Zionist massacre in sabra and shatil. Sabra and Shatila: The story of one provocation

The inability of the Arabs to resist Israel's military power pushes them to search for "alternative" ways to fight the Jewish state. Today the humanitarian card is being played; they are trying to impose on Israel the image of some kind of monster tormenting the “white and fluffy” Palestinians.
The Arabs place particular importance on provoking international pressure on Israel, suggesting that only this can force Israel to make concessions. To provoke pressure on Israel, the enemy often carries out mass murder of its own compatriots, trying to blame these crimes on Israel.

In September 1982 Christian militants from the Lebanese Phalanges, led by pro-Syrian agents, massacred several hundred Palestinians, Pakistanis, and Algerians in two Muslim districts of the Lebanese capital Beirut - Sabra and Shatila. The Arabs used this provocation to accuse Israel of genocide. The provocation then worked - under powerful international pressure, Israel withdrew its troops from Beirut.

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Alexander Shulman
The story of one provocation: Sabra and Shatila

The entire history of the Arab-Israeli wars clearly shows the inability of the Arabs to resist the military power of Israel. The feeling of their weakness has deeply entered the consciousness of the Arabs and therefore, in order to achieve their goals, they are trying to use international pressure on Israel as the only way to force it to make concessions. To provoke pressure on Israel, the enemy often carries out mass murders of his own compatriots, trying to blame Israel for these crimes.

Perhaps the most famous of these bloody provocations was the September 1982 massacre in Sabra and Shatila, two Muslim neighborhoods in the Lebanese capital Beirut, inhabited by Palestinians and citizens of Islamic and Arab states. The massacres were carried out by Christian militants from the Lebanese Phalanges, operating under the control of pro-Syrian agents, but this incident became the reason for unleashing a powerful anti-Israeli propaganda campaign and pressure on Israel.

Lebanon War.1982

At the end of the 70s. Northern Israel has become the target of continuous terrorist attacks by Palestinians. Palestinian terrorists who infiltrated from Lebanon carried out large-scale terrorist attacks in Israel - the taking of hostages and the murder of 21 schoolchildren in Maalot, an attack on bus passengers on the Tel Aviv-Haifa highway, which led to the murder of 38 Israelis.

From Lebanese territory, the Palestinians, using Katyusha rocket launchers received from the USSR, conducted continuous shelling of the northern regions of Israel.

The last reason for a large-scale military operation against terrorist bases was the terrorist attack carried out by Palestinians in London on June 2, 1982, the victim of which was the Israeli Ambassador to Great Britain, Shlomo Argov.

Israel was not going to tolerate the rampant Palestinian terror. “Shlom HaGalil” (Peace to Galilee) is how the IDF General Staff called the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, which began on June 6, 1982.

On the Lebanese border, Israel concentrated 11 armored and motorized infantry divisions, united into three army corps. Each corps was assigned its own area of responsibility or direction:
The western direction was commanded by Lieutenant General Yekutiel Adam,
The central direction is Lieutenant General Uri Simkhoni,
Eastern direction - Lieutenant General Janusz Ben-Gal.
In addition, two divisions under the command of Lieutenant General Moshe Bar Kokhb were deployed to the Golan Heights, in the immediate vicinity of Damascus. The armored divisions included 1,200 tanks. Overall command of the operation was entrusted to the Chief of the General Staff, Colonel General R. Eitan, and the commander of the Northern Military District, Lieutenant General A. Drori.

According to the combat plans, Israeli troops were supposed to completely eliminate Palestinian terrorist groups in southern Lebanon, and then, advancing towards the capital of Lebanon - Beirut, cut the strategically important Beirut-Damascus road, encircle parts of the Syrian army in the Bekaa Valley and in northern Lebanon, after which all these the surrounded groups of Syrian troops and Palestinian terrorists had to be destroyed one by one.

Operation Peace to Galilee began on June 6, 1982. Israeli troops, supported by powerful air strikes, invaded southern Lebanon and began advancing towards Beirut, destroying Palestinian terrorist groups along the way. The offensive took place on a front of 100 kilometers. Initially, 4 divisions were introduced into Lebanese territory; in subsequent days, additional divisions were introduced. An amphibious assault was landed on the Lebanese sea coast from Israeli Navy ships, cutting off the escape routes of Palestinian terrorists

Already in the first days, the Israeli Air Force seized air supremacy: during the air battle on June 9-11, 1982, the largest since World War II, the air defense system of the Syrian army created by the Russian military was destroyed, about 100 Syrian MiGs were shot down in air battles

Already June 13, 1982 Israeli tank and motorized infantry divisions entered the capital of Lebanon - Beirut and encircled Palestinian and Syrian formations in the western part of the city.

Blocked areas of the city were subjected to continuous air and artillery strikes. Finally, at midnight on August 12, 1982. The leader of Palestinian terrorists, Arafat, capitulated. According to the surrender agreement, Arafat and a handful of henchmen were guaranteed escape from Lebanon, but the mass of Palestinian terrorists scattered among the population of the Muslim areas of Beirut.

The encircled capital of Lebanon, the city of Beirut, is burning under Israeli air and artillery attacks. 1982

The Israeli army invades Lebanon. Lebanon War, 1982

To control the surrender of Palestinian gangs, the Israeli military command allowed on August 21, 1982. entry into West Beirut of “multinational forces” from the USA, France and Italy (5,400 people in total). Already at the beginning of September, the expulsion of Palestinians and Syrians ended on September 3, 1982. The "multinational force" was withdrawn from Beirut.

Israel's military victory in Lebanon opened up prospects for the creation of a pro-Israeli Christian state in Lebanon. It must be said that plans to create a Christian state in Lebanon were discussed in Israel even under Ben Gurion, and secret contacts with the leadership of the Christian community of Lebanon had a long history.

Lebanon: Palestinians massacre Christians

Lebanon is characterized by centuries-old hostility between its communities on ethnic and religious grounds. The clashes reached a particularly wide scale during the civil war in Lebanon, which began in 1975. As is customary in the Arab world, the warring parties - armed formations of local ethnic and religious communities - mercilessly slaughtered each other. The number of victims of the civil war in Lebanon exceeded 100 thousand people, and Christians there suffered especially heavy losses.

The director of the Lebanese Peace Foundation, Christian Nagi Nayjar, writes:
“Yasser Arafat and his thugs committed crimes against Lebanese Christians, which, by the way, were practically not covered by the international press.

Dozens of civilians, mostly Christians, were tortured and killed in the northern Lebanese town of Chekka. On January 20, 1976, Palestinians from the Yarmouh Brigade entered the city of Damour, located south of Beirut.

