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Israel Steps Up Attacks in Lebanon
Beirut's Airport Pounded; Rockets Hit Israeli City
By SAM F. GHATTAS, AP

BEIRUT, Lebanon (July 13) - Israel unleashed a furious military campaign on Lebanon's main airport, highways, military bases and other targets Thursday, retaliating for scores of Hezbollah guerrilla rockets that rained down on Israel and reached as far as Haifa, its third-largest city, for the first time.

The death toll in two days of fighting rose to 57 people with the sudden burst of violence sending shock waves through a region already traumatized by Iraq and the ongoing battles in the Gaza Strip between Israel and Hamas. It shattered the relative calm in Lebanon that followed Israel's pullout from its occupied zone in south Lebanon in 2000 and the withdrawal of Syrian forces last year.

Israel's target was Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militant Shiite faction which has a free hand in southern Lebanon and also holds seats in parliament. Hezbollah sparked the current conflict Wednesday with a cross-border raid that captured two of Israel's soldiers.

Israel said it was determined to beat Hezbollah back and deny the militant fighters positions they have held along the border since 2000.

The Lebanese government, caught in the middle, pleaded for a cease-fire.

"If the government of Lebanon fails to deploy its forces, as is expected of a sovereign government, we shall not allow Hezbollah forces to remain any further on the borders of the state of Israel," Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz said.

Israeli warplanes stepped up the pressure early Friday, striking targets in the southern suburbs of Beirut where Hezbollah has its political headquarters, security officials said. The impact of at least four missiles were heard, but there was no immediate word on casualties.

The raid came just a few hours after Israeli planes dropped leaflets in south Beirut warning residents to avoid areas where Hezbollah operates.

Fears mounted among Arab and European governments that violence in Lebanon could spiral out of control.

Israeli analysts warned that Syria, which supports Hezbollah and plays host to Hamas' political leader Khaled Mashaal, could be Israel's next target.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said any Israeli attack against Syria would be an aggression on the whole Islamic world and warned of a harsh reaction, the official Iranian news agency reported Friday.

The agency said Ahmadinejad made the comments in a telephone call to Syrian President Bashar Assad.

At the United Nations, the United States blocked an Arab-backed resolution that would have demanded Israel halt its military offensive in the Gaza Strip, the first U.N. Security Council veto in nearly two years.

Israel's offensive was among its heaviest in Lebanon since it invaded the neighboring country and occupied its capital 24 years ago. Two days of Israeli bombings killed 45 Lebanese and two Kuwaitis and wounded 103. Two Israeli civilians and eight Israeli soldiers have also been killed, the military's highest death toll in four years.

With Beirut's international airport closed after Israeli bombs ripped apart its runway, many tourists were trapped while others drove over the mountains to Syria - though Israeli warplanes struck the highway linking Beirut to the Syrian capital of Damascus early Friday, closing the country's main artery and further isolating Lebanon from the outside world.

Beirut residents stayed indoors, leaving the streets of the capital largely empty. Others packed supermarkets to stock up on goods. Long lines formed on gas stations, with many quickly running out of gas.

Israel said its attacks were to prevent the movement of the captured soldiers and hamper Hezbollah's military capacity. It said it had information Hezbollah was trying to take the two soldiers to its ally, Iran - an allegation denied by the Iranian Foreign Ministry.

Israel launched an offensive in Gaza against Hamas, whose fighters are holding another Israeli soldier captured two weeks ago.

Early Friday, Israeli aircraft struck targets in several parts of Gaza and a Palestinian was killed when an Israeli tank shell struck his truck, officials said. There were no reports of injury in the air raids, which damaged a main road and offices and training camps of militants.

The shockwaves from the fighting on two fronts began to be felt as oil prices surged Thursday to a record above $78 a barrel in world markets, also agitated by the threat of supply disruptions in the Middle East and beyond.

President Bush, speaking of the Lebanon offensive, backed Israel's right to defend itself and denounced Hezbollah as "a group of terrorists who want to stop the advance of peace."

But he also expressed worries the Israeli assault could cause the fall of Lebanon's anti-Syrian government. "We're concerned about the fragile democracy in Lebanon," Bush said in Germany.

The European Union took a harsher tone, criticizing Israel for using what it called "disproportionate" force. EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said he was planning a peace mission.

The Arab League called an emergency meeting of foreign ministers in Cairo on Saturday, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas warned that Israel's Lebanon offensive "is raising our fears of a new regional war."

Egypt launched a diplomatic bid to resolve the crisis, amid apparent frustration among moderate Arab nations that Hezbollah - and by implication its top ally Syria - had started the fight with Israel.

Saudi Arabia, the Arab world's political heavyweight and economic powerhouse, accused Hezbollah guerrillas - without naming them - of "uncalculated adventures" that precipitated the latest Middle East crisis.

"The kingdom sees that it is time for those elements to alone shoulder the full responsibility for this irresponsible behavior and that the burden of ending the crisis falls on them alone," according to a Saudi official quoted by the Saudi Press Agency.

Hezbollah's rocket attack on the port city of Haifa was its deepest such strike into northern Israel yet. No injuries were reported in Haifa, home to 270,000 residents and a major oil refinery 30 miles south of the border. Still, the Israeli ambassador to the United States, Daniel Ayalon, called the attack "a major, major escalation."

"Those who fire into such a densely populated area will pay a heavy price," said David Baker, an official in the Israeli prime minister's office.

Hezbollah's deputy leader denied its fighters fired on Haifa, but Israel blamed the group, which had warned earlier in the day it would strike the city if Beirut were targeted. Israeli officials said it was a Katyusha rocket launched from southern Lebanon. Witnesses also confirmed that a rocket hit the city.

The militants also fired rockets at four other northern Israeli towns, killing a 40-year-old woman on her balcony in Nahariya and a man in Safad.

Soon the Haifa attack, Israeli helicopter gunships raked fuel depots at Beirut's seaside airport with machine guns and missiles. The tanks exploded, sending gigantic flames into the night sky just outside Beirut. Earlier in the day, warplanes shut down the airport with strikes that pounded craters into all three of its runways, and Israeli warships sealed Lebanon's ports.

Among the Lebanese dead were a family of 10 and another family of seven, killed when strikes hit their homes in the southern village of Dweir.

"It's a massacre," said Abu Talal, a 48-year-old resident who joined scores of Hezbollah supporters and townspeople at the funeral of Shiite cleric Sheik Adel Akkash, who was killed along with his wife and eight children, ages 3 months to 15 years.

"This is the (Israeli) arrogance. The raids aim to terrorize us, but morale is high."

The last time Israeli strikes targeted Beirut was in 2000, when warplanes hit a power station in the hills above the city after a Hezbollah attack killed Israeli soldiers. Israel has not hit Beirut's airport since its 1982 invasion of Lebanon and occupation of the capital.

Israel says it holds Lebanon responsible for Hezbollah's snatching of the two soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser, 31 and Eldad Regev, 26. The Lebanese government insisted it had no prior knowledge of the move and did not condone it - and even withdrew its ambassador to the U.S. after he made comments seemingly in support of the guerrillas.

Hezbollah fighters operate with almost total autonomy in southern Lebanon, and the government has no control over their actions. But the government has long resisted international pressure to disarm the group. Any attempt to disarm Hezbollah by force could lead to sectarian conflict.

Associated Press reporter Karin Laub in Jerusalem contributed to this report.


AP-NY-07-13-06 2108EDT

Three Lebanese Killed, 55 Wounded as Offensive Widens
By SAM F. GHATTAS, AP

BEIRUT, Lebanon (July 14) - Israeli warplanes punished the Lebanese capital on Friday, blasting the airport for a second day, knocking down a bridge, igniting fuel storage tanks and cutting the main highway to Syria. Hezbollah fired more rockets at Israeli towns across the border.

Police said three people were killed and 55 wounded in the airstrikes, raising the death toll to 60 on the third day of fighting.

Israel's target was Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militant Shiite faction which has a free hand in southern Lebanon and also holds seats in parliament. Hezbollah began the current conflict Wednesday with a cross-border raid that captured two of Israel's soldiers.

Israel said it was determined to beat Hezbollah back and deny the militant fighters positions they have held along the border since 2000.

On Thursday Israel unleashed a furious military campaign on the Lebanon's main airport, highways, military and other targets Thursday, retaliating for scores of Hezbollah guerrilla rockets that rained down on Israel and reached as far as Haifa, its third-largest city, for the first time.

