Palestinian factions in Lebanon’s volatile Ain al-Helweh refugee camp are determined to prevent Al-Qaeda Islamist militants from infiltrating their ranks. Fears of an Islamist takeover of the impoverished shantytown south of Beirut were heightened by 15 weeks of bloody clashes earlier this year between the army and militants in another camp in the north.

More than 400 people — about 300 militants and 168 soldiers — were killed before the army crushed the Fatah al-Islam and Al-Qaeda-inspired group in Nahr el-Bared north of the country’s second city of Tripoli. Ain al-Helweh does not want to see the same happen there. "All Palestinian factions in Ain al-Helweh, even Islamists, want to fight outsiders who try to infiltrate the camp," said Maher Oueid, the commander of the Islamist group Ansar Allah (Partisans of God). "We will never allow any foreign organisation to settle among the Palestinians in Lebanon," he told AFP.

Hardline Islamist militants linked to Al-Qaeda have inched their way into refugee camps in recent years, mostly in Ain al-Helweh, the country’s largest with 45,000 inhabitants. On the outskirts of the southern port city of Sidon, the Islamists have set up their own mosque, Al-Nur, in the midst of a labyrinth of narrow alleyways.

In June members of the extremist Jund al-Sham group clashed with the army in fighting that left two soldiers and two militants dead. They have also had run-ins with Palestinians in the camp over the past year.

During the Nahr el-Bared fighting, Jund al-Sham merged with another extremist group, Osbat al-Ansar, and has since kept a low profile. But Oueid firmly believes that Al-Qaeda is present in Lebanon. "This was the case in Nahr el-Bared and in other areas the of southern region," he said. "Militants certainly collaborate with Al-Qaeda on an individual basis."

In recent weeks, the Lebanese authorities have blamed Palestinians from Ain al-Helweh for attacking UN troops along the Lebanon-Israel border. "We will not tolerate the camp becoming a haven for criminals," said Munir Maqdah of the secular Fatah faction of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas. "All the (Palestinian) factions have agreed to hand over immediately any such element to the Lebanese authorities."

Suhail Natur of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) said the situation is tense, particularly because of the Beirut political crisis amid parliament’s failure to meet to elect a new president. "It is a volatile situation," he said. Natur warned against Palestinians being dragged into Lebanon’s internal problems, saying this could "trigger the wrath of others." "Someone could always try to enrol thousands of unemployed Palestinian refugees by offering them money," said Natur.

According to recent Western press reports, the Shiite militant Hezbollah movement has been recruiting fighters from moderate Palestinian Sunni groups, namely in Ain al-Helweh, to counter Al-Qaeda. Hezbollah spokesman Hussein Rahhal declined to comment, describing such reports as "without value."