Relatives of Islamic militants leave Lebanon camp

Relatives of Islamic fighters holed up in a Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon began leaving the besieged area today, a Muslim clergyman mediating between the militants and the army said.

“The evacuation has started,” Sheikh Mohammed al-Haj of the Palestinian Scholars’ Association who was on site at the southern entrance to the Nahr el-Bared camp told the pan-Arab Al-Jazeera television.

He said the civilians – mostly women and children, relatives of the Fatah Islam fighters inside the Nahr el-Bared refugee camp – were boarding army buses to be taken for interrogation.

“Lebanese army soldiers received the women and children,” said al-Haj. “After undergoing the necessary security checks, they are being taken to (army) buses.”

Al-Haj added that he hoped the evacuation would be “a step toward ending” the Nahr el-Bared crisis.

An official with the Palestinian Scholars’ Association who did not want to be named because of the sensitivity of the operation said the army received the civilians in an area inside the camp under the army’s control.

The women and children were given food and water before boarding army buses that would take them outside the camp for interrogation, the official added.

The evacuation follows a deal that was reached with Fatah Islam fighters inside the camp to allow their families to leave the settlement.

Al-Haj said he was contacted Friday by Fatah Islam spokesman Abu Salim Taha, requesting his mediation with the Lebanese army command for a truce to allow the remaining civilians to leave the refugee camp.

He said a total of 63 people, including 22 women and 41 children, were expected to be among the evacuees Friday.

The Association has been mediating between the militants and the army since fighting broke out in the camp on May 20.

A senior military official confirmed that a deal has been reached with Fatah Islam fighters to allow their civilian relatives to leave the camp.

“There is an agreement that they (families) come out today... If they’re being truthful, we are ready,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity according to military rules.

“We have taken all the necessary arrangements,” he added, declining to elaborate.

Witnesses near the Nahr el-Bared camp in north Lebanon said the army seemed to have halted its bombardment as of Friday morning, suggesting that the truce to evacuate the families was in place.

A number of Muslim sheikhs from the Palestinian Scholars’ Association have gathered at the southern entrance to the camp from where the civilians were expected to emerge, they added.

Highlighting security concerns surrounding the evacuation, authorities later asked television crews and journalists to leave the area of the camp’s southern entrance. A security official this week had expressed concern that some of those leaving might be wearing explosive belts.

Some media reports said the civilians are believed to include the wife of Fatah Islam leader Shaker Youssef al-Absi and the widow of his deputy, Abu Hureira, who was killed by security troops outside the camp earlier this month.

A spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross, Samar Kadi, said the ICRC had been contacted Friday morning to prepare for a possible evacuation.

“Our teams are on alert and ready with emergency assistance. We will intervene when we are asked,” she added.

For weeks, the army has been calling on the remaining civilians in the camp to leave, clearing the way for a final military assault to eradicate the remaining Fatah Islam fighters there.

In the last two weeks, the Lebanese army has augmented its months-old artillery bombardment of the camp with massive 880 pound bombs dropped from helicopters, which may have prompted the fighters to ask for the truce.

The camp’s more than 30,000 civilian residents fled in the first weeks of the fighting and the army estimates only 70 Fatah Islam fighters remain, down from 360 when the fighting began.

The army has refused to halt its offensive until the militants completely surrender, while, until now, the Islamists have vowed to fight to the death.