The sudden burst of violence sending shock waves through a region already traumatized by Iraq and the ongoing battles in the Gaza Strip between Israel and Hamas. It shattered the relative calm in Lebanon that followed Israel's pullout from its occupied zone in south Lebanon in 2000 and the withdrawal of Syrian forces last year.

Fears mounted among Arab and European governments that violence in Lebanon could spiral out of control.

The Lebanese government, caught in the middle, pleaded for a cease-fire. The government has no control over Hezbollah but has long resisted international pressure to disarm the group. Any attempt to disarm Hezbollah by force could lead to sectarian conflict.

Israeli warplanes stepped up the pressure Friday. The Israeli army said strikes in and around Beirut targeted a fuel tank, two bridges, a highway linking Beirut to the Syrian capital and the southern suburbs where Hezbollah has its political headquarters.

Hezbollah fired more rockets at northern Israel, including 10 at the town of Safed, nine miles from the border, the Israeli military said. There were no casualties. The attacks brought to 150 the number of rockets Hezbollah had fired at Israel in last 48 hours.

Anti-aircraft fire echoed as Israel jets roared over the Lebanese capital. It was not immediately clear who was firing at the planes as both the Lebanese army and Hezbollah have anti-aircraft artillery.

The bombs and missiles knocked down a bridge and badly damaged another. They sheared off the facades of buildings, sending walls and balconies crashing onto parked cars.

Lebanese television stations said the jets damaged a plaza where Hezbollah leaders hold rallies. The TV footage showed broken glass and debris covering streets and a young man with bloodied face and chest walking from a damaged apartment.

Friday morning's violence came hours after Israel dropped leaflets in the area warning residents to avoid areas where Hezbollah operates.

Israeli analysts warned that Syria, which supports Hezbollah and plays host to Hamas' political leader Khaled Mashaal, could be Israel's next target.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said any Israeli attack against Syria would be an aggression on the whole Islamic world and warned of a harsh reaction, the official Iranian news agency reported Friday.

The agency said Ahmadinejad made the comments in a telephone call to Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Israel's offensive was among its heaviest in Lebanon since it invaded the neighboring country and occupied its capital 24 years ago. Two days of Israeli bombings killed 48 Lebanese and two Kuwaitis and wounded 103. Two Israeli civilians and eight Israeli soldiers have also been killed, the military's highest death toll in four years.

With Beirut's international airport closed after Israeli bombs ripped apart its runway, many tourists were trapped while others drove over the mountains to Syria - though Israeli warplanes struck the highway linking Beirut to the Syrian capital of Damascus early Friday, closing the country's main artery and further isolating Lebanon from the outside world.

Beirut residents stayed indoors, leaving the streets of the capital largely empty. Others packed supermarkets to stock up on goods. Long lines formed on gas stations, with many quickly running out of gas.

Israel said its attacks were to prevent the movement of the captured soldiers and hamper Hezbollah's military capacity. It said it had information Hezbollah was trying to take the two soldiers to its ally, Iran - an allegation denied by the Iranian Foreign Ministry.

Israel launched an offensive in Gaza against Hamas, whose fighters are holding another Israeli soldier captured two weeks ago.

Early Friday, Israeli aircraft struck targets in several parts of Gaza and a Palestinian was killed when an Israeli tank shell struck his truck, officials said. There were no reports of injury in the air raids, which damaged a main road and offices and training camps of militants.

At the United Nations, the United States blocked an Arab-backed resolution that would have demanded Israel halt its military offensive in the Gaza Strip, the first U.N. Security Council veto in nearly two years.

The shockwaves from the fighting on two fronts began to be felt as oil prices surged to above $78 a barrel in world markets, also agitated by the threat of supply disruptions in the Middle East and beyond.

President Bush, speaking of the Lebanon offensive, backed Israel's right to defend itself and denounced Hezbollah as "a group of terrorists who want to stop the advance of peace."

But he also expressed worries the Israeli assault could cause the fall of Lebanon's anti-Syrian government. "We're concerned about the fragile democracy in Lebanon," Bush said in Germany.

The European Union took a harsher tone, criticizing Israel for using what it called "disproportionate" force. EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said he was planning a peace mission.

The Arab League called an emergency meeting of foreign ministers in Cairo on Saturday, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas warned that Israel's Lebanon offensive "is raising our fears of a new regional war."

Egypt launched a diplomatic bid to resolve the crisis, amid apparent frustration among moderate Arab nations that Hezbollah - and by implication its top ally Syria - had started the fight with Israel.

Saudi Arabia, the Arab world's political heavyweight and economic powerhouse, accused Hezbollah guerrillas - without naming them - of "uncalculated adventures" that precipitated the latest Middle East crisis.

-"The kingdom sees that it is time for those elements to alone shoulder the full responsibility for this irresponsible behavior and that the burden of ending the crisis falls on them alone," according to a Saudi official quoted by the Saudi Press Agency.

Among the Lebanese dead were a family of 10 and another family of seven, killed when strikes hit their homes in the southern village of Dweir.

"It's a massacre," said Abu Talal, a 48-year-old resident who joined scores of Hezbollah supporters and townspeople at the funeral of Shiite cleric Sheik Adel Akkash, who was killed along with his wife and eight children, ages 3 months to 15 years.

"This is the (Israeli) arrogance. The raids aim to terrorize us, but morale is high."

The last time Israeli strikes targeted Beirut was in 2000, when warplanes hit a power station in the hills above the city after a Hezbollah attack killed Israeli soldiers.

Associated Press reporter Karin Laub in Jerusalem contributed to this report


07-14-06 05:33 EDT

Home of Militant Leader Destroyed; Oil Prices Set Record
By SAM F. GHATTAS, AP

BEIRUT, Lebanon (July 14) -- Israel destroyed the home and office of Hezbollah's leader Friday and tightened its seal on Lebanon, blasting its air and road links to the outside world to punish the guerrilla group - and with it, the country - for the capture of two Israeli soldiers.

Hezbollah's Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said "You wanted an open war and we are ready for an open war," addressing Israelis in an audiotape played on Hezbollah's Al-Manar television. The speech apparently was prerecorded and did not refer to the missile attack.

Nasrallah and his family were safe after the Israeli missiles demolished the two buildings in Beirut's crowded southern neighborhoods, the militant group said.

Hezbollah hit an Israeli warship in Lebanese waters that had been firing missiles into southern Beirut. Al-Jazeera reported the Israeli military was searching for four missing troops. Israeli officials would not immediately comment; an army spokesman said earlier the ship had apparently been struck by a rocket but that the damage was minor and no one was hurt.

Israel's attack on Nasrallah underlined its determination to take the fight directly to Hezbollah's leadership, and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert vowed the massive campaign would continue until the guerrillas were neutralized.

Warplanes again smashed runways at Beirut's airport with hours of airstrikes, trying to render it unusable, and destroyed mountain bridges on the main highway to Syria. Warships blockaded Lebanon's ports for a second day.

Smoke drifted over the capital after strikes exploded fuel tanks at one of Beirut's two main power stations, gradually escalating the damage to Lebanon's key infrastructure. Apartment buildings were shattered by strikes in south Beirut.

In response, Lebanese guerrillas fired at least 50 Katyusha rockets throughout the day, hitting more than a dozen communities across northern Israel.

The death toll in three days of fighting rose to 73 killed in Lebanon - almost all civilians, including five killed Friday - and 12 in Israel, including four killed in rocket attacks. The violence sent shock waves through a region already traumatized by the ongoing battles in the Gaza Strip between Israel and Hamas.

Israel's strikes on the airport and roads and naval blockade all but cut off Lebanon from the world, while hits on infrastructure aimed to exact a price from its government for allowing Hezbollah to operate freely in the south.

At the same time, strikes on Hezbollah - including ones targeting its leadership in south Beirut - aimed to pressure the Shiite Muslim guerrillas to release the Israeli soldiers captured Wednesday and push the militants away from Israel's northern border.

President Bush, in Russia for the G-8 summit, spoke by phone with Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, and "reiterated his position" that the Israeli attacks should limit any impact on civilians, White House spokesman Tony Snow said.

At an emergency U.N. Security Council meeting requested by Lebanon, special envoy Nouhad Mahmoud warned that Israeli attacks "will not resolve the problem, but will further complicate it." Israeli Ambassador Dan Gillerman said Israel had no choice but to react to the "absolutely unprovoked attack" by Hezbollah.

