Lebanon (all aspects)

[SWJED]

22 May NY Times - Lebanese Army and Islamists Battle for 2nd Day by Hassan Fattah.

Lebanese tanks and artillery pounded a Palestinian refugee camp in this northern Lebanese city for the second straight day on Monday, battling members of a radical Islamist group and raising concerns for thousands trapped inside.

Government officials said at least 60 people had been killed — 30 soldiers, 15 militants and 15 civilians — in the fighting that began when a police raid on bank robbers early Sunday escalated into one of Lebanon’s most significant security crises since the end of the civil war in 1990.

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 stations reported that among the dead militants were men from Bangladesh, Yemen and other Arab countries...

[aktarian]

Government officials said at least 60 people had been killed — 30 soldiers, 15 militants and 15 civilians — in the fighting that began when a police raid on bank robbers early Sunday escalated into one of Lebanon’s most significant security crises since the end of the civil war in 1990.

I guess author wasn't paying much attention to news last summer.....

[tequila]

Well, to be fair a lot more people have died already in this dustup, and it's not over yet.

[goesh]

A UN relief convoy got hit trying to enter the fatah islam camp. I don't know how Intelligence keeps up with all these splinter groups

[aktarian]

Well, to be fair a lot more people have died already in this dustup, and it's not over yet.

Wasn't body count last year around 1.000 dead on Lebanese side and about 150 on Israeli?

Plus arguemnt could be made that last year's fighting led to political confrontation between Hezbollah and rest of government resulting in protests and couple of deaths.

[Jedburgh]

Posted on the Counterterrorism Blog, 1 Jun 07:

On May 25, 2007, copies of a new video recording were publicly distributed over password-protected Al-Qaida Internet websites after being authenticated by the pre-eminent Al-Fajr Media Center. The seven-minute recording contains a speech by a masked individual identifying himself only as the “military commander of Al-Qaida’s Committee in Al-Shams” (“Greater Syria”). This is the first known occasion that any individual or organization inside of Lebanon has explicitly identified themselves as part of the international Al-Qaida terrorist network....

Video Threat to Lebanon from "Al-Qa'ida in Greater Syria"

[Ski]

AQ has opened up a new front. Damn. I wonder if we are going to let the Lebanese Army handle this alone. I've read we've been shipping ammo over to them.

[SoiCowboy]

It seems it doesn't matter how podunk or backwater your group is.

Say the magic word Al-Qaeda and you get news time.

I'm just surprised its taken this long for it to happen in this area.

[tequila]

Wasn't body count last year around 1.000 dead on Lebanese side and about 150 on Israeli?

Plus arguemnt could be made that last year's fighting led to political confrontation between Hezbollah and rest of government resulting in protests and couple of deaths.

You're right. I was only thinking of the March 14 vs March 8 political confrontation.

As far as Fatah al-Islam is concerned, it's instructive sometimes to listen to bin Laden's own words:

All that we have mentioned has made it easy for us to provoke and bait this administration. All that we have to do is to send two mujahidin to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaida, in order to make the generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses without their achieving for it anything of note ...

[Jedburgh]

The Jamestown Foundation's Terrorism Focus, 12 Jun 07:

Are Outside Actors Funding Sunni Islamist Groups in Lebanon's Camps?

...Since the emergence of Fatah al-Islam as an armed jihadi threat earlier this spring, Lebanon's Sunni-led March 14 coalition has been forced to answer charges from the Hezbollah-led opposition and others that it—as well as its Saudi and Jordanian allies—has been funding Sunni Islamist groups like Fatah al-Islam in an effort to counter the strength of Hezbollah's weapons and manpower. Links between Fatah al-Islam and the Syrian regime that emerged following the recent clashes made those accusations easier to counter; with respect to the armed groups in Ain al-Helweh, however, the accusations have been both more frequent and harder to disprove....