Within a few hours, the Palestinians massacred almost all the Christian inhabitants of this city. Hundreds of civilians in the Christian towns of Hadat, Ain El-Remmane, Jisr El-Basra, Dekaune, Beirut and southern Metn were killed in daily attacks by the PLO under Arafat.

Arafat's actions in Lebanon can only be described as barbaric. Christians had their heads cut off, young girls were raped, children and their parents were killed right in the streets. Palestinians attacked Christians without distinguishing between men and women, adults and children. They considered all Christians their enemies and killed them, regardless of age and gender."

Details of the massacres of Christians by Palestinians in Lebanon are given in the article Massacre of Lebanese Christians in the city of Damour (1976)

However, Lebanese Christians were not distinguished by pacifism. Christian militias slaughtered the population of the Palestinian camps of Quarantine (January 1976) and Tel Zaatar (August 1976).

It should be noted that the Christian world calmly watched the Arabs exterminate their co-religionists in Lebanon. Christian countries and the Vatican, fearing the reaction of the Arabs, never came to their aid, and the media simply hushed up the genocide of Lebanese Christians.

The USSR stood behind the Arabs

At a time when Palestinian militants were slaughtering Christians in Lebanon, the USSR was in complete control of the actions of its Palestinian charges. The Russians took over the weapons, training and political cover of the terrorists.

The Kremlin hoped, with the help of Arafat, to expand its influence in the Arab world, which had been greatly shaken after the total defeat of the USSR satellites - Syria and Egypt in the wars of 1967 and 1973, and therefore did not skimp: a flow of Russian weapons was coming to the Palestinians: tanks, artillery, portable missiles, weapon.

Israeli troops, advancing in Lebanon, captured huge arsenals of Russian weapons supplied to the Palestinians. According to the German magazine Der Spiegel, the Russian weapons received by the Palestinians would be enough to arm an army of 500,000.

The training of Palestinian militants took place in the USSR: at the 165th Training Center for the Training of Foreign Military Personnel (UC-165) of the General Staff in Crimea, at the Higher Officer Courses “Vystrel” in Solnechnogorsk near Moscow, KGB and GRU sabotage schools near Moscow (in Balashikha), Nikolaev (Privolnoe village), Orenburg (Totsky camps), in the Turkmen city of Mary. Thousands of Palestinian terrorists trained there.

Behind the Palestinians stood the Syrian army, fully equipped with Russian weapons and controlled by thousands of Russian “military advisers,” led by Colonel General G. Yashkin. Thousands of Russian tanks and planes
The USSR handed over to the Syrians in accordance with the 1980 Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation between the USSR and Syria. Syrian troops under the command of Russian “military advisers” occupied strategically important areas of Lebanon

There were continuously high-ranking Russian representatives in Syria and Lebanon who exercised direct control over Palestinian militants. Among them it is worth noting the head of the Main Directorate, first deputy chief of the General Staff of the USSR Armed Forces, General V. Varennikov, in the near future - a member of the State Emergency Committee and a permanent deputy from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation in the State Duma of Russia.

Along with military training and arming of Palestinian terrorists, the USSR provided their diplomatic cover. In 1975, just when the Russian-controlled Palestinians were slaughtering Lebanese Christians, the USSR, relying on an obedient bloc of Afro-Asian countries, achieved the adoption by the UN General Assembly of a resolution condemning Zionism (this shameful resolution was canceled by the UN immediately after the self-liquidation of the USSR in 1991 year).
Israeli representative Chaim Herzog then tore up the resolution, saying: "Hitler would have felt at home...being present at this meeting."

Israel saved Lebanese Christians from Islamic genocide

The only country that extended a helping hand to Lebanese Christians was Israel.

In December 1975 Christian Lebanese Army major Saad Haddad approached the Israeli authorities, asking for assistance to the Christian population of southern Lebanon, and in January 1976. A stream of Israeli military and humanitarian aid to Lebanese Christians poured across the Israeli-Lebanese border.

The LLA was under the control of Israeli officers; the maintenance and arming of this military formation of Lebanese Christians was carried out by Israel. In the ALA, along with Christians, many Shiite Muslims (2 battalions) and Druze (1 battalion) served. After Haddad's death in 1984. The LLA was headed by Lebanese Army General Christian Antoine Lahad. Both Haddad and Lahad were labeled "traitors and Israeli agents" by the pro-Syrian Lebanese government.

Lebanese Army Major Christian Saad Haddad, who led the Israeli-controlled South Lebanon Army.

Soldiers of the Army of South Lebanon - in Israeli uniforms, with captured Russian weapons, also provided by Israel.

An Israeli general (in a red paratrooper's beret) at the base of Christian formations in South Lebanon. To his left is the Lebanese Christian major Saad Haddad, "commander of the Army of South Lebanon" (early 80s)

Israel had close contacts with the Lebanese Christian leadership. Israeli leaders have repeatedly secretly visited Christian areas of Lebanon. In January 1982 Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon secretly visited Lebanon. He met with Kamil Chamoun (former Lebanese President) and Lebanese Forces commander Bashir Gemayel. Sharon made it clear that the result of the Israeli army's invasion of Lebanon should be the creation there of a Christian government friendly to Israel, headed by Israel seeing Bashir Gemayel.

Soon, Bashir Gemayel secretly arrived in Israel, where he met with Prime Minister Menachem Begin in the city of Nahariya. The Lebanese President arrived there on an Israeli military helicopter. The meeting discussed the signing of a peace treaty between Israel and Lebanon. Bashir Gemayel said that Begin "is a great politician and that the Christians of Lebanon will never forget what he, Menachem Begin, and the state of Israel did for them."

Sabra and Shatila

Such a provocation was the murder of the newly elected Lebanese President, Christian Bashir Gemayel, on September 14, 1982. As is known, on September 14, 1982, Gemayel and 26 other people were killed by a bomb explosion at the headquarters of the Kataib party. The perpetrator of the murder was a member of the Syrian Social National Party of Lebanon, Habib Shartouni, who was an agent of the Syrian intelligence services

Lebanese President is Christian Bashir Gemayel. Killed in a terrorist attack organized by pro-Syrian agents on September 14, 1982. I was hoping to sign a friendship treaty with Israel.

After the assassination of the president, events in Lebanon take on a new dynamic. The next day, September 15, Israel sent its troops into the Muslim part of Beirut. The purpose of this action was to maintain order, suppress possible unrest and clear the territory of the many Palestinian militants hiding there after Arafat's flight.

