JULY 2023 – AIN AL-HELWEH PALESTINIAN REFUGEE CAMP, LEBANON
Six dead and 30 wounded, including a Lebanese soldier, hit by shrapnel from “a mortar shell that fell in one of the military posts.” Islamists from the al-Shabab al-Muslim group seem to have been responsible according to Fatah. https://www.thedefensepost.com/2023/07/31/lebanon-clashes-palestinian-camp/
YARMOUK PALESTINIAN REFUGEE CAMP SYRIA 2012
Yarmouk was an “unofficial” refugee camp, as UNRWA rejected a Syrian government request to recognize the camp in 1960. During the Syrian Civil War, Yarmouk camp became the scene of intense fighting in 2012 between the Free Syrian Army and the PFLP-GC, supported by Syrian Army government forces. By the end of 2014, the camp population had gone down to just 20,000 residents. In early April 2015, most of the Yarmouk camp was overrun by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. By 4 April, the camp was reported to have been wholly taken by ISIL, and executions of residents to had begun. In July 2015, the UN quietly removed Yarmouk from its list of besieged areas in Syria, despite not having been able to deliver aid there for four months, and declined to explain why it had done so. After intense fighting in April/May 2018, Syrian government forces took the camp, and its population had reduced to just 100–200.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yarmouk_Camp
SHABRA AND SHATILA – PALESTINIAN REFUGEE CAMPS LEBANON 1982
3,500+ Palestinians killed by Lebanese when Israel led an invasion into Lebanon. The killings were carried out in Beirut’s Sabra neighbourhood and in the adjacent Shatila refugee camp. Two days earlier, on 14 September, Lebanese politician Bachir Gemayel had been assassinated, prompting the Phalangists to call for a revenge attack. The Lebanese Forces carried out the massacre while the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had the Palestinian camp surrounded. The IDF had ordered the militia to clear out the fighters of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from Sabra and Shatila as part of a larger Israeli manoeuvre into western Beirut. As the massacre unfolded, the IDF received reports of atrocities being committed, but did not take any action to stop it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabra_and_Shatila_massacre
TEL AL-ZAATAR, PALESTINIAN REFUGEE CAMP IN LEBANON 1975
During the Lebanese Civil War (that began in the spring of 1975) between Muslims and Christians, the camp was decimated in August of 1976 after a 52-day siege by Christian militiamen aided by Syrian troops. About 1,600 people died during the siege, 4,000 were wounded, 6,000 surrendered (many of whom were later killed), and the rest fled the camp. www.britannica.com/topic/Tall-al-Zatar
Hafez al-Assad received strong criticism and pressure from across the Arab world for his involvement in the battle – this criticism, as well as the internal dissent it caused as an Alawite ruler in a majority Sunni country, led to a cease-fire in his war on the Palestinian militia force. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Tel_al-Zaatar
What does it all mean?
Well on the face of it, some people don’t seem to like the Palestinians. From an Arab point of view Arab countries shed their blood for Palestinians in 1948, 1967 and 1973. When they’re not being killed, made homeless and uprooted by Israeli settlers, Palestinians may have upset their friends. For example, the PLO tried to stage a coup in Jordan in 1970 because it wanted to take over the country. One estimate said that up to 25,000 Palestinians were killed in the subsequent fighting, before the Palestinian leadership was exiled to Tunisia. Fast forward to 1990 when Iraq invaded Kuwait and ask yourself whose side the PLO took. It took the Iraqi side. Subsequently when Kuwait was liberated, Kuwait expelled its 400,000 Palestinian migrant workers. Denmark took in a whole load of Palestinian refugees at one stage, but now finds that 2/3rds of those Palestinians have acquired criminal records in Denmark. Being oppressed does not necessarily turn you into nice people.
