Fifty people were feared dead yesterday as Lebanese troops fought Islamic militants in some of the worst internal violence in years.

The streets of Tripoli, the second largest city in Lebanon, echoed to the sound of automatic weapons as Lebanese soldiers surrounded a group of militants belonging to Fatah al-Islam, a radical Palestinian Islamist faction said to be linked to al-Qaeda.

One minister said that the fighting with Fatah al-Islam, which the Government says is backed by Syria, seemed timed to derail UN moves to set up an international court to try those suspected of carrying out political killings in Lebanon.

Even as soldiers fought the militants in the centre of Tripoli, explosions could be heard as the Lebanese Army moved to crush the Fatah al-Islam stronghold in the Palestinian refugee camp of Nahr al-Bared, nine miles (14km) north of Tripoli. By early evening at least 22 soldiers and 17 militants had been killed.

Last night a woman was killed and 12 people injured when a bomb exploded at a busy shopping mall in Beirut. It was not clear if the blast was linked to the clashes in north Lebanon.

The fighting began when three Fatah al-Islam militants were dropped off in a small street in the Zaharieh district of Tripoli. Residents said that the three took up positions on street corners and were joined by a fourth gunman.

“They were all bearded and had rifles, grenades and suicide vests,” Bassam al-Mori, 27, said. He said that they cocked their weapons and yelled Allahu akbar (God is greatest) as they opened fire at a passing Lebanese Army patrol. At roughly the same time, Fatah al-Islam militants attacked and overran Lebanese Army positions at the entrance to Nahr al-Bared camp. Another army patrol was ambushed just south of Tripoli.

As army reinforcements rushed to the scene of the fighting in Zaharieh, the militants split up and hid in neighbouring apartment buildings. A crowd gathered to watch the ensuing battle, cheering every time the soldiers opened fire.

An army captain inched down the street under heavy covering fire, and was shot in the face. He slumped to the ground as other soldiers poured machinegun fire into the building where the gunman hid. Two soldiers and a plain-clothes intelligence officer crawled toward the captain’s body, using parked cars as cover. They grabbed the captain’s corpse and ran back as soldiers sprayed the buildings with machinegun fire. Another army captain screamed in rage at the throng of civilians.

“They are getting in our way and my men are being killed,” he yelled into his mobile phone. The infantry soldiers were later reinforced by five armoured personnel carriers carrying special forces troops.

Having identified the building occupied by the gunmen, they opened fire with rifles and machineguns. Masonry and dust flew, and the air turned thick and acrid with smoke. Some soldiers entered the ground floor briefly, but the militants hurled a hand grenade at them. It exploded inside, wounding a soldier and a photographer for The Guardian.

Another captain sneaked around the back of the building with a soldier and an intelligence agent. Minutes later came the muffled thump of two exploding hand grenades. The captain reemerged with a triumphant grin and said that he had killed one of the militants.

One soldier said: “We entered the room and saw him reloading. I fired two shots above his head and he surrendered.”

Soldiers said that the gunmen had taken an elderly woman and her daughter hostage and moved up to a new vantage point on the fifth floor. A Fatah al-Islam fighter then threw a hand grenade from a building that was thought to have been cleared, wounding a soldier in the blast. Other troops immediately opened fire at the building but the militant had disappeared inside.

The captain with the grenades went back to flush out the gunmen. Heavy gunfire was heard and more thuds of exploding grenades. He returned to his comrades, shaking and exhausted. He said that he had hurled two grenades inside a room where two of the militants were holed up.

“The explosions took the head off one of them and the arms of the other,” he said, his face suddenly creasing into tears with the tension.

Fatah al-Islam first emerged in November last year, declaring that it had split from Fatah al-Intifada, a pro-Syrian Palestinian faction based in Beirut. The Lebanese Government claims that the group is run by Syrian military intelligence and that its purpose is to cause instability in Lebanon.

Led by Chaker al-Absi, a veteran Palestinian fighter trained by the Syrian Air Force, Fatah al-Islam, says that it is devoted to fighting Israel. Its goal, sources close to the group say, is to become Lebanon’s dominant Palestinian faction.

As fighting raged in Lebanon, Israeli aircraft pounded cars, suspected arms factories and buildings across the Gaza Strip yesterday, in retaliation for rockets fired by Palestinian militants at Israel.

About 35 people have been killed by airstrikes in the past week. At least eight people died and 13 were injured last night when an Israeli missile struck the Gaza City home of Khalil al-Haya, a Hamas MP. He was not at home at the time.

Rival Fatahs

Fatah al-Islam

up to 100 members

Founded November 2006

Based Northern Lebanon

Leader Chaker al-Absi, a Palestinian in his early 50s who supports Osama bin Laden. Sentenced to death in absentia by a Jordanian military court in 2004

Ideology Radical Sunni Islam, allied to al-Qaeda

Fatah

60,000 to 70,000 members

Founded 1958-1959

Based West Bank and Gaza

Leader Mahmoud Abbas, 72, Palestinian President

Ideology Secular, left of centre

Sources: AP, Times archives

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