Thousands of Palestinians fled a badly damaged refugee camp
Wednesday after a fragile truce halted fighting between the
Lebanese army and Al-Qaida-inspired militants.
Vehicles choked the main road out of the Nahr al-Bared camp,
where the Lebanese army had been battling the Fatah al-Islam
militant group since Sunday in Lebanon's worst internal fighting
since the 1975-90 civil war.
"It's mass destruction in there. The dead people are strewn on
the streets. Nobody is picking them up," said camp resident Awad
Saeed Awad as he boarded a bus for the nearby Beddawi camp where
many were seeking refuge.
"We haven't seen Fatah al-Islam. They're probably hiding in the
alleyways."
At least 22 militants, 32 soldiers and 27 civilians have been
killed in the fighting, which initially erupted in both the port
city of Tripoli and Nahr al-Bared, home to 40,000 Palestinians.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said there
were no accurate figures on casualties because of the danger of
moving in and out of the camp, which had been heavily shelled by
the army.
At Beddawi camp, hundreds packed the corridors and classrooms of
a school, sleeping on mattresses on the floor.
"We couldn't even bury the dead," said Mona Diab, 27. "It gives
me the chills. We came only with the clothes we are wearing."
The fighting eased on Tuesday afternoon following an informal
truce. A military source said there was calm but added "the matter
is not over".
"It will only end with the final end of this gang", he said.
Aid workers said some residents had not left the camp. "It's
very dangerous and risky to move inside the camp due to sniping,"
said Hoda Elturk, a spokeswoman for the UN agency which cares for
Palestinians.
Fatah al-Islam, a Sunni Islamist militant group led by a
Palestinian, emerged in 2006 when it split from Fatah al-Intifada
(Fatah Uprising), a Syrian-backed Palestinian group based in
Lebanon.
The group made its base in Nahr al-Bared, one of 12 Palestinian
camps which are home to some 400,000 refugees in Lebanon. The army
is not allowed into the camps under a 1969 Arab agreement.
"They're a breeding ground for any type of mishap," security
analyst Timur Goksel said. "You are in a sovereign country and you
have these autonomous enclaves."
Small factions with similar ideologies to Fatah al-Islam have
also emerged in Ain el-Hilweh camp in south Lebanon.
The government had pledged to root out Fatah al-Islam, which
members of the governing coalition say is a tool of Syrian
intelligence. Syria denies any link with the group.
(China Daily via agencies May 24, 2007)
