ICRC said Wednesday that the ongoing fighting close to the camp`s southern entrance has hampered humanitarian operations in the last week.

"It is becoming harder and harder to bring supplies into the camp and evacuate the wounded and civilians,`` Jordi Raich Curco, head of the Red Cross` delegation in Lebanon, said in a statement. He said the most recent delivery of aid to Nahr al-Bared, consisting of 760 kilograms of food, took place on 20 June.

Several thousand civilians are believed to be trapped inside the camp.

The Lebanese army on Wednesday accused al-Qaeda-inspired militants still barricaded in the refugee camp in northern Lebanon of hiding among Palestinian civilians trapped in the settlement and confiscating humanitarian aid sent to them.

The Lebanese Defense Minister Elias Murr said Tuesday that some 300 Fatah al-Islam militants have been killed or wounded in the fighting which broke out on May 20, leaving only a few dozen fighters hiding in the besieged camp.