Blast kills eight in Beirut

Updated 17.10 Wed Jun 13 2007

Keywords: al-Qaeda, Fatah al-Islam, Walid Eido, Beirut, Lebanon

A blast in the Lebanese capital Beirut has killed eight people, including an anti-Syrian MP, security sources have said.

Walid Eido, who was a member of Saad al-Hariri's majority bloc in parliament, was killed alongside one of his sons.

The explosion was the latest in a series of recent bombings in Lebanon, where the army is battling Islamist militants at a Palestinian refugee camp in the north of the country

Six more people were killed in the explosion on Beirut's seafront strip and nine others wounded, the sources said.

The blast at a military beach club also tore through a street near an amusement park. Television pictures showed a car ablaze and shattered windows of a nearby restaurant.

The explosion was the latest in a series of recent bombings in Lebanon, where the army is battling Islamist militants at a Palestinian refugee camp in the north of the country.

Earlier, two Lebanese soldiers were killed in fresh fighting at the Nahr al-Bared camp, security sources said.

Al-Qaeda-inspired Fatah al-Islam militants attacked Lebanese army posts set up at newly seized territory in the outskirts of Nahr al-Bared camp, they said.

The battle for the camp, Lebanon's bloodiest internal violence since the 1975-1990 civil war, has killed 144 people, including 62 soldiers, more than 50 militants and 32 civilians, since it erupted on May 20.

The Lebanese authorities have demanded the unconditional surrender of the gunmen, who have vowed to fight to the death.

Fatah al-Islam was officially formed late last year. Its leader, veteran Palestinian guerrilla Shaker al-Abssi, says he shares the same ideology as al-Qaeda but has no organisational links with that group.

Many of his men are foreign Arab fighters, some of whom have fought in Iraq.

Most of Nahr al-Bared's estimated 40,000 refugees fled to other camps in the early days of the battle. But a few hundred more have left in recent days.

Lebanese soldiers have been questioning the men leaving the camp to make sure there were no militants among them trying to slip through, security sources said.

Human Rights Watch said in a statement released in Beirut the security forces were detaining and physically abusing some Palestinian men fleeing the camp. It quoted some of them speaking of beatings and food deprivation.