Assad targets Palestinian refugees - Arab News
Earlier today, several lizards posted reports from Western wire services that some 50% of Palestinian refugees were fleeing a refugee camp in Latakia, Syria as a result of attacks by Syrian military forces on that city. As I noted in a posting to one of the articles, the AP story raised questions about why attacks on the city , generally, would prompt half of the residents of a Palestinian refugee camp to flee. Apparently, one has to read Middle Eastern news sources in order to get a more complete picture. As the following report posted in Arab News, an English language daily based in Saudi Arabia, indicates, the flight of Palestinian refugees resulted from the fact that Syrian forces specifically targeted the refugee camp:
BEIRUT: More than 5,000 Palestinian refugees have fled a camp in the besieged Syrian city of Latakia after President Bashar Assad’s forces shelled the city during a broad military assault to root out dissent, the UN said Monday.
UNRWA, the UN agency that aids Palestinian refugees, said the Palestinians fled after Latakia came under fire from gunboats cruising off the coast and ground troops attacking the city over the weekend. It was not immediately clear where the refugees were seeking shelter.
“We are calling for access to the camp to find out what is going on,” said UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness. “There were 10,000 refugees in the camp and we need to find out what is happening to them.”
Palestine Liberation Organization Secretary-General Yasser Abed Rabbo denounced the attack on the Ramel camp and said such violence was “part of the crimes against humanity” targeting Palestinians and Syrians alike.
The Local Coordination Committees, an activist group that helps organize protests in Syria, also confirmed troops fired at fleeing families. It said random gunfire erupted Monday in addition to a campaign of raids and house-to-house arrests.
Troops later entered small neighborhoods in the Ramel Palestinian refugee camp, warning people to leave or risk their houses being destroyed, the LCC said. A witness said security forces were rounding up young men in the area and detaining them in a sports stadium nearby.
Amateur videos posted online by activists showed smoke rising from Ramel, the crackle of heavy gunfire and people shouting, “Allah-o-Akbar!”
Apparently, the AP didn’t think its readers and the readers of media outlets that publish AP articles were worty of knowing this information.