The Christian armed forces, known as the Lebanese Phalanxes, occupied the eastern part of Beirut, so the Israeli command allowed the Christian Lebanese Phalanxes to participate in this operation.

The commander of the 96th motorized infantry division of the Israeli army, Major General Amos Yaron, in whose operational zone the territory of the Palestinian camps of Sabra and Shatila was located, instructed the commanders of the “Lebanese Phalanges” - the Phalangists were to arrest hiding terrorists and suppress possible pockets of resistance, while the Phalangists were prohibited cause harm to civilians.

The commander of the Phalangists in Sabra and Shatila was Eli Hobeika, whose connections with Syrian intelligence are considered proven - he later became a minister in the pro-Syrian government of Lebanon. As Robert Hatam, who was at that time the head of counterintelligence of the Lebanese Phalanges, said in an interview with the Yediot Ahronot newspaper, for the leader of the Phalangists, Eli Hobeika, the entry of the Phalangists into Sabra and Shatila had two goals: - to avenge the death of Bashir Jumayel, and - to frame the Israelis, and above all Sharon personally.

Lebanese Phalanx commander Eli Hobeika bears full responsibility for the massacre carried out by Christian militants in Sabra and Shatila. 20 years later, in January 2002, Eli Khubeika died as a result of the explosion of his own car.

On September 16, 1982, at 6 pm, up to 150 militants from the Lebanese Phalanx organization, led by Eli Hobeika, entered the territory of Sabra and Shatila. Christian Phalangists were armed with small arms, knives and axes. Robert Khatam claims that there were no executions of civilians in Sabra and Shatila - there was a battle, the Phalangists also had losses, but from the moment they entered, the Phalangists shot at everything that moved, many of them swallowed drugs and acted “high.” In addition, the camps consisted mainly of tin barracks - bullets and shrapnel could penetrate several of them, hitting those inside along the way.

In Sabra and Shatila, Christian Phalangists killed, according to various estimates, from 450 to 2,750 people. The exact number of those killed is still unknown. The overwhelming number of those killed were men of military age and older. Among them were not only Palestinians, but also Algerians, Pakistanis and people from other countries. According to the CIA, there were 670 PLO officers in the Sabra, Shatila and Burj el-Burejne camps. Most of the killed and captured terrorists were found with IDs issued in Soviet training camps.

As soon as the military intelligence of the 96th Infantry Division became aware of what was happening on the territory of Sabra and Shatila, Israeli military units were immediately introduced there, stopping the massacre and thereby saving the lives of thousands of their inhabitants

However, the provocation worked - the Arabs blamed Israel, not Christians, for the massacres in Sabra and Shatila. Powerful international pressure forced the Israeli command on September 20, 1982. withdraw troops from West Beirut, international forces were reintroduced there (U.S., French and Italian units were later joined by British units). Control of the city passed to foreign troops

Alexander Shulman
The story of one provocation: Sabra and Shatila

Perhaps the most famous of these bloody provocations was the September 1982 massacre in Sabra and Shatila, two Muslim neighborhoods in the Lebanese capital Beirut, inhabited by Palestinians and citizens of Islamic and Arab states. The massacres were carried out by Christian Arabs from the Lebanese Phalanges, operating under the control of pro-Syrian agents, but this incident became the reason for unleashing a powerful anti-Israeli propaganda campaign and pressure on Israel.

Lebanon War.1982

From Lebanese territory, the Palestinians, using Katyusha rocket launchers received from the USSR, conducted continuous shelling of the northern regions of Israel.

Already June 13, 1982 Israeli tank and motorized infantry divisions entered the capital of Lebanon - Beirut and encircled Palestinian and Syrian formations in the western part of the city.

The encircled capital of Lebanon, the city of Beirut, is burning under Israeli air and artillery attacks. 1982

The Israeli army invades Lebanon. Lebanon War, 1982

Lebanon: Palestinians massacre Christians

Details of the massacres of Christians by Palestinians in Lebanon are given in the article Massacre of Lebanese Christians in the city of Damour (1976)

However, Lebanese Christians were not distinguished by pacifism. Christian militias slaughtered the population of the Palestinian camps of Quarantine (January 1976) and Tel Zaatar (August 1976).

The USSR stood behind the "Palestinians"

Israel saved Lebanese Christians from Islamic genocide

The only country that extended a helping hand to Lebanese Christians was Israel.

Lebanese Army Major Christian Saad Haddad, who led the Israeli-controlled South Lebanon Army.

Soldiers of the Army of South Lebanon - in Israeli uniforms, with captured Russian weapons, also provided by Israel.

Sabra and Shatila

Lebanese President is Christian Bashir Gemayel. Killed in a terrorist attack organized by pro-Syrian agents on September 14, 1982. I was hoping to sign a friendship treaty with Israel.

The Christian armed forces, known as the Lebanese Phalanxes, occupied the eastern part of Beirut, so the Israeli command allowed the Christian Lebanese Phalanxes to participate in this operation.

The inability of the Arabs to resist the military power of Israel pushes them to search for
"alternative" ways to fight the Jewish state. The Arabs attach particular importance to provoking international pressure on Israel, suggesting that only this can force Israel to make concessions.

In September 1982 In Beirut, Christian militants from the Lebanese Phalanges, led by pro-Syrian agents, massacred several hundred Palestinians, Pakistanis, and Algerians in two Muslim areas - Sabra and Shatila. The Arabs used this provocation to accuse Israel of genocide. The provocation then worked - under powerful international pressure, Israel withdrew its troops from Beirut.

Subsequently, a similar technique was successfully used by Islamists in Kosovo, but Arafat, who tried to follow the beaten path during
the intifada he unleashed, he lost - Israel did not allow the Arabs to play on the “humanitarian” field they so loved, which resulted in the suppression of the Palestinian uprising.

The facts of the events of that time are well known. Started June 6, 1982 The Israeli invasion of Lebanon, Operation Peace of Galilee, was aimed at destroying the bases of Palestinian terrorists and Syrians in Lebanon. Already June 13, 1982 Israeli tank and motorized infantry divisions entered the capital of Lebanon - Beirut and encircled Palestinian and Syrian formations in the western part of the city. Blocked areas of the city were subjected to continuous air and artillery strikes. Finally, at midnight on August 12, 1982. The leader of Palestinian terrorists, Arafat, capitulated. According to the surrender agreement, Arafat and a handful of henchmen were guaranteed escape from Lebanon, but the mass of Palestinian terrorists scattered among the population of the Muslim areas of Beirut.

