MIDDLE EAST:The Lebanese army was last night preparing for a final push against the Sunni fighters of Fatah al-Islam after a day of heavy shelling on the Naher al-Bared refugee camp.
The fierce fighting left at least two soldiers dead and 19 wounded, with reports coming from inside the camp that at least eight Fatah al-Islam fighters had been killed. The number of civilians killed or wounded in the fighting could not be confirmed.
"No one can step outside their house," said Bilal Arslan, the leader of the mainstream Fatah faction in Naher al-Bared. "There are snipers everywhere - most people are hiding in basements. There is constant gunfire and explosions. There is no food, no water, no electricity, no medical supplies."
After negotiations by local Sunni clerics and Palestinian factions failed to deliver a solution the army has begun what appears to be the final push to breach the camp and kill or capture the remaining militants.
At the north entrance, soldiers took cover as exhausted medical workers tried to rest, anticipating a long night ahead. Earlier, a column of tanks and armoured personnel-carriers had snaked its way into the mouth of the camp, a few hundred metres from the Fatah al-Islam-controlled areas along the seafront base, where militants have reportedly dug in with booby-traps and roadside bombs.
As tanks pounded the camp from the surrounding hills, muezzins struggled to be heard in their call to Friday prayers. Shells churned up sand in towering swirls or plunged into the sea, sending water spouts more than a hundred metres into the air.
Mr Arslan said that many civilians had taken refuge in the basements of apartment blocks, while others were huddled by the entrances of defunct bomb shelters long flooded with water. He estimated that there were still 250 to 300 fighters in the camp, all committed to a fight to the death.
One military officer, who asked not to be named, said: "We have a green light to breach the camp and we are going to continue our assault until we have achieved our goal."
The army has been fighting militants in the camp since May 20th in Lebanon's worst internal violence since the 1975-1990 civil war. At least 84 people - 35 soldiers, 29 militants and 20 civilians - had been killed before yesterday. - ( Guardian Service)