A Fatah officer and a woman were killed Monday by members of an Islamist group at the main entrance of the Ain al-Helweh camp near Sidon, in southern Lebanon. Ain al-Helweh is the largest of the 12 Palestinian villages in Lebanon, where some 50,000 Arabs make their homes.
According to a spokesman for the Lebanese regular army, the officer was a member of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas Fatah faction. The two were allegedly attacked by operatives from the Usbat al-Ansar group, an Islamist faction, according to the AFP news agency.
Clashes quickly followed between members of the two factions, who fired rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) and automatic weapons at each other.
However, the head of the Fatah armed wing at the camp claimed when speaking to a female Aljazeera correspondent that the attack was an isolated incident, a fight between two men and was not political.
The officer's name was not released. The woman, Nejmah Ali Yunes, was caught in the crossfire. Several others were wounded as well, according to Palestinians who spoke with an AFP reporter on condition of anonymity.
Many families fled to a nearby mosque, hoping to escape the violence, while the Lebanese army sealed off all entrances to the camp.
According to the Lebanese army spokesman, Lebanese military personnel do not enter the camps, leaving security matters to the Palestinians who live in the camps.