Lebanon launches process to disarm Palestinian factions in refugee camps

For the first time in a long time, a joint Lebanese-Palestinian committee has convened to discuss how to disarm the groups that are held by Palestinian factions in Lebanon’s refugee camps.

Nawaf Salam, the prime minister of Lebanon, and the Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee, a government agency that serves as an intermediary between Palestinian refugees and officials, met on Friday.

Participants “agreed to launch a process for the disarmament of weapons according to a specific timetable,” according to the group.

Additionally, it stated that it intended to “enhance the economic and social rights of Palestinian refugees.”

A source within the Lebanese government’s 12 official refugee camps, which house numerous Palestinian factions, including Fatah, Hamas&nbsp, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and a number of other organizations, could start in mid-June.

The camps are under Palestinian control, but Lebanese authorities still maintain control over them, according to a decades-old agreement.

The Lebanese government is under increasing international pressure to stop the Iran-aligned Hezbollah, which fought a war with Israel last year.

The message is clear, he said. According to Zeina Khodr, a journalist from Beirut, “Lebanon is moving forward with monopolizing arms in the hands of the state,” there is a new era, a new balance of power, and a new leadership in the country.

She said that the next step in the process of dismantling Hezbollah’s military infrastructure in southern Lebanon “has already begun,” and that it will focus on destroying Palestinian groups in camps before addressing the issue of Hezbollah’s weapons in the rest of the nation.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas visited Lebanon earlier this week and stated in a speech that the camps’ weapons “hurt Lebanon and the Palestinian cause.” Abbas is the leader of the Palestinian Liberation Organization.

Palestinian factions won’t use Lebanon as a launchpad for attacks against Israel, according to Abbas’s and Joseph Aoun’s visit, and weapons will be consolidated under the Lebanese government’s control.

Numerous groups reportedly sounded opposed to disarmament, according to Al Jazeera’s Khodr.

There are many armed groups, including Hamas and [Palestinian] Islamic Jihad, who believe in an armed conflict with Israel, she said.