Lebanese soldiers battle militants

TRIPOLI, Lebanon -- Fierce clashes erupted between Lebanese soldiers and Islamic militants in a Palestinian refugee camp here yesterday, leaving 22 Lebanese soldiers and 17 militants dead and dozens injured in one of the most significant challenges to the army since the end of Lebanon's bloody civil war.

The confrontation with the Islamist group, Fatah al-Islam, raised fears of a wider battle to rout militants in the rest of Lebanon's 12 refugee camps, where radical Islam has been gaining in recent years. That, in turn, raised the possibility of significant civilian casualties, placing strains on the embattled government of Prime Minister Fuad Saniora.

Yesterday's confrontation comes just days after the UN Security Council began deliberations on a resolution authorizing the formation of a special tribunal to try suspects tied to the Feb. 2005 assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri. Syria, which has been accused in previous investigations of ordering the killing, vigorously denies any connection to the killing.

While anxious not to seem weak in the face of the militant challenge, military specialists say, the government and the military also want to avoid scenes that might draw comparisons to the Israeli attacks on Palestinian camps in the West Bank and Gaza.

"We cannot afford to have that here," said Elias Hanna, a retired army general, who warned against a direct assault. "This is not a question of the army's capabilities or its professionalism; you simply can't send the army into the camps to arrest 200 people without paying a heavy price in civilian casualties."

Tensions rose further last night when a car bomb exploded in a nearly empty parking lot in a Christian section of east Beirut, killing one person and wounding 10 others. Last month, Lebanese authorities charged four members of Fatah al-Islam with bombing two commuter buses carrying Lebanese Christians in the same district of Beirut, Achrafie.

Fatah al-Islam has been a growing concern for security authorities in Lebanon and much of the region. Intelligence officials say it counts about 150 fighters in its ranks and subscribes to the fundamentalist precepts of Al Qaeda.

The group's leader, Shakir al-Abssi, is a fugitive Palestinian and former associate of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former leader of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia who was killed last year in Iraq. Both men were sentenced to death in absentia for the 2002 murder of an American diplomat, Laurence M. Foley, in Jordan.

In the six months since he arrived from Syria, Abssi has established a base at the Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee camp on the northern outskirts of this city, and the scene of yesterday's fighting.

What began as a raid on several homes in Tripoli in pursuit of suspected bank robbers connected to the militant group Fatah al-Islam quickly escalated into an open confrontation with the group at their stronghold in the camp.

Three soldiers and four militants were killed in the early morning confrontation, said a Lebanese security official . Hours later, the official said, militants tied to the group attacked an army patrol in the Koura region north of Tripoli, killing four more soldiers.

Under an agreement with the Palestinian leadership and Arab countries, the army is not allowed to enter the refugee camps. The fighting raged throughout the afternoon, home to about 40,000 refugees, as army reinforcements rushed to the scene and tanks began shelling targets in the camp. Militants who had taken positions on the outskirts of the camp fired back, keeping the army at bay.

Four children and three women were injured in the shelling, said one medical official. But residents inside the camp said at least two civilians had been killed and more than 45 had been injured .

There was no independent verification of the residents' claims.

By nightfall, the army had regained control of several outposts surrounding the camp, but the siege of the camp continued.

Many residents of Tripoli welcomed the army into town, and onlookers clapped whenever tanks fired shells into the camp, reflecting longstanding tensions between Lebanese and Palestinians, who are blamed for sparking the country's civil war in 1975.

Lebanon's 400,000 Palestinians remain among the most downtrodden refugees in the Arab world, enjoying few rights and facing strict restrictions on the kind of work they can do. Most are limited to menial, low-paying jobs and face significant prejudices.

Some refugee camps, in turn, have become fertile ground for a growing militancy.

Syria closed its southern borders with Lebanon yesterday, which are in the vicinity of the Naher al Bared camp. Lebanese officials say that Fatah al-Islam is backed by Syria and has been organized to sow instability in Lebanon. The group has denied the claim.