SIDON, Lebanon: A new split between the rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas has put the teeming Ain al-Hilweh refugee camp on edge, raising fears that the tension might spark a new round of fighting among feuding parties in Lebanon’s largest Palestinian shantytown.
However, officials in the camp scrambled to allay fears of violence, saying Ain al-Hilweh, the scene of frequent fighting in the past between rival factions vying for influence, would not be another Nahr al-Bared camp or a theater for settling scores between Fatah and Hamas.
The Lebanese Army battled for more than three months against Al-Qaeda-inspired Fatah al-Islam militants in the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp in north Lebanon in 2007, a war that left the camp almost completely flattened.
“No return to a new Nahr al-Bared camp. Today, the Palestinian political position is united on being a positive factor in the country and not interfering in Lebanese affairs,” Munir Maqdah, deputy commander of the Palestinian National Security in Ain al-Hilweh, told The Daily Star.
“Our goal will remain Palestine and to return to our land with our homes liberated.”
Asked if the new rift between Fatah and Hamas would reflect negatively on the camp’s volatile security, Maqdah, formerly a Fatah military commander, said: “We have decided not to let this [Fatah-Hamas] struggle spread to Lebanon. We, as political parties, have agreed not to move this struggle to Lebanon’s camps. Our camps have enough problems.”
Maqdah’s remarks come as a raging war of words between Fatah and Hamas marred the 10th anniversary since the mysterious death of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Tuesday accused the Islamist movement Hamas of trying to destroy efforts to broker national unity through a series of bomb blasts in Gaza last week. Abbas said Hamas had been behind the Gaza explosions, which targeted leaders of his Fatah movement. Hamas quickly hit back at Abbas, describing the allegations as “lies.”
Maqdah dismissed fears of a military flare-up in Ain al-Hilweh, which have been exacerbated by the Lebanese security forces’ confirmation of the existence of dormant terrorist cells that could target the Army.
“With the unity of Palestinian factions, which was manifested recently with the formation of a [joint] security force, and also our good relations with the Lebanese parties and our permanent coordination with the Lebanese Army, we have been able to shield our camps,” Maqdah said.
“Our political stance is clear: to serve as a positive factor in Lebanon. We will remain a safety valve for Lebanon and we will preserve our camps and our people.”
Commemorating Arafat’s death, banners and pictures showing the late leader and Abbas together were hung in the streets and narrow alleys of Ain al-Hilweh. The camp, home to around 90,000 people after its population was swollen by 10,000 mostly Palestinian refugees from Syria, is located on the outskirts of the southern city of Sidon.
Asked if he feared the Fatah-Hamas struggle would spill over to Lebanon’s camps, Mahmoud Jawhar, a school bus driver, said: “Fear [of inter-Palestinian fighting] has been haunting us since our grandfathers were forced to leave Palestine ... We have not had a single day of peace. We are fed up with the smell of blood. We do not want a new Nahr al-Bared camp.”
Sources in Hamas, which is part of the joint elite force deployed in the camp to maintain security, said that the movement’s representative in Lebanon Ali Barakat had contacted Fatah’s strongman Fathi Abu Ardat, and the two had agreed to distance the Palestinian camps from the ongoing struggle in Gaza.
A spokesman for Osbat al-Ansar, one of the militant Islamist organizations based in Ain al-Hilweh, dismissed fears of a new Nahr al-Bared-style war in the camp.
“The Nahr al-Bared camp war is behind us. We have succeeded in distancing ourselves from the battles between the Lebanese Army and gunmen in Tripoli and [the Bekaa town of] Arsal,” Sheikh Abu Sharif Akel told The Daily Star in an interview at his office in Ain al-Hilweh.
He dismissed a bomb that was thrown recently at an Army checkpoint outside Ain al-Hilweh as an isolated incident.
“The [security] situation in the camp is better than in many areas even in Lebanon,” Akel said. “In addition to politicians, security and intelligence personnel are now saying that Ain al-Hilweh no longer poses a danger to the Lebanese state and the Lebanese people.
“Ain al-Hilweh camp will not be transformed into Nahr al-Bared camp. This camp is a storage of Muslim and mujahed youth.”
Watching the camp’s activity through CCTV, Akel blamed Israel and America for foiling attempts to bring about a reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas.
“We see that the recent bombings in Gaza that targeted Fatah leaders aimed primarily at deepening differences and ending the inter-Palestinian reconciliation efforts,” he said. “We hope that these differences will not spread to the diaspora camps, especially Lebanon’s camps.”
Akel, whose group once labeled the Lebanese Army an “infidel” army, praised the military for its ideology in fighting Israel.
“The fact is that the Lebanese Army is one of the armies that still say that Jews are enemies and is still behaving on this basis,” he said. “Therefore, efforts should be combined to confront the Zionist enemy in support of our people, our Al-Aqsa [Mosque] and our cause.”
He called on Islamist youths not to target the Lebanese Army, which he said has “a fighting ideology against the Zionist enemy.”
Akel said representatives of Palestinians factions were in contact with the Lebanese Army through a Palestinian liaison committee to avoid frictions between the two sides. The Army is deployed around Ain al-Hilweh’s entrances.
Akel denied media reports that fugitive Salafist Sheikh Ahmad Assir was hiding in Ain al-Hilweh, following deadly clashes between his gunmen and the Lebanese Army in Abra, east of Sidon, in July 2013. At least 18 soldiers and 28 gunmen were killed in the clashes.
“My information says that Ahmad Assir is not in Lebanon,” he said. “He was in Lebanon for some time following the Abra battles. He is now outside Lebanon. He did not enter the camp.
“The [Lebanese] state knows where he headed after the Abra battles and he stayed for a period of time before leaving Lebanon.”
A military judge has indicted 57 individuals, including Assir and former pop singer Fadel Shaker in the Abra battles and demanded the death penalty for all of them.
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