Israeli bombs killed at least 18 civilians in Lebanon and cut a vital aid lifeline to the south on Monday in renewed fighting after diplomatic efforts to end the 27-day-old war stalled. Hezbollah guerrillas responded by firing more rockets into northern Israel, wounding one person.
Israeli air strikes killed 14 civilians in Lebanon and Hezbollah battled Israeli ground troops on Monday as the United Nations Security Council failed to agree on a draft resolution seeking to end 27 days of fighting. Opposition from Lebanon caused the United States and France to delay a vote on the resolution also aimed at setting terms to settle the Israel-Hezbollah conflict.
Helicopter-borne Israeli commandos landed near the southern Lebanese city of Tyre and clashed with Hezbollah guerrillas on Saturday, Lebanese security sources said. At least five people were killed in the night raid, which occurred as world powers edged slowly toward a deal aimed at ending the 25-day-old war in Lebanon.
An Israeli air strike killed at least 33 farm workers in north-eastern Lebanon on Friday and Hezbollah fired scores of rockets into Israel in a worsening conflict that world powers have failed to halt. It was the second-deadliest strike in Lebanon after an air raid killed up to 54 civilians in the village of Qana on Sunday.
Waves of Israeli air strikes destroyed three highway bridges north of Beirut on Friday, forcing United Nations relief agencies to cancel several convoys of aid for the 900Â 000 people displaced by the conflict. The Israeli air force’s bombing of bridges in the Christian heartlands north of the capital cut off the main coastal highway to Syria.
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.
Hezbollah guerrillas killed eight people in Israel in a rocket barrage on Thursday despite an intensive Israeli ground and air campaign to wipe them out, as world powers struggled to end the 23-day-old war. Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said the war had killed 900 people in Lebanon.
Israeli jets pounded Hezbollah’s Beirut stronghold and troops battled the guerrillas in the south on Thursday while world powers struggled to come up with a plan to stop a war now in its fourth week. The United States, France and Britain hope for a United Nations Security Council resolution within a week that would call for a truce and perhaps beef up existing United Nations peacekeepers.
Hezbollah fired more rockets into Israel on Wednesday than on any previous day of the 22-day-old war, after helicopter-borne commandos attacked guerrilla targets in Israel’s deepest raid into Lebanon. Air strikes in support of the helicopter raid in the Hezbollah stronghold of Baalbek in north-eastern Lebanon killed 19 people, including four children.
Hezbollah guerrillas bombarded northern Israel with rockets and fought up to 6Â 000 Israeli troops in south Lebanon on Wednesday after Israel vowed to pursue the war until a strong international force arrived. Israeli commandos snatched suspected Hezbollah members from the ancient city of Baalbek in a helicopter-borne raid backed by air strikes that killed 19 people, including four children.
Hezbollah guerrillas battled up to 6Â 000 Israeli troops on five fronts in south Lebanon on Wednesday, escalating a conflict that Israel’s prime minister vowed to pursue until a strong international force arrived. Israeli commandos snatched suspected Hezbollah members from Baalbek in a helicopter-borne night raid backed by air strikes that killed 19 people, including four children.
Israeli commandos snatched at least three suspected Hezbollah members from the ancient city of Baalbek, deep inside Lebanon, on Wednesday in a raid backed by air strikes that killed at least 12 civilians. But Hezbollah denied they belonged to the group.
Israeli forces thrust into southern Lebanon on Tuesday and pounded towns and villages, meeting fierce resistance from Hezbollah guerrillas who reportedly killed three soldiers. Three weeks after the war erupted when Hezbollah snatched two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid, Israel’s security Cabinet agreed to step up its offensive.
Ignoring growing calls for a ceasefire, Israel blasted eastern and southern Lebanon from the air on Tuesday and prepared to advance deeper into Lebanese territory to push Hezbollah guerrillas back from the border. Three weeks after the war unexpectedly erupted, one Israeli minister said its armed forces needed at least another 10 days to complete its offensive.
Civilians fled battered villages in southern Lebanon on Monday after Israel said it would halt its air strikes but the Jewish state pledged to step up its offensive to root out Hezbollah guerrillas. Israeli planes fired two bombs into Lebanon to support ground troops.
Villagers flying white flags from cars, buses and pickup trucks flooded out of south Lebanon on Monday after United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice won from Israel a brief suspension of devastating air strikes. Rice said she believed a ceasefire to end the 20-day war between Israel and Hezbollah guerrillas could be forged this week, but some fighting went on.
