Tensions High in Ain el-Hilweh after Fatah Member Assassinated

Masked gunmen shot dead a Fatah Movement member on Wednesday evening in the Ain el-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp, in an incident that also left three other people wounded.

State-run National News Agency said Fatah member Walid Yassine “was seriously wounded when gunmen opened fire at his bird shop in the Ain el-Hilweh camp.”

He later succumbed to his wounds at a Sidon hospital, NNA added.

Three other people who were inside the shop were wounded, according to the agency.

Earlier, al-Mayadeen TV said tensions surged in the camp in the wake of Yassine's assassination.

The incident prompted the members of Fatah to go on alert, according to media reports.

Ain el-Hilweh, the largest Palestinian camp in the country and home to about 50,000 refugees, lies near the southern city of Sidon.

It is known to harbor extremists and fugitives because by long-standing convention the Lebanese army does not enter Lebanon's refugee camps.

Y.R.