Pouring It On

The Lebanese military has been pouring on the artillery against Fatah al Islam in its ongoing battle with that Palestinian terrorist group in Nahr al-Bared.

"This is the final phase of the military operation," one Lebanese political source said, adding that he expected the army to capture the whole camp by the end of this week.

The source said there were about 100 people left inside the area controlled by Fatah al-Islam -- 60 fighters and 40 civilians who include 24 wives of militants and 16 children.

Palestinian and U.N. officials had earlier put the number of civilians left in the hundreds. The Lebanese source said some 200 civilians had left the camp in recent days.

Witnesses said soldiers blasted with tanks and artillery the last pockets of the militants who have refused repeated calls to surrender. The fighting, which began on May 20, is Lebanon's worst internal violence since the 1975-1990 civil war.

The conflict has further undermined stability in Lebanon, already crippled by a prolonged political crisis and shaken by bombings that have killed six U.N. peacekeepers and two anti-Syrian lawmakers in the past eight months.

"At its heaviest shortly after dawn, some 20 shells a minute were hitting the camp," said one witness who watched the fighting from a distance. "It was deafening."

The militants hit back, firing a few Katyusha rockets into areas outside the camp. The security sources said two soldiers were wounded in the clashes.

The Lebanese army's slow push into the destroyed camp has cost the lives of 120 soldiers. More than 84 Fatah al-Islam fighters and 41 civilians have also been killed.

There isn't much left to the area, as the incessant artillery has reduced the area to rubble. Two Lebanese soldiers were killed in the latest fighting.