Israeli troops take control of Lebanese village
22/07/2006 - 09:20:52
Israeli troops took control of a village just across the Lebanese border today, after the area was pounded by bombs and artillery through the night.
Several Israeli soldiers – backed by artillery and tank fire – moved into the large village of Maroun al-Ras on the Lebanese side of the border, military officials said.
Afterwards, as some of them returned, officials said the village was under Israeli control.
At one point in the fighting, a half-ton bomb was dropped on a Hezbollah outpost, about 500 meters from the border and near the village.
The raid was part of Israel’s wider strategy of running a “limited” ground operation aimed at destroying Hezbollah’s tunnels, hideouts and weapons stashes in south Lebanon.
Hezbollah has fired hundreds of rockets at northern Israeli towns from north of the Lebanese border, killing 16 civilians and forcing hundreds of thousands of Israelis to repeatedly flee into bunkers.
Today, rockets struck Karmiel and Kiriyat Shemona, injuring seven people.
Air raid sirens also sounded in Haifa, Israel’s third-largest city, along with smaller towns.
After Maroun al-Ras was taken, several small groups of Israeli soldiers in armoured personal carriers travelled to and from the village, but there was no large scale movement. The army did not say what sort of resistance troops encountered.
In Marwahin, also along the border, Israeli troops recovered anti-tank missiles, a launcher, and other weapons used by Hezbollah.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced plans to visit the Middle East on Sunday, her first trip to the region since the crisis erupted 10 days ago – even as she ruled out a quick cease-fire as a “false promise”.
An official from the UN monitoring force in south Lebanon said that between 300 and 500 troops are believed to be in the western sector of the border, backed by as many as 30 tanks – a likely precursor to a larger ground force that Israel could use to sweep Hezbollah out of the area.
Israel’s goal is not to create a buffer zone as it did during its occupation of southern Lebanon from 1982 to 2000, said a senior military official.
Rather, Israel wants to weaken Hezbollah to make it easier for the Lebanese army to move into areas previously controlled by the guerrillas, possibly with the aid of a beefed up international peacekeeping force, the official said.
On Friday, Israel knocked out a key bridge on the road to Syria and pummelled Hezbollah positions in the south as long lines of tanks and armoured personnel carriers lined up at the border – in some places close enough to see Lebanese homes on the other side.
Rice was headed to Rome for meetings with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, the Palestinian president and US allies, before heading to the Middle East.
Ships lined up at Beirut’s port as a massive evacuation effort to pull out foreigners picked up speed.
France, the United Nations and Red Cross painted a dire portrait of life for civilians trapped in the south or forced to flee their homes there. They demanded Israel open humanitarian corridors to allow life’s necessities - shelter, food, water and medicine – to reach the swelling numbers of displaced people – an estimated half-million.
Israeli Defence Minister Amir Peretz said French aid would be allowed into Lebanon’s port of Sidon.
The Lebanese health ministry reported 362 deaths in Lebanon so far in the onslaught, n increase of 55 since it release figures on Thursday. Thirty-four Israelis also have been killed, including 18 soldiers and an air force officer killed Friday in the collision of two helicopters.
Beirut was swelling with refugees from the south – and from its own Shiite southern neighbourhoods, heavily hit by Israeli strikes. They piled up by the hundreds in parks and schools – those with money enough staying in hotels.
But after 10 days, Beirutis – inured by past wars – were emerging more and more from their homes, fed up with staying indoors even as the conflict looked ready to escalate. More shops on central Hamra Street were open, and in the evening families, including many southern refugees, were strolling along the seafront, kids roller-blading, young men smoking waterpipes.
An Israeli ground incursion, however, could dramatically increase the pain in Lebanon. More than 400,000 people live south of the Litani River, north of which Israel wants to push Hezbollah. Though tens of thousands have left, many are believed still there, trapped because roads were damaged by Israeli bombs or afraid of being caught in the airstrikes on thoroughfares.
Now they were likely to be in the crossfire as Israeli troops cross the border.
Israel’s army chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, said the military would conduct “limited ground operations as much as needed in order to harm the terror that harms us” – leaving it unclear how deep and how powerful the Israeli punch into Lebanon would be. Israel on Friday called up several thousand reservists to free up regular troops for duty in the north.
“We will fight terror wherever it is because if we do not fight it, it will fight us. If we don’t reach it, it will reach us,” he told a nationally televised news conference.
