Dozens of families, many of them empty-handed, returned on Wednesday to a bombed-out Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon that was the scene of 15 weeks of fierce battles between the army and Islamist militants.Buses and mini-vans hired by the UN Relief and Works Agency and bearing Palestinian flags picked up the first families from the Beddawi refugee camp for the short drive to Nahr al-Bared camp, located outside the city of Tripoli.
Some refugees were carrying plastic bags with just a few personal belongings, while the majority waited empty-handed and expressionless at the eastern entrance to the devastated seafront camp for the army to search them before allowing them in. "I am happy to be going home but I'm very scared," Insaf Fuad, 25, said as she waited for clearance with her husband and four children aged one to four. "I am scared of what is waiting for us and I know that our house was partially destroyed."