The director of the Lebanese Peace Foundation, Christian Nagi Nayjar, writes: “Yasser Arafat and his thugs committed crimes against Lebanese Christians, which, by the way, were practically not covered by the international press.
Dozens of civilians, mostly Christians, were tortured and killed in the northern Lebanese town of Chekka. On January 20, 1976, Palestinians from the Yarmouh Brigade entered the city of Damour, located south of Beirut. Within a few hours, the Palestinians massacred almost all the Christian inhabitants of this city. Hundreds of civilians in the Christian towns of Hadath, Ain El-Remma-neh, Jizr El-Basra, Dekaune, Beirut and southern Metn were killed in daily attacks by the PLO under Arafat.
Arafat's actions in Lebanon can only be described as barbaric. Christians had their heads cut off, young girls were raped, children and their parents were killed right in the streets. Palestinians attacked Christians without distinguishing between men and women, adults and children. They considered all Christians their enemies and killed them, regardless of age and gender."

However, Lebanese Christians were not distinguished by pacifism. Christian militias slaughtered the population of the Palestinian camps of Quarantine (January 1976) and Tel Zaatar (August 1976).

In March 1978 - in response to the actions of Palestinian terrorists, the Israeli army carries out Operation Litani and occupies southern Lebanon. In June of the same year, Israel withdrew its troops from Lebanon, handing over control of the border strip to Christian militia led by Major Saad Haddad. Major Haddad and 400 Lebanese Christian soldiers formed the backbone of the South Lebanon Army (SLA) (called the Free Lebanon Army until 1980). The LLA was under the control of Israeli officers; the maintenance and arming of this military formation of Lebanese Christians was carried out by Israel. In the ALA, along with Christians, many Shiite Muslims (2 battalions) and Druze (1 battalion) served. After Haddad's death in 1984. The LLA was headed by Lebanese Army General Christian Antoine Lahad. Both Haddad and Lahad were labeled "traitors and Israeli agents" by the pro-Syrian Lebanese government.

Lebanese Army Major Christian Saad Haddad, who led the Israeli-controlled South Lebanon Army.

Soldiers of the Army of South Lebanon - in Israeli uniforms, with captured Soviet weapons, also provided by Israel.

Israeli invasion of Lebanon in June 1982 actually saved Lebanese Christians from genocide. Israeli plans to create a Christian state friendly to Israel in Lebanon were close to fruition. On August 23, Lebanon held presidential elections, which were won by Israeli-approved candidate Bashir Gemayel. Soon, Bashir Gemayel secretly arrived in Israel, where he met with Prime Minister Menachem Begin in the city of Nahariya. The Lebanese President arrived there on an Israeli military helicopter. The meeting discussed the signing of a peace treaty between Israel and Lebanon. Bashir Gemayel said that Begin "is a great politician and that the Christians of Lebanon will never forget what he, Menachem Begin, and the state of Israel did for them."

This development of events caused fear and despair among the Arabs - the Arabs could not accept the appearance of a Christian state in Lebanon, but they were unable to resist Israel's plans on the battlefield. Only a major provocation could dramatically change the status quo in Lebanon. Such a provocation was the murder on September 14, 1982 of the newly elected Lebanese President, Christian Bashir Gemayel, by a bomb allegedly planted in his office by a pro-Syrian militant.

Lebanese President is Christian Bashir Gemayel. Killed in a terrorist attack organized by pro-Syrian agents on September 14, 1982. I was hoping to sign a friendship treaty with Israel.

After the assassination of the president, events in Lebanon take on a new dynamic. The next day, September 15, Israel sent its troops into the Muslim part of Beirut. The purpose of this action was to suppress possible unrest and clear the territory of many Palestinian militants hiding there after Arafat's flight.

The Israeli command allowed the Christian formations "Lebanese Phalanx" to participate in this operation. There was nothing unusual about this - the Israeli command had repeatedly engaged them in the past to carry out similar purges. The commander of the 96th division of the Israeli army, Major General Amos Yaron, in whose zone of occupation was the territory of the Palestinian camps of Sabra and Shatila, instructed the commanders of the “Lebanese Phalanges” - the Phalangists were to arrest hiding terrorists and suppress possible pockets of resistance, while the Phalangists were forbidden to inflict damage to civilians.

It is important to note that the Lebanese Phalanges, unlike the Army of South Lebanon, were not controlled by the Israeli military command; pro-Syrian agents played a prominent role in the leadership of the Lebanese Phalanges. The commander of the Phalangists in Sabra and Shatila was Eli Hobeika, whose connections with Syrian intelligence are considered proven - he later became a minister in the pro-Syrian government of Lebanon. As Robert Hatam, who was at that time the head of counterintelligence of the Lebanese Phalanges, said in an interview with the Yediot Ahronot newspaper, for the leader of the Phalangists, Eli Hobeika, the entry of the Phalangists into Sabra and Shatila had two goals: - to avenge the death of Bashir Jumayel, and - to frame the Israelis, and above all Sharon personally.
The commander of the Lebanese Phalanges, Eli Hobeika, bears full responsibility for the actions of the Phalangists in Sabra and Shatila. 20 years later, in January 2002, Eli Khubeika died as a result of the explosion of his own car.

The provocation worked - the Arabs accused Israel of massacres in Sabra and Shatila. Powerful international pressure forced the Israeli command on September 20, 1982. withdraw troops from West Beirut, international forces were reintroduced there (U.S., French and Italian units were later joined by British units). Control of the city passed to foreign troops

Christian Maronite Phalange Party (Kataib), since the 1950s. had representation in parliament. In response to the strengthening of the PLO in Lebanon, back in 1967 it created military camps of the Christian militia, which later transformed into the Lebanese Forces LF, numbering up to 20,000 people, of which 3,000 were career military personnel. Under the leadership of Bashir Gemael, the LS became a powerful army. In the civil war until 1982, the LS united the forces of the entire Lebanese Christian Front. At the time of the events, they were commanded by Elie Hobeika, who would later become a parliamentarian and then a minister of the Lebanese government cabinet.

Occasion

A number of publications report that the reason for the massacre was revenge for the massacre of civilians in the Christian city of Damour, carried out by troops of the Palestine Liberation Organization and their allies in 1976. , as well as for the murder of Bashir Gemayel.

Historical background

Background

Lebanese Civil War

Lebanon, which was in a state of civil war, was partially occupied by Syrian troops, who moved the camps of the PLO militants, with whom the Syrians fought at the first stage of the war, to the southern part of Lebanon - to the border with Israel.