Oil prices rose to above $78 a barrel, and OPEC tried to reassure the market by stressing its commitment to "order and stability."

In a telephone call with U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Olmert said Israel would not halt its offensive until Hezbollah was disarmed. Olmert agreed to let a U.N. team try to mediate a cease-fire, an official close to Olmert said on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad warned Israel against extending its assault into Syria and said the Jewish state couldn't harm Iran, which also backs Hezbollah.

French President Jacques Chirac said Israel's actions were "totally disproportionate" but also condemned Hezbollah's attacks. He implicitly suggested that Syria and Iran might be playing a role in the crisis.

The U.N.'s top humanitarian official, Jan Egeland, said Israel's attacks against transportation infrastructure violated international law and held grave consequences for civilians.

Israeli officials said the campaign by the air force was the biggest since the Israeli invasion in 1982. The only comparable military action since then was the "Grapes of Wrath" offensive in 1996, also sparked by Hezbollah attacks.

But the casualties were mounting faster than in 1996, when at least 165 people were killed in 17 days of fighting. By contrast, 73 people in Lebanon have been killed in only three days of Israel's bombardment.

On the Israeli side, eight soldiers have died and two civilians were killed by Hezbollah rockets on northern towns. At least 11 were wounded in Friday's rocket attacks.

Israel says it holds the government responsible for Hezbollah's actions, but Saniora's Cabinet has insisted it had no prior knowledge of the raid that seized the soldiers and that it did not condone it.

Hezbollah operates with near autonomy in south Lebanon, and the government has resisted international pressure to disarm it - a step that could break the country apart. Saniora's government is dominated by anti-Syrian politicians, some sharply critical of Hezbollah, but the guerrilla group also has two ministers in the Cabinet.

The fighting in Lebanon is Israel's second front. It launched an offensive in the Gaza Strip two weeks ago in response to the June 25 capture by Hamas militants of an Israeli soldier, Cpl. Gilad Shalit.

Throughout the morning, Israeli fighter-bombers pounded runways at Beirut's airport for a second day, apparently trying to ensure its closure after the Lebanese national carrier, Middle East Airlines, managed to evacuate its last five planes to Amman.

Another barrage hit fuel tanks at one of Beirut's two main power stations at Jiye.

For the first time in the assault, strikes targeted the crowded Shiite residential neighborhoods in south Beirut, a stronghold of Hezbollah's leadership.

An initial wave before dawn hit near Hezbollah's security headquarters and targeted roads, damaging two overpasses. The facades of nearby apartment buildings were shorn away, balconies toppled onto cars and the street was littered by glass from shattered windows. Firefighters struggled to put out several blazes.

A young man with blood pouring down his face was shown on Lebanese TV walking out of a damaged apartment building.

An afternoon strike hit an apartment building near Hezbollah's Al-Nour radio station. The radio continued broadcasting, and Hezbollah TV showed smoke billowing from an apartment in the area and firefighters running toward the building.

"I have huge debts and now my store is damaged," said Fadi Haidar, 36, cleaning up broken glass at his appliance shop, which had an estimated $15,000 in damage.

Still, he supported Hezbollah's decision to seize the soldiers.

"Israel is our enemy and every Muslim must make a sacrifice," he said. "As time goes by, they will all realize that Sayyed Nasrallah is right and is working in the interest of Muslims."

Israeli planes also hit transmission antennas for TV stations in the eastern Bekaa Valley, a Hezbollah stronghold.

Warplanes also bombed the highway between Beirut and Damascus - Lebanon's main land link to the outside world - forcing motorists onto mountainside roads.

In northern Israel, 220,000 people hunkered down in bomb shelters amid Hezbollah's rocket barrage.

At least 50 rockets hit seven towns and communities in Israel, including Safad and Nahariya - where two people were killed a day earlier. Since Wednesday, 61 Israelis have been hurt.

The Israeli offensive was causing political waves in Lebanon, with some anti-Syrian politicians accusing Hezbollah of dragging the country into a costly confrontation with Israel.

"Hezbollah is playing a dangerous game that exceeds the border of Lebanon," Druse leader Walid Jumblatt said in comments published Friday. Jumblatt, a leading anti-Syrian figure, also denounced the Israeli attacks.


7/14/2006 16:54:29 EDT

Militant Leader Vows 'Open War' With Israel
By HAMZA HENDAWI, AP

BEIRUT, Lebanon (July 15) - Hezbollah rammed an Israeli warship with an unmanned aircraft rigged with explosives and set it ablaze Friday, Israeli military officials said, after attack jets smashed Lebanon's links to the world one by one and destroyed the headquarters of the Islamic guerrilla group's leader.

The attack on the warship off Beirut's Mediterranean coast - which left four sailors missing - was the most dramatic event on a violent day in the conflict that erupted suddenly Wednesday and appeared to be careening out of control despite pleas from world leaders for restraint on both sides.

During the same attack a civilian merchant ship was hit by a Hezbollah rocket, the Israeli army said. It did not give the nationality of the vessel or say whether there were casualties.

"You wanted an open war and we are ready for an open war," Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said in a taped statement. He vowed to strike even deeper into Israel with rockets.

Israel again bombarded Lebanon's airport and main roads in the most intensive offensive against the country in 24 years. For the first time it struck the crowded Shiite neighborhood of south Beirut around Hezbollah's headquarters, toppling overpasses and sheering facades off apartment buildings. Concrete from balconies smashed into parked cars, and car alarms set off by the blasts blared for hours.

The toll in three days of clashes rose to 73 killed in Lebanon and at least 12 Israelis, as international alarm grew over the fighting and oil prices rose to above $78 a barrel. The U.N. Security Council held an emergency session on the violence, and Lebanon accused Israel of launching "a widespread barbaric aggression."

In addition to the fighting in Lebanon, Israel pressed ahead with its offensive in the Gaza Strip against Hamas, striking the Palestinian economy ministry offices early Saturday.

The Israeli warship, which had been carrying several dozen sailors, was towed to Haifa after suffering heavy damage. The fire was put out after several hours. The military confirmed news reports that four sailors were missing and said a search for them was under way.

The Israeli army said the source of the attack was still under investigation. But military officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the probe, said the ship had been targeted by an unmanned drone.

The explanation indicated Hezbollah has added a new weapon to the arsenal of rockets and mortars it has used against Israel. Hezbollah reconnaissance drones have entered Israeli airspace twice in recent years. In those instances, Israel accused Iran of providing the drone technology to the guerrilla group.

Despite fears the assault could bring down the Western-backed, anti-Syrian government of Lebanon, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert vowed the campaign would continue until Hezbollah guerrillas, who are backed by Syria and Iran, lose their near-control of southern Lebanon bordering Israel.

Olmert agreed in a phone call with U.N. chief Kofi Annan to allow U.N. mediation for a cease-fire - but only if the terms include the disarming of Hezbollah and the return of two Israeli soldiers whose capture by the Muslim guerrillas Wednesday triggered the fighting.

Hezbollah rained dozens of rockets on towns in northern Israel. One rocket hit a home in Meron, killing a woman and her grandson. Some 500,000 Israelis were ordered to stay indoors and away from windows Friday night as a precaution against the rocket fire. Residents in northern border communities were ordered to sleep in bomb shelters, which are found in virtually every Israeli home and apartment building.

Nasrallah was not hurt after the Israeli missiles demolished his headquarters - two buildings in Beirut's southern neighborhoods, the militant group said. Three people died in the airstrikes.

The attack on the warship was apparently timed to coincide with Nasrallah's message on the militant group's television station. "The surprises that I have promised you will start now. Now in the middle of the sea, facing Beirut, the Israeli warship ... look at it burning," Nasrallah boasted.

President Bush, who has backed Israel's right to defend itself, spoke by phone with Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora from a G-8 summit in Russia and "reiterated his position" that the Israeli attacks should limit any impact on civilians, White House spokesman Tony Snow said.

But the promise fell short of the Lebanese leader's request for pressure for a cease-fire.

Israel's campaign appeared to have a two-pronged goal. One was to batter Hezbollah and end its near control of the south on Israel's borders.

"We know it's going to be a long and continuous campaign and operation, but it's very clear. We need to put Hezbollah out of business," Brig. Gen. Ido Nehushtan told The Associated Press.

Israel's army chief, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, said Hezbollah has rockets that can reach at least 40 miles, which would bring more Israeli cities, such as Hadera, within range.

