syrian and Palestinians in its ranks.
Speaking in Tripoli, Ahmad Fatfat, a cabinet minister, said the violence was part of efforts to sabotage UN moves to set up a tribunal to try suspects in the 2005 assassination of the prime minister Rafik al-Hariri. A UN inquiry has implicated Syria and Lebanese officials in the killing, but Damascus denies any involvement.
Syria also denies any link to Fatah al-Islam, whose leader, Shaker al-Abssi, says the group has no organisational links to al-Qaeda but agrees with its aim of fighting "infidels".
Syria said it had closed two border crossings to north Lebanon due the violence, but the main crossing remained open.
Lebanon's anti-Syrian 14 March movement, which dominates the government, described yesterday's clashes as a "criminal attack, which comes as a translation of the threats made by the head of the Syrian regime to set Lebanon ablaze if the international tribunal is established".
The clashes in the camp began early yesterday morning shortly after police raided a militant- occupied flat on Mitein Street, a major thoroughfare in Tripoli.
Authorities said police were looking for suspects in a bank robbery a day earlier in Amyoun, a town south-east of Tripoli, in which gunmen made off with £63,000 in cash.
The armed militants resisted arrest and a gunbattle ensued. It spread to surrounding streets and continued through the afternoon. Witnesses said the militants then seized Lebanese army positions at the entrance to the refugee camp, capturing two armoured cars. The gunmen also opened fire on roads leading to the city and ambushed a military unit, killing two soldiers, security officials said.
By midmorning, the army had brought reinforcements and was firing on Fatah Islam positions.
There have been long-standing tensions between some Lebanese citizens and the tens of thousands of Palestinians who took refuge from fighting in Israel over the decades.
Abed Attar, a resident of Tripoli who stood watching army soldiers firing tank shells into the camp while others cheered, said: "We strongly back the Lebanese army troops and what they are doing."
Web links
Israeli Government
gov.il
Haaretz
haaretzdaily.com
Jerusalem Times
jerusalem-times.net
Middle East conflict
news.scotsman.com
This article: news.scotsman.com
Last updated: 20-May-07 00:03 BST |