Lebanon War (1982)

On September 1, 1982, the armed forces of the PLO freely left Lebanon within the framework of the agreements.

09/14/1982, the Lebanese President, Christian Bashir Gemayel, a popular politician, a supporter of the union with Israel, and with him 26 other people, were killed during the explosion of the house in which they were located. The first natural assumption of the Phalangists was that the crime was committed by members of the PLO, although it later turned out that it was done by a Lebanese Christian, a member of the Syrian National Party.

“After the assassination of the newly elected President Bashir Gemayel, we decided to bring the IDF into West Beirut in order to prevent Christians from taking revenge on the Muslim population.”

Original text(English)

After the September 14 assassination of president-elect Bashir Jemayel we decided to move the IDF into West Beirut to prevent a Christian revenge on the Muslim population.

Historian Mikhail Shterenshis notes that the number of PLO combat members who remained here to carry out subversive work ranged from 2,000 to 2,500 people. Instead, ordinary citizens were taken to Tunisia, “made up” to look like thugs.

Sabra and Shatila camps

The Sabra and Shatila camps were formed after part of the Arab population of Palestine ended up in Lebanon as a result of the Arab-Israeli War (1947-1949). After the war, Israel requisitioned the lands and homes of the refugees and prohibited them from returning to Israeli territory, as Arab countries at that time liquidated the Jewish communities on their territory, who had lived there for thousands of years, expelling the Jews and taking away all their property.

Jewish refugees mostly settled in Israel, where they were comfortable. But the Lebanese government refused to grant Arab refugees citizenship and limited their rights. The socio-economic conditions of their living were and remain extremely low. According to Franklin Lamb, head of the Sabra Shatila Foundation, in 2009, Sabra and Shatila are the poorest of the world's 59 Palestinian refugee camps and even poorer than the Gaza Strip camps, with an unemployment rate of over 40%.

Najjar also states that the Sabra and Shatila massacres "were not a mistake, but represented the failure of the Christian community to continue to tolerate extermination and systematic genocide." He's writing:

Arafat's actions in Lebanon can only be described as barbaric. Christians had their heads cut off, young girls were raped, children and their parents were killed right in the streets. Palestinians attacked Christians without distinguishing between men and women, adults and children. They considered all Christians their enemies and killed them, regardless of age and gender.

According to A. Klein, there is reason to believe that in September 1982, Mohammad Safadi, one of the three Black September terrorists who participated in and survived the terrorist attack at the Munich Olympics in 1972, was killed in the Sabra and Shatila camps.

Phalangists

The Phalangists belonged to the nationalist Lebanese Christian party "Lebanese Phalanges", founded in 1936 by Pierre Gemayel. The party played a significant role in the country's politics, adhering to a pro-Western course.

On April 13, 1975, in response to the assassination attempt on their leader Pierre Gemayel by unknown assailants, who were suspected of being Palestinian militants, the Phalangists shot at a bus with 26 Palestinians. These two incidents started the long-running Lebanese Civil War. In 1980, an assassination attempt was made on Pierre's son, Bachir Gemayel, commander of the united Christian militia Lebanese Forces, killing eight people, including his 18-month-old daughter Maya.

Since the beginning of the Lebanese civil war, Israel has established close ties with the Phalangists and supplied them with weapons, uniforms and other materials. The Mossad was responsible for communication with the Phalangists.

In 1982, the Phalangists warmly supported the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, however, they refused to take part in the hostilities. In an interview with Israeli television, the head of the Phalangist party, Pierre Gemayel, when asked why the Phalangists remain on the sidelines when the Israeli army is fighting with Palestinian militants, said that they do not want to become strangers in the Arab world. At the same time, the Lebanese nationalist organization Guardians of the Cedar, led by its leader Etienne Sacre, openly sided with the Israelis.

During the offensive in the south of the country, Israeli troops were warmly welcomed by both Christian and Muslim populations, tired of constant abuse by Palestinian paramilitary organizations.

According to the Kahan Commission, IDF Chief of Staff Rafael Eitan gave direct orders to the Phalangists to refrain from participating in battles because he feared that they would take revenge on civilians. The Phalangist leadership believed that Palestinian refugees jeopardized the position of Christians in Lebanon (from a political and demographic point of view) and advocated their expulsion from the country, including by violent means.

Following the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, the Phalangists wore Israeli military uniforms with an emblem including the inscription "Ketaib Lubnaniyeh" and an image of a cedar tree.

Opinions about the presence of PLO fighters in Sabra and Shatilla

Although, according to PLO statements, its fighters completely left Beirut two weeks before the massacre, in accordance with the agreements, it is known for certain that on the day of the operation there were a number of armed people from the Palestinian and Lebanese-Muslim sides in the camps.

Israeli author V. Mostovoy claims that “according to the CIA, 670 PLO officers with weapons, including Soviet-made RPG anti-tank missiles, remained in the Sabra, Shatila and Burj el-Burejne camps.” The same information is provided by Israeli journalist Alexander Shulman.

Information about the presence of well-camouflaged underground fortifications in Sabra and Shatila and PLO militants hiding in them was also confirmed by the well-known international terrorist Ilyich Ramirez Sanchez, a PLO ally who has repeatedly visited these camps:

In Shatila, the underground shelters were not discovered by the Lebanese forces, and the Popular Front fighters in Shatila survived the massacre... They were in Shatila, they were underground. This did not happen in Sabra, and quite a lot of people were actually killed there.

Original text(Spanish)

En Chatila, las fuerzas libanesas no descubrieron los subterraneos y los combatientes del Frente popular de Chatila sobrevivieron a la masacre... Estaban en Chatila, estaban enterrados. En Sabra no habia eso y all so mataron a unos cuantos

The Israeli Kahan Commission, which investigated the events in Sabra and Shatila, confirmed the presence of militants in the camps. The commission's report states that "according to information from various sources, the terrorists did not fulfill their obligations to evacuate all their forces from West Beirut and hand over their weapons to the Lebanese army, but left there, according to various estimates, approximately 2,000 fighters, as well as many weapons depots." The report says that in addition to them, in West Beirut there were about 7,000 members of the left-wing militia "Mourabitoun", allies of the PLO, whose evacuation the agreement did not provide for.

Other sources rule out that there were PLO fighters in the camps and suggest that claims about their existence are an Israeli invention. According to Palestinian witnesses and individual journalists, a small and poorly armed group of Palestinians and Lebanese tried to defend the camps. However, if these were PLO militants, then they were still in the camps, contrary to the signed agreement on the withdrawal of all PLO forces from Beirut.