The other goal was to seal off Lebanon by repeatedly striking its airport and main roads - including the coastal highway from north to south and the Beirut-Damascus highway, Lebanon's main land link to the outside world. At the same time, Israel was gradually escalating the damage to the country's infrastructure, painstakingly rebuilt since the civil war ended in 1990.

Israel holds Lebanon responsible for the capture of its two soldiers in a surprise Hezbollah raid; the Lebanese government insists it had nothing to do with the attack. However, Israel wants it to rein in the guerrillas, a move Lebanon has long resisted.

The level of damage inflicted by Israel appeared finely calibrated. For example, a missile punched a hole in a major suspension bridge on the Beirut-Damascus road but did not destroy it, unlike less expensive bridges on the road that were brought down. An Israeli strike hit fuel depots at one of Beirut's two power stations - sending massive fireballs and smoke into the sky - but avoided the station itself.

Throughout the morning, Israeli fighter-bombers pounded runways at Beirut's airport for a second day, apparently trying to ensure its closure after the Lebanese national carrier, Middle East Airlines, managed to evacuate its last five planes to Jordan. One bomb hit close to the terminal building.

Civilian casualties were mounting faster than during Israel's last major offensive in Lebanon, in 1996, an assault also sparked by Hezbollah attacks. In that campaign, 165 people were killed over 17 days, including 100 in the shelling of a U.N. base.

"We are on the right and we shall avenge every attack we endure," said Fadi Haidar, an American-Lebanese who swept up the shattered glass outside his store in south Beirut. "I have huge debts and now my store is damaged. ... But as time goes by, they will all realize that Sayyed Nasrallah is right and is working in the interest of Muslims."

Meanwhile, the U.S. government told Americans in Lebanon to consider leaving when it is safe, and said it was making plans for the evacuation of people who cannot leave on their own. The State Department estimates there are 25,000 U.S. citizens who work or live in Lebanon.

AP correspondents Karin Laub and Josef Federman in Jerusalem, and Sam F. Ghattas and Zeina Karam in Beirut, contributed to this report.


07-15-06 05:24 EDT

By HAMZA HENDAWI, AP

BEIRUT, Lebanon (July 15) - Israeli warplanes renewed attacks on Lebanon early Saturday, targeting bridges and fuel storage tanks and gas stations in the east and south, security officials said.

Hezbollah's Al Manar television station said at least three people were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Hermel, in the eastern Bekaa Valley. But security officials said six members of a family were injured when a rocket hit their house in Hermel.

Israeli fighter jets destroyed two bridges in eastern Lebanon, Lebanese officials said, declining to be named because they are not authorized to talk to the media.

The jets pounded a mountainous area near the border with Syria where radio and satellite TV antennas are located, they said.

"You wanted an open war and we are ready for an open war," Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said in a taped statement. He vowed to strike even deeper into Israel with rockets.

Another strike targeted three bridges south of Beirut early Saturday, officials said.

Israeli jets also destroyed another bridge in the southern market town of Nabatiyeh, the officials said.

Jets also hit six gas stations and fuel tanks were also set ablaze in attacks along the coastal highway linking Beirut to the south of the country.

The Arab Al-Jazeera satellite TV channel also reported that Hezbollah's guerrillas had fired dozens of rockets at the Israeli town of Nahariya by the early hours of the morning.

President Bush on Saturday blamed Hezbollah alone for the escalating violence in the Middle East.

"In my judgment, the best way to stop the violence is to understand why the violence occurred in the first place," Bush said. "And that's because Hezbollah has been launching rocket attacks out of Lebanon into Israel and because Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers."

In southern Lebanon, Israeli troops warned residents of the Lebanese border village of Marwaheen to evacuate in two hours or else the village would be destroyed, security officials said. No reason was given for the Israeli ultimatum.

About 150 Lebanese Sunni Muslim Bedouins left the village Saturday morning and assembled around a U.N. peacekeeping post seeking shelter, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to give statements to the media.

In Jerusalem, an Israeli army spokesman said Saturday that it attacked 44 Hezbollah targets in the past 24 hours, including the group's headquarters, al Manar broadcasting offices and several bridges in Lebanon, one on a Beirut-Damascus road.

The newed violence came even as the Israeli army announced that a missile fired by Hezbollah, not an unmanned drone laden with explosives, had damaged an Israeli warship off the coast of Lebanon.

The attack late Friday alarmed Israel because initial information indicated the guerrillas had used a drone for the first time to attack Israeli forces.

But the army's investigation showed that Hezbollah had fired an Iranian-made missile at the vessel from the shores of Lebanon, said Brig. Gen. Ido Nehushtan.

"We can confirm that it was hit by an Iranian-made missile launched by Hezbollah. We see this as very profound fingerprint of Iranian involvement in Hezbollah," Nehushtan said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Another Hezbollah missile also hit and sank a nearby merchant ship at around the same time, Nehushtan said. He said that ship apparently was Egyptian, but had no other information.

Nehushtan said the body of one of the four Israeli soldiers missing in the attack was found aboard the damaged warship. Other Israeli military officials said two bodies had been found.

Al-Manar TV showed footage of dozens of Lebanese people dancing in the streets to celebrate the announcement of damages inflicted to an Israeli ship.

Israel launched its offensive after Hezbollah guerrillas crossed the Israel-Lebanon border on Wednesday and captured two Israeli soldiers. Israel has bombarded Lebanon's airport and main roads in the most intensive offensive against the country in 24 years, while Hezbollah has launched hundreds of rockets into Israel.

At least 73 Lebanese have died, most of the them civilians in the four-day Israeli offensive. Eight Israeli soldiers and four civilians have been killed in the fighting, and the loss of the sailors threatened to drive the death toll higher.


07-15-06 06:14 EDT

By SAM F. GHATTAS, AP

BEIRUT, Lebanon (July 15) - Israeli warplanes pounded Hezbollah's south Beirut stronghold and roads around the country, killing at least 15 Lebanese as they fled the onslaught. Hezbollah expanded its rocket fire, hitting another of Israel's main cities, and Israel warned that the guerrillas could strike Tel Aviv.

A senior Israeli intelligence official said Iranian troops helped Hezbollah fire a missile that damaged an Israeli warship off the Lebanese coast Friday night.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the information, said about 100 Iranian soldiers are in Lebanon and helped fire the Iranian-made, radar-guided C-102 at the ship that killed one and left three missing.

The Lebanese guerrilla force has shown an increasing sophistication since snatching two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid, sparking Israel's largest assault against Lebanon in 24 years.

"You wanted an open war and we are ready for an open war," Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said in a taped statement.

Five Hezbollah rockets hit Tiberias in northern Israeli on Saturday, causing no injuries - the first rocket attack on Tiberias, about 22 miles south of the border, since the 1973 Mideast War. An Israeli intelligence official said Hezbollah has rockets with ranges of 60 to 120 miles that could reach Tel Aviv, Israel's largest metropolitan area.

At least 88 people have died in Lebanon, most of the them civilians, in the four-day Israeli offensive, sparked by Hezbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid. On the Israeli side, at least 15 have been killed - four civilians and 11 soldiers.

In successive early morning raids that continued through the afternoon, Israeli warplanes pounded roads, destroying one bridge after another, splitting large parts of the country.

At least 12 Lebanese villagers, including women and children, were killed in what appeared to be an Israeli airstrike on a convoy of vehicles evacuation a village near the border with Israel in southern Lebanon, a witness said. The convoy was leaving the village of Marwaheen, which abuts the border, when it was attacked. Associated Press Photographer Nasser Nasser said he counted 12 bodies in two cars that burned from the attack shortly after midday.

At least three civilians were killed in another Israeli airstrike on the main highway linking Lebanon to Syria.

Israel also renewed bombardment of south Beirut suburbs, stronghold of Hezbollah which was blasted by several raids early and late Friday, destroying the headquarters of Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah and his residence. Nasrallah survived unharmed, said Hezbollah TV.

Black smoke billowed from the Haret Hreik neighborhood after four loud impacts reverberated across the Lebanese capital. Witnesses said the planes were attacking Hezbollah's security compound in the area, a sealed-off bloc of buildings where Nasrallah has an office and residence, and where the Shura Council political decision-making body is located.

As the fighting continued unabated, Lebanon sought support from fellow Arabs whose foreign ministers were meeting at an emergency session in Cairo on Saturday to discuss the the worst Israeli attack since the 1982 invasion of the country.

