Most Lebanese and some diplomats in Beirut believe that the Israelis are pursuing a "scorched earth" policy in southern Lebanon designed to drive all population from the area and establish a DMZ. "Why burn crops. unless thats the purpose?" asks one high official of the Lebanese Foreign Ministry. "The commandos buy their supplies in Beirut anyway." Statements by Israeli officials do little to quiet these fears. last April. when he was still defense minister. Moshe Dayan told newspaper reporters that unless the Lebanese stopped the Palestinian raids. "We will step up the raids until the people find it impossible to live there. Their homes will be destroyed and the whole area will be deserted." And in a chilling echo of "Pentagonese." the Rabin government told Israelis last June that it was abandoning its previous policy of "retaliation" in southern Lebanon for a policy of "preemptive strikes." The human suffering behind the antiseptic words is. as always. chilling: Ein elHilweh. a Palestinian refugee camp near Sidon. has been bombed countless times. Last June. a poor neighborhood of Lebanese and Palestinians. including a school. was leveled. Hundreds of refugees have moved into another school. "What will we do when classes begin?" wails a teacher. An old man pokes through the rubble of his house. Although the man is Lebanese. on the one wall that still stands hangs a cheap tinted portrait of Yasir Arafat.
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refugee refugees