Course of events

September 15th At 6:00 the Israeli army entered West Beirut. According to Kahan's report, at first there was no armed resistance, but within a few hours fighting broke out with armed militants in the city. As a result, three Israeli soldiers were killed and more than a hundred were wounded.

During the encirclement and blocking of the Sabra and Shatila neighborhoods, heavy fire was opened from the eastern part of Shatila. One Israeli soldier was killed and twenty wounded. During that day and, to a lesser extent, September 16-17, the IDF command post and troops surrounding both camps were repeatedly hit by RPGs and small arms fire from Sabra and Shatila. The Israelis responded with artillery fire.

However, Israeli historian Benny Morris writes that the IDF in West Beirut "met virtually no resistance" since Syrian army and PLO units had left the city a month earlier.

Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon and IDF Chief of General Staff Rafael Eitan decided to use the Phalangists to clear Palestinian refugee camps of terrorists supposedly located there. The use of the Phalangists was explained, among other things, by the desire to reduce IDF losses in Lebanon, the desire to meet public opinion in Israel, dissatisfied with the fact that the Phalangists were only “reaping the benefits” of the war without taking part in it, as well as the opportunity to use their professionalism in identifying terrorists and weapons caches.

After the entry of Israeli troops into West Beirut, Sharon, Eitan and the Phalangist leadership discussed the details of the operation, which was codenamed “The Iron Mind”.

Robert Maroun Hatem, then chief of security for Hobeik (the Phalangist leader), wrote a controversial (below) unofficial biography of his chief, From Israel to Damascus, in 1999, which was banned in Lebanon. In it he notes:

“On the afternoon of September 16, 1982, before the Lebanese military entered the refugee camps, “Sharon gave clear instructions to Hobeika to take the necessary measures to keep his people within the law.” Despite this, Hobeika gave his order: “Complete extermination... The camps must be wiped out [from the face of the earth].”

The Ynetnews information portal confirms:

“During the meeting, IDF representatives emphasized that civilians should not be harmed.”

16 of September at 6 pm, in accordance with the plan, Phalangist detachments with a total number of 200 people entered the Sabra and Shatila neighborhoods with the aim of “cleaning up the PLO terrorists.” Israeli soldiers initially maintained a cordon and fired flares while remaining outside.

According to Morris, the firefight between the Phalangists and Palestinian militants died down almost immediately after the Christian militia entered the camp - at 6 pm. The Phalangists split into small detachments and moved from house to house, killing residents. The massacre continued without interruption for almost 30 hours. Many camp residents slept the night the massacre began, unaware of what was happening. The sounds of gunfire did not frighten them, as they had become familiar in the previous days.

According to Richard Curtis[ ], soon reports began to arrive about a massacre taking place in the camp. On the second day, the Phalangists broke into the Akka hospital, located inside the camps, and began to kill the patients there, raped and killed two nurses and violated their corpses (Curtis). Then, the camp residents were taken to a stadium located nearby. According to Palestinian accounts, upon arrival there, the men were told to crawl on the ground, and those who crawled quickly were killed on the spot because this could indicate that they were militants (Pean).

September 17 Two Israeli journalists independently requested comments from Yitzhak Shamir and Sharon regarding the incoming reports of the massacre of civilians, but received no response. Israeli journalist Ze'ev Schiff tried to obtain relevant information through Minister Tzipori, but to no avail.

The Phalangists remained in Sabra and Shatila until 8 am September 18. At 9 a.m. that day, Israeli and foreign journalists who entered the camp discovered hundreds of bodies there.

An unknown number of unidentified corpses were buried by the Phalangists using bulldozers in ditches in a vacant lot in the southern part of the camps.

Accusations against Israel - IDF and Shin Bet

3. Pierre Péan from the newspaper Le Monde writes:

“According to Palestinian accounts, Israeli soldiers took part in arrests, robberies, beatings and executions in the immediate vicinity of and inside the camps. According to the same evidence, some of the men, children and male teenagers arrested by the Israelis were later killed."

Example of evidence:

“... I don’t know if they spoke Hebrew, but I’m sure that they were Israelis, since they wore a uniform different from the Lebanese one and did not know Arabic.”

Original text(English)

They didn’t wear the same uniforms as the Lebanese Forces and didn’t speak Arabic. I don’t know whether they were speaking Hebrew, but I am sure they were Israelis.

4. Robert Fisk of the Independent newspaper cites testimony from several Palestinian women from the Sabra and Shatila camps that Palestinian men whom the Israelis picked up for interrogation disappeared without a trace and forever. The Israelis, according to Palestinian witnesses, took them from the exit of the camp and from the stadium, where the Phalangists and IDF soldiers herded the camp residents.

According to the testimony of another witness, they were shot (the source does not specify who exactly) in the basements of the stadium, and the corpses were buried there under the supervision of Israeli soldiers. According to Fisk, about 1,800 people are officially listed among the “missing” camp residents.

Robert Fisk (one of the authors of the aforementioned Washington Report on Middle East Affair, often criticized by US Jewish organizations for its pro-Arab stance), one of Britain's leading foreign reporters, is known in particular for his persistent anti-Israel stance. He fundamentally doubts any version coming from the authorities, especially if they start a war.

R. Fisk does not believe that a journalist “should be biased,” but his duty is to monitor the authorities. This British journalist became famous for his biased, emotional articles containing few facts, but many guesses, easily refuted, and even the slang word “fisking” arose, implying a point-by-point refutation of lies and slander

Israel's response to criticism

The Kahan Commission, specially appointed at the request of the Israeli public to investigate the circumstances of the tragedy and carefully studied all the details, completely rejected accusations of direct participation of the Israeli military in the massacre.

However, the Kahan Commission report contained a lot of criticism of the IDF leadership and the Israeli government and was therefore highly praised in the United States and Western Europe. Because of this, the events that took place were never examined by an international court or an international commission.

The French Minister of the Interior noted:

“This report honors Israel and provides the world with a new lesson in democracy.”

R. Fisk, however, argues that the commission relied only on the testimony of Israeli officers and soldiers, and did not interrogate Palestinian survivors of the massacre. The leader of the Phalangists, Hobeika, complained that he was not interrogated and he “could not prove his innocence.”

Accusations against Syria and Syrian intelligence

According to Robert Maroun Hatem, the massacre was organized by his boss, Elie Hobeika, at the direction of Syrian intelligence in order to discredit Israel.

Robert Maroun Hatem, nicknamed "Cobra", at that time acting as a bodyguard to the Phalangist commander Eli Hobeika, in his book "From Israel to Damascus" argued that the latter, being a Syrian agent, deliberately, contrary to the instructions of the Israeli military command, carried out a massacre of civilians people with the aim of compromising Israel.

