The Israeli army on Friday prepared for a possible push deeper into southern Lebanon to drive out Hezbollah which threatened to launch rockets further into Israel if it hits central Beirut.
While world powers worked on a United Nations resolution to end the 24-day-long conflict, Israeli jets targeted Hezbollah offices and the house of a senior guerrilla leader in southern Beirut as well as targets across the south and east of Lebanon,
Israeli Defence Minister Amir Peretz ordered the army to prepare for the possible push north to the Litani river, about 20km north of the border, security officials said.
A ground offensive as far as the Litani would need the approval of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s Cabinet, since it would mean going beyond a planned ”security zone” in southern Lebanon.
Political sources said Olmert has so far objected to sending soldiers as far the Litani and is not convinced it would halt Hezbollah rocket fire into Israel, one of Israel’s main aims.
”No decision has been made,” Brigadier-General Ido Nehushtan told Reuters. But, he added, the army ”is ready and prepared to take what action is required”. An invasion up to the Litani would be Israel’s deepest push into Lebanon since 1982.
Hezbollah rockets killed eight Israeli civilians on Thursday. The guerrilla group also killed four Israeli soldiers, making Thursday Israel’s deadliest day yet in the war.
Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah threatened to target Tel Aviv if Israel attacked central Beirut.
”If you strike Beirut, the Islamic Resistance will strike Tel Aviv and it is able to do so,” Nasrallah said, in the first apparent confirmation that Hezbollah has missiles capable of hitting the city 130km from the border.
Israeli television quoted a senior military source as saying Israel would destroy Lebanon’s infrastructure, already pounded by air strikes, if Nasrallah’s threat was carried out.
Israel said it had so far carved out a zone containing 20 villages six to seven kilometres from the border.
Major Zvika Golan, spokesperson for the Israeli northern command, said the army had a plan to clear a 15km security area in southern Lebanon, if authorised.
”We are going to need more brigades, probably two more, and that will depend on government authorisation,” Golan said. ”It’s not decided.”
Israel already has about 10 000 soldiers in southern Lebanon. Adding two brigades would take that to 12 000 troops. Hezbollah said it was battling soldiers who had tried to launch an incursion near Markaba, just inside Lebanon, after midnight.
Israeli air strikes hit Lebanon’s main road to Damascus near the border with Syria and dirt roads north-east of the Bekaa Valley town of Baalbek, witnesses said.
Nasrallah offered to stop Hezbollah’s rocket barrage if Israel ended attacks on civilian areas in Lebanon. But Israel’s military could not stop Hezbollah rocket fire by force, he said.
”Even if you take a few kilometres of the border, even if you occupied south of the Litani, or north of the Litani and reached Beirut, it will not let you realise this goal,” he said.
Hezbollah, which triggered the war by capturing two Israeli soldiers, has killed 68 Israelis, including 41 soldiers. It wants to swap the soldiers for prisoners held by Israel.
‘We have certainly not reached agreement’
Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said the war had killed 900 people in Lebanon and wounded 3 000. He said a million Lebanese, a quarter of the population, had been displaced. The Reuters tally of deaths is at least 687.
A Lebanese security source said 80 Hezbollah fighters had been killed so far — well below Israeli estimates.
Israel has imposed an air and sea blockade of Lebanon. Siniora told the BBC his country would run out of fuel in about a week if it did not get new supplies.
France and the United States held intensive talks on Thursday on a draft United Nations resolution which would seek an end to the fighting and strengthen existing UN peacekeepers until a more robust force can be formed.
Washington wants an international force in southern Lebanon immediately after a truce. But France, seen as a likely leader of the force, wants troops in only after a permanent ceasefire.
US ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton told reporters differences had been narrowed but ”we have certainly not reached agreement.” Talks continue on Friday.
Israel has also launched an offensive in the Gaza Strip to recover another captured soldier and stop Palestinian rockets.
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. – Reuters