Massacres at Sabra & Shatila
(September 16-17, 1982)
The Lebanese Christian Phalangist
militia was responsible for the massacres that occurred
at the two Beirut-area refugee camps on September
16-17, 1982. Israeli troops allowed the Phalangists
to enter Sabra and Shatila to root out terrorist
cells believed located there. It had been estimated
that there may have been up to 200 armed men in the
camps working out of the countless bunkers built
by the PLO over
the years, and stocked with generous reserves of
ammunition.
When Israeli soldiers ordered the
Phalangists out, they found hundreds dead (estimates
range from 460 according to the Lebanese police,
to 700-800 calculated by Israeli intelligence). The
dead, according to the Lebanese account, included 35
women and children. The rest were men: Palestinians,
Lebanese, Pakistanis, Iranians, Syrians and Algerians.
The killings came on top of an estimated 95,000 deaths
that had occurred during the civil war in Lebanon
from 1975-1982.
The killings were perpetrated to avenge the murders
of Lebanese President Bashir Gemayel and 25 of his followers, killed
in a bomb attack earlier that week.
Israel had allowed the Phalange to enter the camps
as part of a plan to transfer authority to the Lebanese, and accepted
responsibility for that decision. The Kahan
Commission of Inquiry, formed by the Israeli government in response
to public outrage and grief, found that Israel was indirectly responsible
for not anticipating the possibility of Phalangist violence. Israel
instituted the panel's recommendations, including the dismissal of Gen. Raful Eitan, the Army Chief of
Staff. Defense Minister Ariel Sharon resigned.
The Kahan Commission, declared former Secretary of
State Henry Kissinger, was
"a great tribute to Israeli democracy....There are very few
governments in the world that one can imagine making such a public
investigation of such a difficult and shameful episode."
Ironically, while 300,000 Israelis demonstrated in
Israel to protest the killings, little or no reaction occurred in the
Arab world. Outside the Middle East, a major international outcry
against Israel erupted over the massacres. The Phalangists, who
perpetrated the crime, were spared the brunt of the condemnations for
it.
By contrast, few voices were raised in May 1985,
when Muslim militiamen attacked the Shatila and Burj-el Barajneh
Palestinian refugee camps. According to UN officials, 635 were killed and 2,500 wounded. During a two-year battle
between the Syrian-backed Shiite Amal militia and the PLO, more than
2,000, including many civilians, were reportedly killed. No outcry was
directed at the PLO or the Syrians and their allies over the
slaughter. International reaction was also muted in October 1990 when
Syrian forces overran Christian-controlled areas of Lebanon. In the
eight-hour clash, 700 Christians were killed-the worst single battle
of Lebanon's Civil War.
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