Lebanese troops collect first weapons surrendered in Palestinian camps

Lebanese troops entered the Burj Al-Barajneh refugee camp in Beirut’s southern suburbs late on Thursday and began collecting the first weapons surrendered as part of a government move to disarm Palestinian factions.

The weapons handover is part of a broader disarmament push that follows a Lebanese government decision, announced on Aug. 5, to limit possession of arms exclusively to the state. It also follows an earlier meeting between Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, held on May 21 in Beirut.

Prime Minister Nawaf Salam welcomed the start of the process, saying that the initial handover of Palestinian weapons to the Lebanese Army marked an important step.

Additional batches will be transferred in coming weeks from Burj Al-Barajneh and other camps, he added.

Ramez Dimashqieh, head of the government’s Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee, described the operation as “a handover based on lists prepared in advance by the Lebanese Army in coordination with the Palestinian forces inside the camp.”

He told Arab News: “The Lebanese Army has prepared lists of the weapons present in the camp, specifically heavy weapons, and the operation will take place in phases and will not be completed in one day.”

Dimashqieh said that “the weapons being handed over (to the military) are not new weapons brought into the camps, but have been present in the camp for a long time.”

At the time of the weapons handover, Hezbollah activists circulated claims on social media that the arms surrendered in Burj Al-Barajneh camp “belonged to a defector from the Fatah movement and had been brought into the camp two days earlier.”

The Lebanese Army’s Engineering Regiment examined the weapons before removing them. Ahead of the transfer, army personnel told journalists gathered at the camp entrance to leave the area.

Dimashqieh said that the weapons will be held by the Lebanese Army, with the crackdown eventually extending to other camps.

Lebanon hosts 12 Palestinian refugee camps, spread across Beirut and its southern suburbs, the Bekaa, the north, and the south. The largest is Ain Al-Hilweh, located in the Sidon region.

In the past, the Lebanese Army has avoided entering the Palestinian camps, instead dealing mainly with committees set up by Palestinian leaders.

A Palestinian official described “diverging views” among Palestinian forces in the camps regarding the surrender of weapons, with factions allied with Hezbollah opposing the handover.

Ghassan Ayoub, a member of the leadership of the Palestinian People’s Party in Lebanon, told Arab News: “This does not mean that all Palestinian factions are not interested in reaching an understanding with the Lebanese state. There is no barter process, but the Palestinians are committed to obtaining human rights.”

Thomas Barrack, US envoy to Lebanon and Syria, praised the Palestinian weapons handover on Thursday night, describing it as a “bold measure and a historic step toward unity and stability.”

The previous night, Lebanese Army Intelligence, in a targeted security operation inside the Phoenicia Intercontinental Hotel in Beirut, arrested Shadi Mahmoud Mustafa Al-Far, a former Fatah official in the Burj Al-Barajneh camp.

While it remains unclear if the operation was linked to the weapons surrender on Thursday, a Palestinian security source said Al-Far had been dismissed from Fatah more than two months ago for violating the movement’s organizational decisions.

A Lebanese security source confirmed that Al-Far is “pursued by several Lebanese judicial warrants.”

Another Palestinian political source, who declined to be named, described the weapons handover in Burj Al-Barajneh camp as a “step in the right direction.”

The source added: “There is a need to dismantle networks that have emerged over 50 years, intersecting arms and drug trafficking, and implicated in major corruption operations.”

The weapons handover in the camp comes two days after a delegation from the Palestinian Liaison Committee with the Lebanese side, including Yasser Abbas, held talks decision-makers in Lebanon, including political officials and officers in the Lebanese Army Command, the Palestinian source said.

“The delegation’s most prominent meeting was with Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, an ally of Hezbollah, who is negotiating on behalf of the party with the US side regarding the implementation of the ceasefire agreement,” the source said.