Beirut - Tensions rose Tuesday in Palestinian refugee camps
in southern Lebanon after a series of bomb explosions in the past few
days, which left no casualties but caused fear among the camps'
residents.
At dawn Tuesday a bomb exploded near the house of Fatah member
Monther Bhaiji, in the Ain el-Hilweh camp, east of the southern port
of Sidon, but no casualties were reported.
Earlier, a stun grenade was thrown by unidentified people inside
the Rashidiyeh refugee camp on the outskirts of the port city of
Tyre. There were no injuries.
On Monday, an explosion damaged the house of Fatah member Salah
Joumaa. The attack was followed by a brief shootout, but patrols were
conducted in the camp in order to prevent any further escalation.
The attacks come a week after a high-ranking Fatah official was
killed in a blast at the entrance to the Miyeh Miyeh camp in southern
Lebanon.
Kamal Medhat, an aide to Palestinian Ambassador and Palestinian
Liberation Organization representative in Lebanon Abbas Zaki and
Fatah's former intelligence chief in Lebanon, was killed along with
three of his bodyguards in a bomb attack on his convoy on March 23.
'People are for sure afraid,' said General Fathi Zeidan, the
senior Fatah officer in the Miyeh Miyeh refugee camp, east of the
port city of Sidon.
All 12 Palestinian refugee camps across Lebanon are controlled by
Palestinian factions rather than Lebanese authorities. There are some
367,000 Palestinians living in the camps.
Khalil Makkawi, president of the Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue
Committee, echoed General Zeidan's concerns and said 'it is a very
tense situation inside the camp and the Palestinian leaders are
trying to contain the situation.'
Worries about violent factional splits in Palestinian camps in
Lebanon were brought to the fore in February by the International
Crisis Group's report.
The report described the Palestinian 'camps that harbor a
marginalized, impoverished population; an abundance of weapons; and a
leadership that, no longer in a position to fight Israel, is adrift,
without a sense of purpose.'
Since the conflict between Fatah al-Islam, a Sunni fundamanetalist
Palestinian group and the Lebanese army in the Nahr al-Bared camp in
2007 in northern Lebanon, Beirut has watched the camps uneasily for
more signs of violence.
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