Lebanese Foreign Minister Fawzi Salloukh presented his fellow Arab League members with a draft resolution condemning Israel's military offensive and supporting Lebanon's "right to resist occupation by all legitimate means."

President Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin also discussed the worsening situation, but the two appeared divided on how to restore calm.

Bush blamed Hezbollah and Syria for the escalating violence in the Middle East. "In my judgment, the best way to stop the violence is to understand why the violence occurred in the first place," Bush said. "And that's because Hezbollah has been launching rocket attacks out of Lebanon into Israel and because Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers."

Putin said it was unacceptable to try to reach political goals through abductions and strikes against an independent state. "In this context we consider Israel's concerns to be justified," he said. At the same time, he said, "the use of force should be balanced."

The attack on fleeing Marwaheen residents followed an Israeli warning by a loudspeaker from a facing Israeli military position across the border that residents of Marwaheen had to leave the village by evening. No reason was given for the Israeli ultimatum.

The convoy of several vehicles was hit near the border fence about half a mile from the village.

The residents said they had first gone to a U.N. Ghanaian position to take refugee but they were turned down. There was no immediate confirmation from U.N. peacekeepers, who have a force in southern Lebanon.

At least three civilians were killed in an Israeli airstrike on a bridge on the Beirut-Damascus highway in eastern Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, security officials said.

Israeli warplanes fired four missiles on an overpass linking the eastern city of Chtaura with the Masnaa crossing point on the Lebanese-Syrian border, the officials added.

Jets also hit six gas stations and fuel storage tanks were also set ablaze in attacks along the coastal highway linking Beirut to the south of the country. One bomb dug a 30-foot-deep hole in the coastal highway at Naameh 10 miles south of Beirut, turning a bridge overpass into a heap of concrete and twisted steel.

Residents of nearby buildings swept the glass, fixed blown out windows and doors. Motorists, particularly minivans carrying families fleeing from the south manevered its way through narrow side roads to bypass the blocked sections of the highway.

The jets pounded a mountainous area near the border with Syria where radio and satellite TV antennas are located, they said.

In Jerusalem, an Israeli army spokesman said Saturday that it attacked 44 Hezbollah targets in the past 24 hours, including the group's headquarters, al Manar broadcasting offices and several bridges in Lebanon, one on a Beirut-Damascus road.

The renewed violence came as Israel announced that the navy had retrieved two bodies of four sailors who went missing on Friday after Hezbollah struck a warship off the Lebanese coast.

Israeli military officials said the ship had been struck by Hezbollah missile, shortly after Israel destroyed Nasrallah's office and residence in south Beirut's neighborhood of Haret Hreik.

Nasrallah, addressing supporters in an audiotape broadcast on the group's TV station, vowed to continue the fight.

Israel launched its offensive after Hezbollah guerrillas crossed the Israel-Lebanon border on Wednesday and captured two Israeli soldiers. Israel has bombarded Lebanon's airport and main roads in the most intensive offensive against the country in 24 years, while Hezbollah has launched hundreds of rockets into Israel.

Associated Press reporters Hussein Dakroub and Hamza Hendawi in Beirut, and AP Photographer Nasser Nasser from south Lebanon contributed to this report.


07-15-06 06:14 EDT

Death Toll in Four-Day-Old Conflict Tops 100
By SAM F. GHATTAS, AP

BEIRUT, Lebanon (July 15) - Waves of warplanes thundering through the darkness bombed Beirut's southern suburbs for hours early Sunday, a day after Israel stepped up its air strikes and tightened a noose around this reeling nation.

The Israeli air force on Saturday hit strongholds of the Hezbollah Shiite Muslim guerrilla group, bombed central Beirut for the first time, and pounded seaports and a key bridge. Then, after midnight and until 2:30 a.m., about 18 powerful explosions rocked southern Beirut, where Hezbollah is headquartered and much of the air assault has been aimed since cross-border hostilities erupted Wednesday.

Israeli jets could be heard over the city, much of it darkened because airstrikes have knocked out power stations and the fuel depots feeding them.

Warplanes bombed the Jiyeh power station about 12 miles south of Beirut on Sunday. Firefighters said they didn't have enough water to put out the fire and appealed on Lebanese radio for people who own water tanks to help.

Hezbollah's TV aired footage showing two long columns of smoke rising from buildings into the night sky. Much of Shiite-populated southern Beirut was deserted, its residents having fled east to Lebanon's Bekaa Valley.

Trying to defuse the violence, which began when Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers and killed eight others in a cross-border raid, Lebanon's prime minister indicated he might send his army to take control of southern Lebanon from Hezbollah - a move that might risk civil war.

In a more ominous sign that the struggle could spread, Israel accused Iran of helping launch a missile that damaged an Israeli warship, a charge both Hezbollah and Iran denied.

Hezbollah, meanwhile, fired barrages of rockets ever deeper into Israel, and Israeli officials warned that Tel Aviv, 70 miles inside Israel, could be hit.

The death toll in the four-day-old conflict rose above 100 in Lebanon, and stood at 15 in Israel. Hezbollah denied Israeli media reports that its leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, was hurt in an airstrike Sunday, the Al-Jazeera television said.

Despite worldwide alarm, there was little indication either Western or Arab nations could muster a quick diplomatic solution. In New York, Lebanon accused the United States of blocking a U.N. Security Council statement calling for a cease-fire. Diplomats said Washington for now preferred to see the issue dealt with at this weekend's Group of Eight meeting in Russia and in other ways.

The United States and France, meantime, prepared to evacuate their citizens, and Britain dispatched an aircraft carrier to the eastern Mediterranean in apparent preparation for evacuations.

Choking back tears, Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora went on television to plead with the United Nations to broker a cease-fire for his "disaster-stricken nation."

The Western-backed prime minister, criticizing both Israel and Hezbollah, also pledged to reassert government authority over all Lebanese territory, suggesting his government might deploy the Lebanese army in the south, which Hezbollah effectively controls.

That would meet a repeated U.N. and U.S. demand. But any effort by Saniora's Sunni Muslim-led government to use force against the Shiite Muslim Hezbollah guerrillas could trigger another bloody civil war in Lebanon. Many fear the 70,000-strong army itself might break up along sectarian lines, as it did during the 1975-90 civil war.

Reacting to Saniora's statements, Israel's Vice Premier Shimon Peres said Lebanon must prove it was serious by deploying troops on the border.

"We have to see what they do and not what they say," Peres told Israel's Channel 2 TV.

Iran, meanwhile, denied any role in the fighting, disputing Israeli claims that 100 Iranian soldiers had helped Hezbollah attack an Israeli warship late Friday.

There has been no sign in Lebanon of Iranian Revolutionary Guards for 15 years. But Iran is one of Hezbollah's principal backers along with Syria, providing weapons, money and political support. Many believe Iran and Syria are fueling the battle to show their strength in the region.

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad again condemned Israel's Lebanon offensive Saturday, telling Tehran's state television, "The Zionist regime behaves like Hitler."

In Indonesia, about 5,000 Muslims from a large Islamic political party protested Sunday in Jakarta against Israeli attacks on Lebanon and Gaza. Some held up signs saying "Israel is the real terrorist," while others waved Palestinian flags.

Despite global concerns, there were few signs of diplomatic efforts to halt the fighting.

President Bush, on a trip to Russia, said it was up to Hezbollah "to lay down its arms and to stop attacking." But Russian President Vladimir Putin urged a balanced approach by Israel and said it appeared the nation was pursuing wider goals than the return of abducted soldiers.

Arab foreign ministers, meeting in Cairo, adopted a resolution calling for U.N. Security Council intervention. But moderates led by Saudi Arabia, bickering with Syria and other backers of Hezbollah, denounced the Lebanese guerrilla group's actions in provoking the latest conflict.

In one sign the West expects a drawn-out battle, the U.S. Embassy said it was looking into ways to get Americans in Lebanon to Cyprus. France said it had already decided to send a ferry from Cyprus to evacuate thousands of its nationals. The British were sending two warships, including the carrier Illustrious, toward Lebanon, in apparent preparation for evacuations.

In all, 33 people were killed in Lebanon on Saturday, police said. That raised the Lebanese death toll in the four-day Israeli offensive to 106, mostly civilians. On the Israeli side, at least 15 have been killed, four civilians and 11 soldiers.

Israeli warplanes demolished the last bridge on the main Beirut-Damascus highway - over the Litani River, six miles from the Syrian border - trying to complete their seal on Lebanon.

