Hizbollah kills 11 on Israel's deadliest day
Pastor Dale Morgan
Friday August 4, 1:03 AM Reuters
*Hizbollah kills 11 on Israel's deadliest day*
By Andrew Marshall
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Hizbollah guerrillas killed eight people in a rocket
barrage on Israel and three Israeli soldiers in fighting in Lebanon on
Thursday, the deadliest day of the war for Israel, as world powers
struggled to end the conflict.
Hizbollah has continued to unleash rockets and battle on the ground in
Lebanon despite Israeli assertions that 23 days of air and ground
attacks have dealt the guerrilla group a heavy blow.
Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said the war had killed 900 people
in Lebanon and wounded 3,000, with a third of the casualties children
under 12. He said a million Lebanese, a quarter of the population, had
been displaced and infrastructure devastated. The Reuters tally of
Lebanon deaths is at least 683.
Sixty-seven Israelis have been killed in the war including 40 soldiers.
Al Arabiya television said a fourth Israeli soldier had been killed in
Thursday's fighting.
The United States, France and Britain hope for a U.N. Security Council
resolution within a week that would call for a truce and maybe
strengthen existing U.N. peacekeepers until a more robust force can be
formed, U.N. officials said.
"I'm now hopeful we will have such a resolution down very shortly and
agreed within the next few days," Prime Minister Tony Blair said. "The
purpose of that will be to bring about an immediate ceasefire and then
put in place the conditions for the international force to come in."
But splits between the United States and France, a possible leader of
the new force, over the timing of a ceasefire have complicated
diplomatic efforts to end the fighting.
France's U.N. ambassador said he was less confident that a Security
Council resolution could be adopted within days.
"Yesterday morning I was confident that we could have a resolution
adopted in the coming days, but by the end of the day I was less
confident," Jean-Marc de la Sabliere said.
The Lebanon war, launched after Hizbollah snatched two Israeli soldiers
in a raid across the border on July 12, has coincided with an Israeli
offensive in the Gaza Strip to recover another captured soldier and halt
Palestinian rocket fire.
Israeli forces killed five Palestinian gunmen and three civilians,
including a 10-year-old boy, in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, witnesses
said. Israel's offensive in the Strip, which it quit last year, has cost
at least 161 Palestinian lives.
AIR STRIKES
Israeli aircraft launched strikes on 70 targets in southern Lebanon and
Beirut overnight.
Jets bombed Hizbollah-dominated suburbs of Beirut for the first time in
days and hit a bridge in the northern Akkar region, as well as targets
in the eastern Bekaa Valley and roads near the Syrian border, a Lebanese
security source said.
Planes repeatedly bombed targets around the southern town of Nabatiyeh
and shelling cut a road in the southern Bekaa Valley. Heavy Israeli air
strikes and shelling also hit the area around the southern village of
Blat, north of Marjayoun.
Israel is expanding the ground war in southern Lebanon. Seven brigades,
or up to 10,000 troops, were fighting Hizbollah on Thursday, Israeli
army radio said.
The army has carved out a "security zone" of 20 villages in south
Lebanon up to six km (four miles) from the border and will stay until an
international force arrives, Israeli TV said.
U.N. peacekeepers of the UNIFIL force said the Israelis had made two new
incursions into Lebanon in the past 24 hours and kept hold of five other
areas previously seized. Lebanese security sources said Hizbollah
fighters attacked Israeli units using anti-tank rockets, mortars and
assault rifles.
A Lebanese security source said 80 Hizbollah fighters had been killed so
far -- well below the Israeli estimate.
An Israeli inquiry into Sunday's bombing of Qana, where up to 54
Lebanese civilians died, said the military had made a mistake, but
accused Hizbollah of using civilians as human shields.
Amnesty International said the probe was inadequate.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in remarks published on Thursday
he expected a U.N. vote on a truce next week.
He said U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice did not expect a truce
to end fighting in Lebanon in the next few days.
The United States and France, diplomats said, are ironing out
differences on an initial resolution calling for a truce, a buffer zone
and the disarmament of Hizbollah.
But Paris has insisted it will not send troops without a truce and an
agreement in principle on the framework for a long-term peace deal by
Israel, Hizbollah and the Beirut government. Washington wants a force as
soon as fighting stops.
Once fighting ended, talks would begin at the U.N. on a second
resolution for a permanent ceasefire all combatants could accept and
authorising an international force in the south.
Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos, on a visit to Damascus,
said after meeting President Bashar al-Assad that Syria indicated it was
willing to "play a positive role" in resolving the crisis.
Jordan's King Abdullah, among the staunchest U.S. allies in the region,
said the war had turned Hizbollah into heroes in the eyes of ordinary Arabs.
"A fact America and Israel must understand is that as long as there is
aggression and occupation there will be resistance and popular support
for the resistance," he said.
(Additional reporting by Jerusalem, Damascus, U.N. and Milan bureaux)