3 Refugee Ships Leave Israel for Beirut

Three shiploads of Christian refugees who fled the fighting in southern Lebanon last month set sail for Beirut on Friday in an exodus arranged by Israel and the Lebanese Forces, the primary Christian militia in Lebanon.

The 800 refugees were among thousands who fled the Kharoub region north of Sidon when Muslim fighters and their Druze allies captured that area from their Christian foes.

Israeli officials have indicated that they feared the influx of Christian refugees would create instability in the “security zone” that Israel is establishing just north of its border with Lebanon.

800 Refugees Transferred

About 800 refugees were bused from Lebanese villages to this northern Israeli port. Israeli soldiers in full combat gear accompanied the convoy, the first large transfer of Lebanese refugees through Israel.

The refugees, mostly children and elderly men and women, carried jugs of water, suitcases, bedding and plastic bags with their personal belongings.

“I hope to return back to our home if the Israeli army will help us,” said a 60-year-old man who said he left his village of Miye ou Miye near Sidon 25 days ago.

As the refugees boarded the three vessels, women soldiers and sailors handed out chocolate cake, candies and fruit at the foot of the gangplank.

Under Lebanese Flag

A Christian spokesman who refused to give his name said the ships were owned “by a private Lebanese Christian company.” They flew no flag while in port, but the spokesman said they would sail to Beirut under the Lebanese flag.

One of the ships was the Charlie One, a 700-ton ferry that recently withdrew Lebanese Forces militiamen from Sidon after more than a month of fighting between Christians and Muslims in the city.

The words Charlie Two were painted in large blue letters on the side of a second ferry, but the name Alizur Blanco was plainly visible on the ship’s bow.

The Alizur Blanco was captured by the Israeli navy last July while on a ferry run from Cyprus to Beirut and its passengers were held on suspicion of being Palestinian guerrillas.

As the refugee ships set sail for the Lebanese capital, Christian and Muslim gunmen traded sniper fire and shelled residential areas of Beirut for the sixth day in a row, killing at least two people and wounding 33.

Shell Hits Playground

Hospital spokesmen said nine children were among those wounded in Christian East Beirut when a shell hit their school playground. In mainly Muslim West Beirut, at least 16 people were reported wounded by sniper and artillery fire. It was not immediately clear where the deaths occurred.

Fighting along the so-called Green Line between Christian and Muslim sectors of the capital kept all six connecting roads closed to traffic for most of the day.

In the Aley Mountains east of the capital, Lebanese Christian army units and Druze militiamen battled with tanks and artillery near Souq el Gharb, a strategic army base.

Shells fired by Druze gunners landed near Christian President Amin Gemayel’s palace in suburban Baabda and the Lebanese Defense Ministry in nearby Yarze, radio stations reported. A negotiated truce took hold two hours after the fighting started, and there were no reports on casualties.

The increased fighting seemed to push Lebanon toward a full-scale resumption of the 10-year-old civil war. The Cabinet appeared paralyzed, with Christian and Muslim members split over an offensive by Muslim and Druze militiamen that seized a coastal belt of Christian villages near the ancient southern port of Sidon.

Christian Cabinet ministers on Friday denounced Lebanese Premier Rashid Karami, a Muslim, for failing to condemn the “barbaric killings and looting” in the Muslim advances in the south.

But the Lebanese Forces militia moved publicly to cool tempers, saying it wants to “keep open the door of dialogue” and “does not wish to open a war with West Beirut and the suburbs.”