At Jenin refugee camp, only the ruins are beyond argument

JENIN, West Bank With rumors swirling of massacres and mass burials in the Jenin refugee camp, the Israeli Army has said that the number of Palestinian dead is not in the hundreds but in the dozens and agreed to allow the Red Cross to monitor the collecting of bodies that the army has said are still lying around.

The army on Sunday also took a group of reporters through the camp in an attempt to stem a growing outcry that led the Israeli Supreme Court to enjoin the army from burying Palestinians in an enemy's cemetery. On Sunday, the court ruled that the army must collect the bodies, accompanied and assisted by the Red Cross. The outcry also prompted Secretary of State Colin Powell to call on Israel to allow relief agencies to operate in the camp.

[On Monday, Palestinian medics began retrieving bodies, The Associated Press reported. Palestinian medical officials said troops were making the work of the medic crews more difficult by stopping ambulances repeatedly for searches and ID checks.]

Palestinians say hundreds of people were killed in the camp, including many civilians, while Israel said about 100 died, most of them gunmen. The claims and counterclaims were fed by the fact that relief agencies and reporters had been officially barred from entering the Jenin refugee camp, although some reporters found their way in, and by the fact that both sides described the battle for the camp as the most bitter of the Israeli operation.