Karantina massacre | |
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Part of the Lebanese Civil War | |
![]() Palestinian refugees Zuhaiba Alshaheen, Mohammed Amcha and grandchildren Ahmad Jawhar and Ahmad Kinj, with Zuhaiba seen confronting a militant, in Karantina, 1976 (photo taken by Françoise Demulder)[1] | |
Location | Beirut, Lebanon |
Coordinates | 33°53′13″N 35°30′47″E / 33.88694°N 35.51306°E |
Date | January 18, 1976 |
Target | Karantina district of Beirut |
Attack type | Massacre |
Deaths | 600–1,500[2] |
Victims | Palestinians, Kurds, Syrians, Armenians, Lebanese Sunnis[3] |
Perpetrators | Kataeb, Guardians of the Cedars, Tiger militia[4] |
Motive | Anti-Palestinianism and Islamophobia |
The massacre was followed by the Damour massacre as a reprisal.[5] |
The Karantina massacre (Arabic: مجزرة الكرنتينا; French: Massacre de La Quarantaine/Karantina) took place on January 18, 1976, early in the Lebanese Civil War. La Quarantine, known in Arabic as Karantina, was a Muslim-inhabited district in mostly Christian East Beirut controlled by forces of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO),[6] and inhabited by Palestinians, Kurds, Syrians, Armenians and Lebanese Sunnis.[7][8] The fighting and subsequent killings also involved an old Quarantine area near the port and nearby Maslakh quarter.[9][5][10]
Karantina was overrun by militias of the right-wing and mostly Christian Lebanese Front, specifically the Kataeb Party (Phalangists),[11][12] resulting in the deaths of approximately 600–1,500 people.[2][5] According to then-Washington Post-correspondent Jonathan Randal, "Many Lebanese Muslim men and boys were rounded up and separated from the women and children and massacred, while the women and young girls were violently raped and robbed."[10]
The Damour massacre two days later was a reprisal for the Karantina massacre.[5][13]
After Kataeb Regulatory Forces (KRF), Guardians of the Cedars (GoC), National Liberal Party's Tiger militia and Lebanese Youth Movement (LYM) forces took control of the Karantina district, the Tel al-Zaatar refugee camp was besieged for five months, ending in the Tel al-Zaatar massacre.[4]
the massacre of 1,500 Palestinians, Shi'is, and others in Karantina and Maslakh, and the revenge killings of hundreds of Christians in Damour
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