Four days into the Israeli offensive, Lebanese themselves remained divided over Hezbollah's operation: Some angry and terrified, others proud.

"No one has stood up to Israel the way the resistance (Hezbollah) has," said a 33-year-old housewife, Laila Remeiti, one of about 130 people who have taken refuge at a Beirut government school.

But the toll across the country was clear, with bridges, seaports, military coastal radars and Hezbollah offices all attacked in intensive air raids and sea bombardments Saturday:

Fleeing refugees, including women and children, were cut down on a road adjacent to the Lebanese-Israeli border in an airstrike as they left the village of Marwaheen. The bodies of several children, one headless, were sprawled on the ground. Police said 15 were killed in the afternoon attack and an Associated Press photographer counted 12 bodies in the two cars.

At least three civilians were killed when another Israeli airstrike hit a bridge near the Syrian border, cutting the last land link on the main road to Syria and its capital, Damascus.

In the afternoon, Israeli forces hit central Beirut, striking the port and a lighthouse on a posh seafront boulevard, a few hundred yards from the campus of the American University of Beirut. The seaport is adjacent to downtown Beirut, a district rebuilt at a cost of billions of dollars after the 1975-1990 civil war.

The brunt of the onslaught focused more and more on Hezbollah's top leadership in south Beirut and the eastern city of Baalbek. Ambulances raced to a Baalbek residential neighborhood where black smoke rose from airstrikes. Israel also targeted the headquarters compound of Hezbollah's leadership in a crowded Shiite neighborhood of south Beirut for the second straight day.

Hezbollah in turn struck out repeatedly at Israel. Its rockets hit Tiberias three times on Saturday, the first attack on the city - 22 miles from Lebanon - since the 1973 Mideast war. At least two houses were directly hit, but only a few light injuries were reported, medics said.

Residents were ordered into bomb shelters, and Israeli media reported that hundreds of tourists were fleeing the city. Police used megaphones to urge bathers at the Sea of Galilee to seek shelter.

On Israel's second front, against Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, Israeli aircraft on Saturday struck the Economy Ministry of the Hamas-led Palestinian government and three other targets, killing two people, Palestinian and Israeli officials reported.

Early Sunday, Israeli troops, tanks and attack helicopters were back inside the Gaza Strip again firing missiles and exchanging gunfire with armed Palestinians, signaling that the large-scale operation that began after a soldier was captured last month is still in full swing.

Israeli tanks entered the town of Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza, across the border from an Israeli town, Sderot, frequently hit by Hamas guerrilla rockets. Despite the incursion, militants fired two missiles that landed in Sderot, an AP Television cameraman reported. There was no immediate word on damage or casualties.

Three Hamas gunmen were killed in the renewed Gaza fighting, Hamas said. At least 11 people were wounded in Israeli airstrikes in Beit Hanoun, including a child, hospital officials said.

Israel attacked Gaza on June 28, three days after Hamas-backed militants killed two soldiers and captured a third at an army post just inside Israel.

Associated Press reporters Hussein Dakroub and Hamza Hendawi in Beirut, Nasser Nasser in south Lebanon and Matt Moore in Jerusalem contributed to this report.


7/16/2006 01:34:37 EDT

AP

WASHINGTON (July 15) - The State Department said Saturday it was trying to determine how it might evacuate Americans from besieged Lebanon to the neighboring Mediterranean island of Cyprus, where they could get on commercial planes.


The United States estimates 25,000 Americans live or work in Lebanon. Officials assume far fewer would choose to leave if they could.


The department said it was working with the Pentagon on a plan for helping American citizens depart Lebanon.


Israel imposed a sea, air and land blockade of Lebanon. It was targeting bridges, roads, the international airport and ports in response to a raid by Hezbollah militants into Israel that captured two soldiers and killed eight.


Witnesses said Saturday that Israeli aircraft attacked central Beirut for the first time in a four-day offensive.


The State Department said Friday that Americans in Lebanon should consider leaving when it was safe to do so, and officials made contingency plans for the evacuation of people who cannot leave on their own.


Family members and non-emergency American employees of the U.S. Embassy in Lebanon have been given permission to leave.


Pentagon officials have said they were monitoring the situation and studying options for removing Americans, in anticipation of the State Department requesting help soon with an evacuation. As of late Saturday afternoon, the Pentagon said it had not received such a request.

07/15/06 14:51 EDT

AP

JERUSALEM (July 15) - The Israeli army deployed a Patriot missile battery in the northern city of Haifa on Saturday after four days of intense fighting with Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas, the army said.


The missile defense system cannot destroy Katyusha rockets - hundreds of which have been fired at Israel from Lebanon in recent days - but could protect against surface-to-surface missiles, such as those possessed by Syria, the army said.


Hezbollah has fired more than 350 rockets at northern Israel since Wednesday, killing four Israeli civilians and injuring about 50. Rockets struck Haifa for the first time on Friday.


The recent round of fighting began after Hezbollah killed eight Israeli soldiers and captured two others in a cross-border attack on Wednesday. In response, Israel launched a major military offensive on Lebanon, killing more than 105 Lebanese.


lc-rpm

07/15/06 12:22 EDT

Sunday, 16 July 2006, 02:25 GMT 03:25 UK

Lebanon's prime minister has made an emotional appeal for a ceasefire as Israel continues its attacks sparked by Hezbollah's capture of two soldiers.
Fouad Siniora urged the UN to supervise a truce to end Israeli raids that have killed more than 80 Lebanese.

Hezbollah on Saturday launched rockets at Tiberias in the deepest such attack on Israel. Four Israelis were injured.

Early on Sunday, Israel began a fifth day of bombardments, targeting the group's al-Manar TV station in Beirut.

According to the station, Israeli air-to-ground and gunboat shells hit a bridge on the road from the Beirut to the airport, south of the city centre.

Residential areas in the Haret Hreik and Bir al-Abed districts also came under attack, the TV said.

The Israeli Army has said any responsibility for endangering the civilian population rested with Hezbollah.

Disaster zone

The conflict has also dominated the G8 summit in Russia whose president called for "maximum effort" to defuse tension.

And the Arab League added to calls for the UN to act - its secretary general said the Middle East peace process was dead.

Mr Siniora asked all Lebanese to be united and stand behind their government.

He said his government knew nothing of Hezbollah's border raid that captured the two Israeli soldiers and left eight more dead last Wednesday.

Mr Siniora called the Israeli operation a "murderous machine" but said Lebanon would prevail.

He added: "Lebanon is a disaster zone... and [it] pleads to its friends in the world to rush to its aid."

Israel expanded its bombardment on Saturday, attacking a large number of targets across the country.

Warplanes fired rockets on the Lebanon-Syrian border and hit the centre of Beirut for the first time on Saturday.

Eighteen Lebanese civilians, including women and children, were killed on the coastal road to the southern city of Tyre when their vehicles were struck by missiles as they fled a village.

Hezbollah's offices in Beirut were destroyed. The militant group injured four Israelis in cross-border rocket attacks on Tiberias.

Israel has deployed Patriot interceptor missiles in the northern port city of Haifa which was hit by rockets earlier.

It also warned Lebanon not to fire on Israeli aircraft.

"Israel has avoided harming the Lebanese army until now, but Israel will not hesitate to strike at any party that operates against it," a military spokeswoman said.

'Wider objectives'

In Cairo, Arab foreign ministers holding an emergency conference blamed the current outbreak of violence on the failure of the Middle East peace process.

Secretary General Amr Moussa said the process was dead.

The final resolution of the meeting called for an immediate ceasefire and a plan to take the Arab-Israeli conflict back to the UN Security Council.

At the G8 summit in St Petersburg, Russian President Vladimir Putin called for the world to make the "maximum effort" to defuse tension.

He condemned "terrorist acts that involve kidnapping people".

But he added: "We have the impression that, besides rescuing the servicemen who have been abducted, Israel is pursuing other, wider objectives."

US President George W Bush put the blame squarely on Hezbollah and said Syria should act to curb the group's operations.

Thousands of foreigners are leaving Beirut, leaving its economy in tatters.

Countries including the US and France are making plans to evacuate their nationals from Lebanon.

Sunday, 16 July 2006, 05:17 GMT 06:17 UK

The UN Security Council has failed to agree on a statement calling for a ceasefire in Lebanon, despite pleas from the Lebanese prime minister.
Lebanese diplomats blamed the US for blocking the ceasefire move.

