Lebanon on Thursday began the first phase of a long-planned effort to remove weapons from Palestinian refugee camps, placing the arms under the custody of the Lebanese army. The operation opened in Burj al-Barajneh in southern Beirut and in the southern Al-Bass camp, implementing a disarmament accord reached by Lebanese President Aoun and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on 21 May. Palestinian presidential spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh said the initial consignments were transferred "as a deposit" and that additional deliveries would follow in the coming weeks across the country’s 12 camps. Ramez Dimashqieh, head of the Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee, described the move as the start of "ensuring that arms are confined to the state." The New Arab reported that Abbas’s Fatah movement supplied the first cache, which included heavy and medium weapons, while light arms remain with camp security units for now. Authorities intend to extend the process to larger and more volatile sites such as Ain al-Hilweh, part of a broader Lebanese strategy to consolidate the state’s monopoly over force amid parallel debates on disarming other non-state groups.