BEIRUT - The Lebanese army banned Lebanese and Palestinians on Thursday from staging a protest outside the US embassy against the raid of a prison in Jericho and the arrest of the Palestinian leader Ahmed Sa’adat. Lebanese army tanks and armoured personnel carriers banned the demonstrators from approaching the vicinity of the US embassy in Awkar, 20 kilometres north of Beirut. “The organizers of the demonstrations did not obtain permission from the interior ministry to carry out such a protest. That is why the demonstration was banned,” Lebanese Interior Minister Ahmed Fatfat said. “This is a measure to prevent any chaos near the embassy,” a Lebanese police source at the scene told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
Palestinian sources said Lebanese army troops also prevented people, especially men, from leaving Palestinian camps in southern and northern Lebanon. “The Palestinian people were banned today to take part in the demonstration to denounce the Israeli attack on our free people,” Anwar Raja, a spokesman for the pro-Syrian Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC). Around 367,000 Palestinian refugees live in 12 camps across Lebanon. |