THE WORLD IS SILENT AS LEBANESE ARMY POUNDS PALESTINIAN REFUGEE CAMP

Farewell Fatah al-Islam by Gabriel Schoenfeld (Contentions)

“A crime of especial notoriety,” is what the Guardian called it in 2002 when Israel entered a Palestinian refugee camp in the West Bank city of Jenin to root out terrorists who had organized a suicide bombing that killed 29 at their seder tables in a hotel in Netanya on the first night of Passover. In all, 52 Palestinians, almost all of them terrorists, died in this supposed genocide, while Israel, in a costly effort to to conduct itself in the most humane fashion possible, lost 23 soldiers of its own.

In Tripoli right now, the Lebanese army is pounding a Palestinian refugee camp with tank shells and other heavy weapons far less discriminating in their lethal effects than anything fired by Israeli ground troops in Jenin—and many Lebanese are cheering them on. The choir of Europeans and American leftists who routinely champion the Palestinian cause is strangely silent—or maybe not so strangely silent. Perhaps their real interest lies not in defending Palestinian rights but in bashing Israel—and Israel, of course, is not engaged in this particular fray.

Lebanese Army and Islamists Battle for 2nd Day - Hassan M. Fattah
Lebanese tanks and artillery pounded a Palestinian refugee camp in Tripoli for the second straight day on Monday, battling members of a radical Islamist group. Government officials said at least 60 people had been killed - 30 soldiers, 15 militants and 15 civilians. The militant group, Fatah al-Islam, which is thought to have links to al-Qaeda, fired antiaircraft guns and mortars and had night vision goggles and other sophisticated equipment. The Lebanese Army does not have such gear. Lebanese television reported that among the dead militants were men from Bangladesh, Yemen and other Arab countries. Some of the men wore explosive belts used by suicide bombers. Among those killed on Sunday was Saddam al-Hajdib, a fugitive suspect in a failed train bombing in Germany last year. (New York Times)