Hatem’s accusation is confirmed by the fact that Hobeika lived in Lebanon for many years after the massacre and even managed to be not only a member of parliament, but also the Minister of Energy in the pro-Syrian government of the country. Neither the PLO, which was expelled from Lebanon in 1982, nor Syria, which supports the Lebanese Christians, nor their Muslim allies in Lebanon pursued Hobeika, despite his direct involvement in the massacre. Moreover, Syria provided his security until 2001 (Saleh al-Naami, Hamas).

Hobeika, in response to the publication of Hatem's book, containing unpleasant details of his personal life, said that its author was an illiterate drug addict whom he kicked out of service in 1985. According to the former head of the Phalangists, this book is an Israeli intrigue, and it was written by “an American a journalist of Jewish origin who was in Lebanon during the civil war."

The murder of Hobeika on January 25, 2002, three days before the flight to Brussels in connection with the proposed trial to investigate Sharon's role in the massacre, has given rise to many interpretations (see the section “Murder of Elie Hobeika”).

Kahan Commission

After the details of the massacre became known, the Israeli opposition demanded an immediate investigation into the extent of Israel's responsibility for the incident. On September 24, a large demonstration took place in Tel Aviv demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Begin and Defense Minister A. Sharon and the appointment of a judicial commission, in which, according to various estimates, from 200 to 400 thousand participants took part. This was one of the most massive protests in the history of Israel, in which almost 10% of the country's population participated.

At first, Begin's government said Israel bore no responsibility for the massacre. A government statement was released calling all accusations against Israel "blood libel" and anti-Semitism. “The goyim are killing the goyim, and the Jews are to blame!” Begin said at a government meeting and refused to dismiss Sharon.

Attempts to prosecute Ariel Sharon

Six months after the massacre, Time magazine controversially interpreted the Kahan Commission's findings, claiming that Sharon had "advised" the Phalangists to retaliate against Palestinian militants with massacres. Sharon sued Time for libel. The jury admitted that the magazine slandered Sharon and harmed his reputation, but for the public figure to formally win the case, it was also necessary to prove that the editors acted with malicious intent and disregard for the truth - this point of the claim was not proven.

In 2001, relatives of those killed in the massacre made an unsuccessful attempt to prosecute Sharon as a war criminal by suing him in a Belgian court. The court accepted the claim, but later rejected it, since, according to Belgian law from 1876, the accused must be in Belgium at the time of the commission of the crime or at the time of filing the lawsuit against him. A number of sources believe that this was a political rather than a legal decision.

Murder of Elie Hobeika

01/25/2002, three days before the flight of Elie Hobeika, the commander of the Phalangists during the cleansing in Sabra and Shatila, to Brussels, where they tried to build an accusation against Ariel Sharon based on his testimony (however, Hobeika himself did not appear in the lawsuit), he was killed . The car Hobeika was in was blown up, killing 5 more people. A previously unknown Lebanese anti-Syrian group claimed responsibility for his murder, but the report raised doubts among many.

One of Hobeika's former assistants was shot dead along with his wife by unknown assailants using a pistol with a silencer in Brazil, and another died under strange circumstances after crashing his car into a tree in New York. Both died on the eve of the hearings in Belgium around the same time as Hobeika, one on 01/31/2001, and the second on 03/22/2002. According to Robert Fisk, both could shed light on the circumstances of the massacre.

Version about Syrian involvement

According to V. Mostovoy, not confirmed by other sources, Hobeika’s lawyer spoke at a press conference, where he stated:

“My client told me that he would tell the truth: Sharon did not order the massacre... Christians entered the Palestinian refugee camps because they learned that Arafat had left hundreds of his bandits there with guns, and they were shooting at the Phalangists and Sharon’s soldiers.”

The lawyer believed that Hobeika was killed because his testimony did not suit the PLO, its leader Yasser Arafat and Syrian intelligence

On January 26, 2002, Belgian Senator Vincent Van Quickenborne, who visited Hobeika before the murder, gave an interview to Al Jazeera. Van Quickenborn said he told him he had no plans to blame Sharon for the massacre. Khobeika also stated that he himself was completely innocent, since “he was not in Sabra and Shatila that day.” Quickenbourne does not rule out the possibility that Hobeika abandoned his intention to accuse Sharon out of fear for his life.

According to The World Lebanese Cultural Union, after the 9/11 attacks in the United States, Hobeika tried to offer his services to the CIA in capturing Mughniyeh, the former chief of intelligence services of the terrorist organization Hezbollah. Having learned about this, at the end of 2001 the Syrians completely removed his protection, instructing Lebanese legal authorities to take measures against him, or at least threaten them with them.

Version of Israeli involvement

The Lebanese Interior Minister and the Arab press accused Israel and Ariel Sharon, who at that time was already Israel's Prime Minister of Defense, of killing Hobeika. According to the Arab press, in this way the Israeli intelligence services silenced the main witness of Sharon's participation in the massacre. According to The Daily Star, Hobeika told its editor that he had made and handed over to lawyers in the event of his death an audio recording that exposed Sharon's role in the massacre, "even greater than is commonly believed." However, as of November 2009, there is no information about the publication of such an audio recording.

In response to accusations from the Arab press about the murder of Hobeika, Sharon said: “We have nothing to do with this, and the issue is not even worth commenting on.”

International reaction

The UN Security Council condemned the massacre. The UN General Assembly, in a separate resolution, condemned the massacre in Sabra and Shatila, qualifying it as an act of genocide.

US President Ronald Reagan said he was horrified by the attack and “all decent people should share our outrage and disgust.”

The international community blamed the massacre of civilians on Israel, whose troops secured the camps but were not directly involved in what was happening inside them. According to supporters of this approach, the massacre was made possible by the inaction of local Israeli commanders and the highest military command.

A number of sources believe that the massacre in Sabra and Shatila received undeservedly a lot of attention precisely because of Israeli involvement. This opinion, in particular, is shared by scientists from the Institute for the Economy in Transition.

Over time, the fact that Arabs killed Arabs in Sabra and Shatila was forgotten in the world, and Israel was blamed for the murders.

Others, on the contrary, believe that the international reaction and the reaction of the Western press to the events in Sabra and Shatila was insufficient.

However, when Muslim militants attacked the Shatila and Burj el-Barajna camps in May 1985, and, according to UN sources, 635 people were killed and 2,500 wounded, there were no public protests, and no commission of inquiry, like the Kahan commission, investigated the massacre.

