Two Red Cross Workers Killed In Lebanon

Mortar Hits Ambulance While They Tried To Set Up Talks Between Palestinian Militants, Lebanese Army

(AP)  Two local Red Cross workers were killed and a third wounded Monday when they came under fire from inside a Palestinian refugee camp where the Lebanese army has been fighting al Qaeda-inspired militants holed up inside. A Muslim sheik trying to mediate the conflict also was wounded in a separate shooting incident.

Security officials said the workers, identified by the state-run news agency as Boulos Maamari and Haitham Suleiman, were killed near the northern entrance to the Nahr el-Bared camp when their vehicle was struck by what appeared to be a mortar shell fired by Fatah Islam militants from inside the camp. A third Red Cross worker was seriously wounded.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to talk to the press, said there also were army casualties from the shelling but did not give more details. Red Cross officials did not immediately respond to repeated requests for comment.

In a separate incident near the camp's southern entrance, a Muslim sheik trying to negotiate an end to the conflict was wounded as he left Nahr el-Bared.

Hospital officials at the Islamic Hospital in the northern city of Tripoli where he was taken said Sheik Mohammed Haj was lightly injured in his leg when the vehicle he was in belonging to the Palestinian Red Crescent came under fire from inside the camp.

Haj's spokesman Sheik Walid Abu Heit told reporters at the hospital that the incident would not stop Haj's mediation efforts. "We do not blame anyone for the incident at this point," he said.

The Red Cross workers' deaths came as Lebanese troops exchanged sporadic gunfire with Fatah Islam on Monday — a day after heavy clashes erupted as the army stepped up its bombardment of the militants who have been barricaded inside Nahr el-Bared.

A senior military official told The Associated Press Monday that the army would continue to expand its control in and outside the camp with the aim of tightening the noose around Fatah Islam gunmen.

"The battle will continue until the gunmen surrender and those responsible for killing Lebanese soldiers are brought to justice," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to give official statements.

The leading An-Nahar newspaper reported Monday the Lebanese military had brought in new reinforcements, including more effective artillery and additional naval forces, while pro-Syrian Palestinian factions had joined Fatah Islam militants in their fight.

The fighting between Fatah Islam and the army, which began May 20, is the worst internal violence to engulf Lebanon since the 1975-90 civil war. Fifty-seven soldiers have been killed in the Nahr el-Bared fighting, while another two soldiers were killed in last week's clashes with Jund al-Sham militants in the Palestinian refugee camp of Ein el-Hilweh in southern Lebanon, according to the military official.

More than 130 people in total, including at least 60 Fatah Islam militants, 20 civilians and the two Red Cross workers, have been reported killed in the fighting in northern Lebanon.

In a sign of continued tension outside the camp, Lebanese policemen found a hand grenade on Monday near the house of former Justice Minister Joseph Shaoul in the Christian neighborhood of Ashrafieh in the heart of Beirut, security officials said, speaking on customary condition of anonymity. Security forces blocked the road as a military bomb expert safely removed the grenade, which did not explode.

Fears of spreading chaos have also been sparked by clashes at another Palestinian refugee camp, Ein el-Hilweh in the south, and several bombings in the Beirut area.

Meanwhile, Lebanese security forces arrested four Lebanese men Monday suspected of belonging to a militant Islamic group during raids on their houses in southeastern Lebanon, security officials said. It was not immediately known if the four belonged to Fatah Islam.

Last week, state security officers captured three foreign militants — two Syrians and an Iraqi — during a raid on their house in eastern Lebanon who confessed to belonging to al Qaeda and planning to stage attacks with car bombs, the state-run National News Agency said.

A Lebanese military magistrate also has filed terrorism charges against 27 suspected members of Fatah Islam.

[bluestardad]

MULTIPLE INDEPENDENT RESEARCH FACTS ARE THE ENEMY OF BUSH AND HIS CHICKEN HAWK NEOCONS THAT SELL OUT AMERICAN SOLDIERS FOR THE POLICY OF ISRAEL!

ISRAELIS HIDE BEHIND PROBLEMS THEY HAD IN EUROPE 70 YEARS AGO! AS SOON AS YOU QUESTION THE POLICY OF THESE SLUGS THEY SAY A PERSON IS ANTI SEMITIC! I AM AMERICAN NOT ISRAELI AND OUR TROOPS ARENT EITHER!

THERE ARE MILLIONS OF OTHER GOOD PEOPLE IN THE MIDDLE EAST THAT DESERVE A VOICE JUST NOT AMERICAN LIVES!

"Gen. William Odom discusses the %u201Cworst strategic disaster in American history,%u201D the war in Iraq: the view of most generals that the war is wrong, the failure of the politicians to see the consequences of their actions, the centrality of the neoconservatives and the Israel lobby in pushing for the Iraq invasion, the %u201Csurge,%u201D

www.antiwar.com/blog/2007/
05/10/gen-william-odom

EVEN AS AMERICAN MILITARY AID LANDS IN LEBANON, President Bush is funding Al Qaeda in Lebanon with funds from Iraq!

http://www.newyorker.com/
fact/content/articles/070305fa_fact_hers
h

READ AIPAC BRAG ABOUT THEIR INFLUENCE
ON AMERICAN POLITICIANS!

http://www.aipac.org/for
ms/join_aipacClubs.htm

[sevenveils]

It's obvious at this point the terrorists in the Palestinian refugee camp are well armed, trained and great in numbers.

It takes a lot of money to fund something like this. Your petrol dollars at work?

[xzavierbrown]

Posted by bluestardad at 01:45 PM : Jun 11, 2007
+ report abuse

is that you mr. gibson?

[bluestardad]

BUSH IS SENDING MONEY TO BOTH SIDES!

THIS ENTIRE MESS IS NOT IN AMERICAS NATIONAL INTEREST AND IS NOT NEWS WORTHY!

LET ISRAEL PLAY ITS OWN GAME!


AMERICA IS NOT THE UNITED STATES OF ISRAEL!