Ein al-Hilweh, Lebanon’s largest community of Palestinian refugees and their descendants, has long been a downtrodden place, impoverished and racked by factional violence.
Its residents usually have a grim view of their future.
Recruitment for Hamas and its armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, is way up across Lebanon’s 12 Palestinian refugee communities, according to Hamas and Lebanese officials.
They say that hundreds of new recruits have joined the militants’ ranks in recent months, exhilarated by Hamas’s ongoing war with Israel.
But elsewhere, Hamas’s willingness to combat Israel has won new adherents.
Persons:
Ein, Abu Ubaida, Israel
Organizations:
Hamas, Qassam, ’, The New York Times
Locations:
Lebanon’s, Israel, balaclava, Gaza