Port-au-Prince, Haiti ? Scores of foreigners, including missionaries and aid workers, streamed out of Haiti on Friday to escape a two-week rebellion that has overwhelmed the impoverished country’s north. Many police deserted their posts, and rebels threatened new attacks.

Pro-government militants torched 15 homes in the western port of St. Marc overnight, and three people died in the fires, independent Radio Galaxie reported.

A day after the U.S. government urged Americans to leave Haiti, more than 200 Americans, French and Canadians stood in long lines Friday at Toussaint Louverture International Airport, anxious to get out.

“We knew that it was right for us to leave. It’s just hard,” said Nancy McWilliams, an 18-year-old from Ottawa, Ontario, who abandoned a volunteer job at a children’s home in northern Cap-Haitien.

The U.S. government has begun placing air marshals on all American flights in and out of Haiti because of hijacking fears, officials in Washington said. American Airlines said seats were sold out on four of five daily flights to the United States.

American missionary Gerald St. Vincent, waiting for a flight to Miami, said Haiti would resolve its problems “only if they have help from outside sources — not less help but more.”

The uprising began two weeks ago when rebels took the city of Gonaives, and they have since pushed police out of more than a dozen towns in the north. They accuse President Jean-Bertrand Aristide of breaking promises to help the poor and of driving the country into chaos while quietly supporting attacks on opponents — charges the president denies.

On Friday, American and other diplomats presented Aristide a plan that calls for an interim governing council to advise him. It would also disarm politically allied street gangs and appoint a prime minister agreeable to both sides. But it would not have Aristide resign, which the opposition has demanded, and neither side indicated they would accept it.

Protesters at an anti-government march Friday vehemently denounced any negotiations that could leave Aristide in power.

“Aristide is a scorpion!” about 1,000 marchers chanted, until they were attacked by Aristide supporters, who threw rocks and bottles and then opened fire.