Posted on 08/08/2007 12:03:28 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
NAHR AL-BARED, Lebanon (Reuters) - Two Lebanese soldiers and four al Qaeda-inspired militants were killed on Wednesday in pitched battles at a Palestinian refugee camp, taking the death toll from nearly 12 weeks of fighting to 267.
Security sources said the men were killed in overnight and morning clashes at Nahr al-Bared camp in north Lebanon during which artillery, rockets, grenades and machine guns were used.
Troops made some advances inside, seizing a number of buildings, they said.
The military control a large part of the camp and its vicinity, home to 40,000 refugees before the fighting, but Fatah al-Islam militants have been putting up fierce resistance.
The army has now lost 136 soldiers since the battle erupted on May 20. More than 90 militants and 41 civilians have also been killed in Lebanon's worst internal violence since the 1975-1990 civil war.
Lebanese authorities said this week that a senior Fatah al-Islam military commander, Shihab Qaddora, also know as Abu Hureira, was killed late last month in a clash with security forces in the nearby city of Tripoli.
There was no confirmation of when or how Qaddora, 35, a well-known Lebanese militant who had spent more than six years in a Syrian prison, managed to sneak out of the camp but he was at one stage leading the battles at Nahr al-Bared.
Some local media reported he had fled the besieged camp by swimming for five hours. They said Qaddora was contacting sleeping Fatah al-Islam cells in Tripoli to prepare for attacks against the security sources.
Fatah al-Islam, which split from a Syrian-backed Palestinian faction last year, has Lebanese, Palestinians and other Arabs in its ranks, including some who have fought in Iraq. It says it supports al Qaeda's ideas, but has no direct links with it.
The conflict has further undermined stability in Lebanon, already crippled by a prolonged political crisis and shaken by bombings that have killed six U.N. peacekeepers and two anti-Syrian lawmakers in the past eight months.
The assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri in 2005 marked an end to the relative stability Lebanon had experienced since it emerged from the civil war.
Don’t you just hate it when this happens? /sarc
Prayers for the fallen Lebanese Soldiers. They are fighting very well and bravely against the terrorists... and this although they have outdated equipment and are trapped between the Syrians, Hizbullah, Al-Qaeda and Palestinian terror groups.
Many of the Lebanese soldiers are Christians and Druze.
That'll put an end to this crap.
L
The Bible predicts this. It will happen.
I have a hard time from a strictly military viewpoint understanding why any of the bad guys are still alive. Tells me the Lebanese Army lacks a lot of equipment and training.
They do. They are militarily in the 1980’s.
However they know how to fight. They pounded and shelled the terrorist “refugee” camp with Artillery and mortars WW2 style and stormed if afterwards. The videos are awesome.
I agree, there have been a lot of Lebanese Army casualties but quite a few casualties are due to booby traps and ambushes and such.. the Islamists are trying to make this last as long as they can and take as many with them as they can.
The area they are fighting in has pretty much been decimated, maybe it’s time to just pulverize it.. and any remaining bad guys.. altho they have artillery’d the heck out of some areas in the camp already.
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