Early on Sunday, Israel began a fifth day of bombardments as part of an operation that followed Hezbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers.

Hezbollah has in turn maintained its rocket fire into Israel.

Power station

The current president of the UN Security Council, French ambassador Jean-Marc de La Sabliere, said there would be "no agreement tonight" on a truce statement following a closed-door session late on Saturday.

Lebanese representative Nouhad Mahmoud said he was "very disappointed" and that this would "send a very wrong signal not only to the Lebanese people, but to Arab people".

On Saturday, Lebanon's Prime Minister Fouad Siniora had made an emotional appeal for a UN-supervised ceasefire to end Israeli raids that have killed more than 80 Lebanese.

Israel maintained its raids on Sunday, targeting Hezbollah's al-Manar television building, the Israeli army said.

Israeli television reported that Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrullah was wounded in a raid but al-Jazeera television quoted Hezbollah as denying this.

Associated Press news agency said Israel had bombed the Jiyeh power station south of Beirut and that firefighters did not have enough water to douse the flames.

Al-Manar TV said Israeli air-to-ground and gunboat shells had hit a bridge on the road from Beirut to the airport.

Residential areas in the Haret Hreik and Bir al-Abed districts had also come under attack, the TV said.

In attacks on Saturday, Israeli warplanes fired rockets on the Lebanon-Syrian border.

And 18 Lebanese civilians, including women and children, were killed on the coastal road to the southern city of Tyre when their vehicles were struck by missiles as they fled a village.

The Israeli army has said any responsibility for endangering the civilian population rests with Hezbollah.

Peace 'dead'

The conflict has dominated the current G8 summit in Russia. Host President Vladimir Putin called for "maximum effort" to defuse tension.

He condemned "terrorist acts that involve kidnapping people".

But he added: "We have the impression that, besides rescuing the servicemen who have been abducted, Israel is pursuing other, wider objectives."

US President George W Bush put the blame squarely on Hezbollah and said Syria should act to curb the group's operations.

And in Cairo, Arab foreign ministers holding an emergency conference blamed the current outbreak of violence on the failure of the Middle East peace process.

Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa said the process was dead.

The final resolution of the meeting called for an immediate ceasefire and a plan to take the Arab-Israeli conflict back to the UN Security Council.

Sunday 16 July 2006, 5:08 Makka Time, 2:08 GMT

Lebanon has accused the United States of blocking a Security Council statement calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, and said the impotence of the UN's most powerful body sent wrong signals to small countries.


Nouhad Mahmoud, the Lebanese special envoy, said: "It's unacceptable because people are still under shelling, bombardment and destruction is going on ... and people are dying."

Qatar, the only Arab nation on the council, received widespread support during closed council consultations for a press statement calling for an immediate ceasefire, restraint in the use of force, and the protection of civilians caught in the conflict, council diplomats said.

But Cesar Mayoral, Argentina's UN ambassador, said the United States objected to any statement and Britain opposed calling for a ceasefire.

The US and Britain want to wait for the outcome of this weekend's Group of Eight meeting in Russia, an Arab League foreign ministers meeting, and a mission sent to the Middle East by Kofi Annan, Mayoral and other diplomats said.

No agreement

Jean-Marc de La Sabliere, the French ambassador to the UN and the current council president, confirmed that "there was no agreement on a text tonight, but we will meet on Monday".

But Mahmoud protested, saying while innocent civilians are killed "here we are impotent in having ... some stand to address the situation".

"It sends very wrong signals not only to the Lebanese people but to all Arab people, to all small nations that we are left to the might of Israel and nobody is doing anything," he said.

"We want a resolution. We want a ceasefire. We want very clear stand from the Security Council. But concession after concession arrived to the press release - and even the press release was not possible to issue."

Change

Lebanon's pro-Western government came to power after the assassination of Rafik al-Hariri, the former prime minister, in February 2005. This led to Syria's withdrawal of its forces from its smaller neighbour, ending a 29-year occupation.

"We have many reasons to expect much more from the Security Council," said Mahmoud, an ambassador who was sent from Beirut.

And from the United States?

"They were always supportive in the last one-and-a-half years, but when it comes to Israel it seems things change," he said.


AP

Sunday, 16 July 2006, 03:53 GMT 04:53 UK

Israeli forces have moved back into the northern Gaza Strip, a week after withdrawing during an operation to recover a captured soldier.
Troops and tanks, backed by helicopters, moved towards the town of Beit Hanoun early on Sunday.

Three were killed and eight wounded by an Israeli air strike, Palestinian medical sources said.

Israeli forces have been attacking targets in Gaza for nearly three weeks since the capture of Cpl Gilad Shalit.

Israeli troops are also involved in attacks inside Lebanon after Hezbollah guerrillas there captured two more Israeli soldiers.

Air strikes

Beit Hanoun is an area often used by militants for launching rockets into Israel.

Small groups of militants exchanged fire with the advancing Israeli forces. The Israeli town of Sderot is a frequent target for Palestinian rockets.

Israel's declared goal is the return of Cpl Shalit and an end to the rocket fire.

Its forces withdrew from the northern Gaza Strip a week ago after completing its first operation. Forces then entered the southern Gaza Strip but before Sunday's incursion all ground forces had left.

Air strikes have continued throughout, however.

On Saturday, an Israeli air strike on a house in Gaza City killed one person and injured several, including young children, Palestinian sources said.

Israel said Hamas militants used the building as an ammunition depot and were preparing rockets there.

A second Palestinian died in northern Gaza under helicopter fire.

The economy ministry of the Hamas-led Palestinian government was also hit by air strikes and badly damaged but there were no reports of casualties.

Sunday, 16 July 2006, 15:40 GMT 16:40 UK

Rockets fired by Hezbollah militants in Lebanon have killed at least eight people and wounded dozens of others in the coastal Israeli city of Haifa.

It is the worst attack on Israel since the clashes with Lebanon began.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said the strike on Israel's third city would have "far-reaching consequences".

Hours later, 10 Lebanese people died in an Israeli air raid on south Lebanon as Israel continued strikes, which have claimed more than 100 Lebanese lives.

The Israeli air strikes began after Hezbollah seized two Israeli soldiers in a raid into Israel on Wednesday.

In other developments:


Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah denounces Israel for attacking Lebanese civilians and villages, in his first televised appearance since the offensive
Iran's foreign ministry denies Israeli allegations that it supplied missiles to Hezbollah and warns Israel it will incur "unimaginable losses" if it attacks fellow Hezbollah supporters Syria
The Israeli military recovers the bodies of three sailors missing after their ship was hit by a Hezbollah missile on Friday, bringing the number of Israeli troops killed in the Lebanon offensive to 12
Israel raises the rocket alert threat as far south as Tel Aviv


European Union Foreign Policy chief Javier Solana arrives in Beirut for talks on the crisis

Pools of blood


Correspondents say the large death-count in a strike on Israel's third-largest city has rattled the whole country.

It is the second time Haifa has been hit by Hezbollah rockets in recent days.

In a first salvo on Saturday at least 13 rockets were reported to have landed in the city.

The eight people who died were part of a train repair crew working at a railway depot.

The BBC's Wyre Davies at the depot says that the rocket, believed to be a Katyusha rocket, crashed through the roof.

About 50 people were also injured.

Our correspondent says that the devastation is still apparent, with pools of blood everywhere.

The attack on Haifa raised Israel's civilian death toll from the fighting to 12.

Second wave

According to Israel Radio a second wave of four rockets then hit, one landing in a city street. People driving on the roads in Haifa reportedly abandoned their cars as they fled from the onslaught.

Following the depot attack a new barrage of rockets hit to the north of the city in Kiryat Motzkim and Kiryat Haim.

Hezbollah has claimed responsibility for the attacks, saying it was retaliation for the deaths of Lebanese civilians and the destruction of the country's infrastructure during the Israeli air raids.

Israel has carried out a heavy bombing campaign across Lebanon, hitting Hezbollah sites, but also a wide range of civilian targets.

City exodus

The BBC's Ian Pannell in Beirut says that there have already been a number of Israeli air strikes against Lebanese targets on Sunday.

In the southern suburbs of Beirut, Hezbollah's al-Manar TV was attacked.

A major power station in Beirut was also struck.

There was also a raid in the eastern city of Baalbek, where local Hezbollah leaders were believed to have gathered.

US security teams have landed at the US Embassy in Beirut to start planning the evacuation of Americans.