The two-year mutual extermination of supporters of the pro-Syrian Shiite organization Amal and the PLO, in which more than 2,000 people died, including a large number of civilians, did not cause international protests against any of the parties involved.

International reaction was also minimal in October 1990, when Syrian troops captured Christian-controlled areas of Lebanon and killed 700 Christians in eight hours of fighting.

“The first, terrifying fact is that Arabs killed Arabs. The second is that Israeli soldiers stopped the carnage. And the third is that if the current smear campaign against Israel continues without an indignant reaction from decent people, yes - indignant, then within a few weeks or months there will only be a general opinion that it was the Israeli military that committed these terrible murders.”

Original text(English)

The first horrific truth is that Arabs murdered Arabs. The second truth is that Israeli soldiers stopped the carnage. And the third truth is that if the current libelous campaign against Israel should go on without a reaction of outrage by decent men - yes, outrage - then within a matter of weeks or months everyone everywhere will have gotten the impression that it was an Israeli military unit which perpetrated the horrible killings."

“Just do an Internet search,” Avner writes. “Think of the angry responses to the results of the second Lebanon War (2006) in light of the first (1982). Paradox triumphs."

In art

In 2008, Israeli director Ari Folman shot the animated film Waltz with Bashir (Vals Im Bashir), which tells about the war in Lebanon and the events in the Sabra and Shatila camps. The film is a series of interviews with Israeli army soldiers who took part in the war and witnessed the massacre.

Footnotes

Amnon Kapeliouk, translated and edited by Khalil Jehshan Sabra & Chatila: Inquiry Into a Massacre (Microsoft Word doc)
Valentin Volansky. Origins of the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990)
Sabra and Shatila: one lie that shocked the world
Political and economic aspects of the fight against terrorism
Israel MFA 104 Report of the Commission of Inquiry into the events at the refugee camps in Beirut
Syria & Lebanon Authors: Terry Carter, Lara Dunston, Amelia Thomas, Lonely Planet Publications
"in violation of U.S.-Israeli agreements"
The First Word: The Rosh Hashana of Sabra and Shatilla, By YEHUDA AVNER, Sep 21, 2006
[M. Shterenshis. History of the State of Israel 1896-2002. Herzliya, Isradon, 2003, p.576.]
Palestinian Camps Are Ready to Erupt, Franklin Lamb Franklin Lamb is Interim Director of the Washington DC-Beirut Lebanon based Sabra Shatila Foundation. He can be reached at Sabrashatila.org
“All the terrorists in the world were there!”
Lebanon Foundation for Peace: An Open Letter to Human Rights Watch: We Have Hundreds of Eye Witnesses to the Events at Sabra and Chatilla, Will You Call Them?
Joseph Farah, Mister PRESIDENT, YOU FORGOT TO MENTION SYRIA... , What about Syria?, Joseph Farah, Posted: February 01, 2002
Klein, A. J. (New York, 2005), Striking Back: The 1972 Munich Olympics Massacre and Israel's Deadly Response, Random House ISBN 1-920769-80-3, pp. 224-225
Dunsoton, Carter, Thomas p.35
Bashir Gemayel (1947-1982)
Kahane commission report
Sharon Invades
The Passionate Attachment
Nasr: Iran Sees Lebanon Strife as Way to Pressure Washington
TWENTY YEARS AFTER THE MASSACRES AT SABRA AND SHATILA The past is always present Le Monde diplomatique English edition
Vyacheslav Mostovoy, HISTORY OF THE SABRA AND SHATILA CAMPS
http://mnenia.zahav.ru/AuthorProfile.aspx?aid=76
Shulman, Alexander The story of one provocation: Sabra and Shatila (04/13/2009). Retrieved September 27, 2009.
Fausto Giudice

Our visit began at a clinic owned by the Red Crescent Society. The society itself was organized in 1968, and there are 5 such clinics in Lebanon. They serve Palestinians and are located within a 5-minute walk of Sabra and Shatila:

The level of equipment of the clinic is quite high and can rival many identical ones in Russian regional centers. This dentist spoke fluently with us in Russian. It is noteworthy that 80 percent of doctors speak Russian, as they trained in the Soviet Union:

Because Palestinian refugees in Lebanon have no right to anything: neither education, nor work, they have no money. There is no future either. Therefore, they need free medical treatment like air:

We were shown a kind of folk art museum at the clinic. This key is very symbolic. Many years ago, when Palestinians were forced to leave their homeland, each owner wore the key to his home around his neck. Several decades have passed, and the keys still hang on the necks of many Palestinians. Because while they are alive, the hope of returning home is alive:

For Palestinian children, even Santa Claus has no gifts - only bones and scraps:

Childhood…

Literal translation: “Isn’t what’s happening in Palestine the Holocaust?”

A wide shopping street leads to Sabra and Shatila:

Various products are sold here. Some of them show blue-eyed mannequins with a broken head:

10.

11.

Local "Eldorado":

12.

Most items are "second hand":

13.

Just outside the market is a mass grave where 3,000 Palestinians killed in the 1982 massacre are buried:

14.

Under this lawn, in places with bald patches, lie the remains of the dead. Then bulldozers simply dug a huge hole, in which those who wanted to live yesterday found themselves:

15.

What is surprising is the lack of respect for their own dead fellow countrymen on the part of the Palestinians. I shuddered from the realization that I was walking on the bones of women and children...

Only this piece of stone and the inscription on it remind of that tragedy:

16.

Outwardly, Sabra and Shatila are ordinary areas of Beirut. Contrary to my expectations, they are not surrounded by fences and barbed wire, and they are not guarded by soldiers:

17.

As in many Arab neighborhoods, there are surprisingly many wires here:

18.

It is interesting that each subsequent balcony, starting from the second floor, is further from the building than the previous one. As a result, on the top floors you can easily shake hands with a neighbor from the house opposite:

19.

The sky is incredibly blue. From bottom to top, the view is amazing:

20.

If only it weren’t for the wires... Because of them, it seems like you’re looking at the sky from a cage:

21.

The patios are very dirty. Chickens and garbage are an indispensable attribute of Palestinian neighborhoods:

22.

23.

National symbols are very common:

24.

25.

Since Palestinians are prohibited from working, there are always a lot of people on the streets.

There are a total of 12 registered and 7 unregistered refugee camps in Lebanon. The largest is home to about 75,000 people. In total, there are 320,000 refugees from Palestine in Lebanon, but the country's government claims that there are 600,000. This was done in order to maintain a religious balance in the country and not give refugees citizenship:

26.