The number of Saudis in the Al Qaeda-inspired Fatah al-Islam group battling the Lebanese army has been exaggerated by some Lebanese, a Saudi official was reported as saying on Sunday. Lebanese troops have been fighting the militant group at a Palestinian refugee camp in north Lebanon since May 20. More than 200 people have been killed.
Lebanese officials have said dozens of Fatah al-Islam's members are from the kingdom, after hundreds of Saudis are thought to have gone to Iraq to fight with Al Qaeda militants against US forces and the US-backed government there. But Riyadh's consul in Beruit, Abdel-Hadi al Shafei, said few of the dead fighters had been identified as Saudi and there was no evidence that many more were fighting at the camp. "Lebanese parties are exploiting the Saudi presence among Fatah al-Islam in the Nahr al-Bared camp," Shafei told London- based daily al-Hayat, which is owned by a senior Saudi prince. "There is a desire to embarrass Saudi Arabia by announcing 'large numbers' of Saudis among the dead, although bodies are charred and disfigured and no documents have affirmed they are Saudi." | "Besides, fighting is too much like work. Us Saudi's prefer to talk about fighting rather than getting our hands dirty." |
Shafei said only six to eight bodies in a Tripoli morgue were those of Saudi nationals and one body had been delivered to its Saudi family. |