Foreign nationals have been leaving Lebanon to escape the violence.

As the violence has escalated the number of locals attempting to flee has grown, but with the Israelis targeting the border areas and nearby roads, this has become increasingly difficult.

Eight Killed in Attack on Haifa
By SAM F. GHATTAS, AP

BEIRUT, Lebanon (July 16) - Waves of warplanes thundering through the darkness bombed Beirut's southern suburbs for hours Sunday, and Hezbollah guerillas fired rockets into Israel's third-largest city, killing eight people and wounding seven.

A barrage of rockets pounded the northern Israeli city of Haifa in the worst strike on Israel since violence broke out along the border with Lebanon last week. One of the rockets hit a storage room at the train station, killing eight people, Israeli police said.

Hours later, the guerrillas launched a new onslaught of rockets at Haifa and other communities across northern Israel, causing more injuries, authorities said. Rockets hit Kiryat Motzkim and Kiryat Haim, north of Haifa, and the northern towns of Acco and Nahariya. Area residents were told to head to bomb shelters.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert warned there would be "far-reaching consequences" for the rocket attacks.

Hezbollah said on its TV station that it fired dozens of rockets at Haifa and targeted the refinery "after the enemy continued all night their destructive shelling" of Beirut's southern suburbs and other areas.

It was the second time Hezbollah rockets hit Haifa. Israel responded to the first strike Thursday by stepping up its airstrikes in Lebanon, which it began last week after Hezbollah militants captured two soldiers in a cross-border raid.

About 18 powerful explosions rocked southern Beirut _where Hezbollah is headquartered — for more than two hours after midnight Sunday. A day earlier, the Israeli air force hit strongholds of the Hezbollah Shiite Muslim guerrilla group, bombed central Beirut for the first time, and pounded seaports and a key bridge.

Israeli jets could be heard over the city Sunday, much of it darkened because airstrikes have knocked out power stations and the fuel depots feeding them. Warplanes bombed the major Jiyeh power station about 12 miles south of Beirut on Sunday.

Hezbollah's TV aired footage showing two long columns of smoke rising from buildings into the night sky. Much of Shiite-populated southern Beirut was deserted, its residents having fled east to Lebanon's Bekaa Valley.

Trying to defuse the violence, which began when Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers and killed eight others in a cross-border raid, Lebanon's prime minister indicated he might send his army to take control of southern Lebanon from Hezbollah — a move that might risk civil war.

In a more ominous sign that the struggle could spread, Israel accused Iran of helping launch a missile that damaged an Israeli warship, a charge both Hezbollah and Iran denied.

Hezbollah, meanwhile, fired barrages of rockets ever deeper into Israel, and Israeli officials warned that Tel Aviv, 70 miles inside Israel, could be hit.

The death toll in the four-day-old conflict rose above 100 in Lebanon, and stood at 24 in Israel. Hezbollah denied Israeli media reports that its leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, was hurt in an airstrike Sunday, the Al-Jazeera television said.

Despite worldwide alarm, there was little indication either Western or Arab nations could muster a quick diplomatic solution. In New York, Lebanon accused the United States of blocking a U.N. Security Council statement calling for a cease-fire. Diplomats said Washington for now preferred to see the issue dealt with at this weekend's Group of Eight meeting in Russia and in other ways.

The United States and France, meantime, prepared to evacuate their citizens, and Britain dispatched an aircraft carrier to the eastern Mediterranean in apparent preparation for evacuations.

Choking back tears, Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora went on television to plead with the United Nations to broker a cease-fire for his "disaster-stricken nation."

The Western-backed prime minister, criticizing both Israel and Hezbollah, also pledged to reassert government authority over all Lebanese territory, suggesting his government might deploy the Lebanese army in the south, which Hezbollah effectively controls.

That would meet a repeated U.N. and U.S. demand. But any effort by Saniora's Sunni Muslim-led government to use force against the Shiite Muslim Hezbollah guerrillas could trigger another bloody civil war in Lebanon. Many fear the 70,000-strong army itself might break up along sectarian lines, as it did during the 1975-90 civil war.

Reacting to Saniora's statements, Israel's Vice Premier Shimon Peres said Lebanon must prove it was serious by deploying troops on the border.

"We have to see what they do and not what they say," Peres told Israel's Channel 2 TV.

Iran, meanwhile, denied any role in the fighting, disputing Israeli claims that 100 Iranian soldiers had helped Hezbollah attack an Israeli warship late Friday.

There has been no sign in Lebanon of Iranian Revolutionary Guards for 15 years. But Iran is one of Hezbollah's principal backers along with Syria, providing weapons, money and political support. Many believe Iran and Syria are fueling the battle to show their strength in the region.

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad again condemned Israel's Lebanon offensive Saturday, telling Tehran's state television, "The Zionist regime behaves like Hitler."

In Indonesia, about 5,000 Muslims from a large Islamic political party protested Sunday in Jakarta against Israeli attacks on Lebanon and Gaza.

Despite global concerns, there were few signs of diplomatic efforts to halt the fighting.

President Bush, on a trip to Russia, said it was up to Hezbollah "to lay down its arms and to stop attacking." But Russian President Vladimir Putin urged a balanced approach by Israel and said it appeared the nation was pursuing wider goals than the return of abducted soldiers.

Arab foreign ministers, meeting in Cairo, adopted a resolution calling for U.N. Security Council intervention. But moderates led by Saudi Arabia, bickering with Syria and other backers of Hezbollah, denounced the Lebanese guerrilla group's actions in provoking the latest conflict.

In one sign the West expects a drawn-out battle, the U.S. Embassy said it was looking into ways to get Americans in Lebanon to Cyprus. France said it had already decided to send a ferry from Cyprus to evacuate thousands of its nationals. The British were sending two warships, including the carrier Illustrious, toward Lebanon, in apparent preparation for evacuations.

In all, 33 people were killed in Lebanon on Saturday, police said. That raised the Lebanese death toll in the four-day Israeli offensive to 106, mostly civilians. On the Israeli side, at least 15 have been killed, four civilians and 11 soldiers.

Israeli warplanes demolished the last bridge on the main Beirut-Damascus highway — over the Litani River, six miles from the Syrian border — trying to complete their seal on Lebanon.

Bridges, seaports, military coastal radars and Hezbollah offices were all attacked in intensive air raids and sea bombardments Saturday:

_Fleeing refugees, including women and children, were cut down on a road adjacent to the Lebanese-Israeli border in an airstrike as they left the village of Marwaheen. The bodies of several children, one headless, were sprawled on the ground. Police said 15 were killed in the afternoon attack and an Associated Press photographer counted 12 bodies in the two cars.

_At least three civilians were killed when another Israeli airstrike hit a bridge near the Syrian border, cutting the last land link on the main road to Syria and its capital, Damascus.

_In the afternoon, Israeli forces hit central Beirut, striking the port and a lighthouse on a posh seafront boulevard, a few hundred yards from the campus of the American University of Beirut.

_The brunt of the onslaught focused more and more on Hezbollah's top leadership in south Beirut and the eastern city of Baalbek. Ambulances raced to a Baalbek residential neighborhood where black smoke rose from airstrikes. Israel also targeted the headquarters compound of Hezbollah's leadership in a crowded Shiite neighborhood of south Beirut for the second straight day.

Hezbollah in turn struck out repeatedly at Israel. Its rockets hit Tiberias three times on Saturday, the first attack on the city — 22 miles from Lebanon — since the 1973 Mideast war. At least two houses were directly hit, but only a few light injuries were reported, medics said.

Residents were ordered into bomb shelters, and Israeli media reported that hundreds of tourists were fleeing the city. Police used megaphones to urge bathers at the Sea of Galilee to seek shelter.

On Israel's second front, against Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, Israeli aircraft on Saturday struck the Economy Ministry of the Hamas-led Palestinian government and three other targets, killing two people, Palestinian and Israeli officials reported.

Early Sunday, Israeli troops, tanks and attack helicopters were back inside the Gaza Strip again firing missiles and exchanging gunfire with armed Palestinians, signaling that the large-scale operation that began after a soldier was captured last month is still in full swing.

Israeli tanks entered the town of Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza, across the border from an Israeli town, Sderot, frequently hit by Hamas guerrilla rockets. Despite the incursion, militants fired two missiles that landed in Sderot, an AP Television cameraman reported. There was no immediate word on damage or casualties.

07-16-06 06:54 EDT