At least 51 people were killed, many of them children, in an Israeli air blitz on the Lebanese village of Qana on Sunday, triggering outrage across the region and warnings of retribution for Israel’s "war crime". In Beirut, a mob of angry demonstrators smashed into the United Nations building as thousands took to the streets in protest.
Hezbollah pledged on Saturday to deny the United States and Israel any political gains from the war in Lebanon as US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice flew to Jerusalem to discuss ways to end the 18-day-old conflict. Israel rejected as unnecessary a United Nations plea for a truce to aid civilians trapped by fighting.
United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice headed to Jerusalem on Saturday to discuss ways to end the 18-day-old war in Lebanon as Israel rejected a United Nations plea for a truce to aid civilians trapped by fighting. ”There is no need for a 72-hour temporary ceasefire because Israel has opened a humanitarian corridor to and from Lebanon,” said Israeli government spokesperson Avi Pazner.
United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice headed for Israel on Saturday to discuss terms for a United Nations Security Council resolution to end its 18-day-old war with Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon. Rice, who visited Jerusalem and Beirut earlier in the week, was expected to meet Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in the evening and hold more talks in Israel on Sunday.
Israel battered Lebanon on Friday, killing 11 people as waves of air raids struck villages in the hills behind the southern port of Tyre and hundreds of artillery rounds crashed across the border.
Israeli warplanes and artillery hammered Lebanon again on Thursday as the Beirut government said up to 600 people may have been killed in Israel’s 16-day-old campaign against Hezbollah guerrillas. Israel’s inner Cabinet chose to pursue a strategy of air strikes and limited ground incursions, rather than a full-scale invasion of Lebanon.
The Phoenicians were the greatest traders of the ancient world and the Lebanese are their descendants. In Lebanon, every situation — no matter how dire — is an opportunity for someone to do business. Ammar runs a shop selling decorative inlaid boxes, hubble-bubble pipes, necklaces, keffiyehs (cotton headdresses), historical-looking artefacts and just about anything else that a tourist in Beirut might be induced to buy.
Israel on Wednesday suffered its worst day since the Lebanon conflict began when 14 of its soldiers were believed to have been killed in fighting with Hezbollah, a military calamity that could prove to be a turning point in the war. The setback appeared to unnerve Ehud Olmert, Israel’s Prime Minister. Less than a day after he had vowed to fight Hezbollah to the end, he spoke on Wednesday for a need for a quick end to the conflict.
Hezbollah guerrillas killed up to 13 Israeli soldiers in fighting in Lebanon on Wednesday and world diplomats met in Rome but stopped short of calling for an immediate end to the 15-day-old war. Foreign ministers at the crisis conference pledged to work urgently for a ”lasting, permanent and sustainable” ceasefire, but did not call for the fighting to stop immediately.
Thirteen Israeli soldiers were reported killed in fierce fighting with Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon on Wednesday while United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan told world diplomats in Rome that the 15-day-old war must end. Al Jazeera television said 13 soldiers had been killed in clashes in the southern town of Bint Jbeil, which Israel calls a Hezbollah stronghold.
Fierce fighting raged in Lebanon on Wednesday as an international conference opened in Rome on how to end Israel’s 15-day-old war with Hezbollah guerrillas. Al-Jazeera television said nine Israeli soldiers had been killed during clashes with Hezbollah guerrillas in a south Lebanese village. Israeli medics reported heavy casualties.
Israel’s killing of four United Nations observers piled pressure on an international conference in Rome on Wednesday to end a 15-day-old Middle East conflict, as Hezbollah vowed not to accept any ”humiliating” truce terms. Israel, with apparent United States approval, has said it would press on with its offensive.
United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called for an urgent ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah but the guerrilla group’s leader on Monday vowed no let-up in missile attacks against the Jewish state. Israeli warplanes pounded south Lebanon early on Monday after Hezbollah missiles hit northern Israel over the weekend.
Israel unleashed more air strikes on Lebanon and Hezbollah fired rockets at Haifa on Sunday as a senior United Nations official demanded a halt to the violence to allow aid to reach desperate civilians. United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, leaving for the Middle East later in the day, has said she will pursue a lasting solution, not an immediate ceasefire.
Israel will pursue its war on Hezbollah with more military incursions into south Lebanon but will not unleash a full-scale invasion for the moment, an Israeli army spokesperson said on Saturday. Thousands of Lebanese civilians have fled north fearing Israel will invade and expand an 11-day-old bombardment of Lebanon which has killed 345 people, mostly civilians.
United States marines pushed baby carriages and lifted children into transport boats as Americans desperate to flee the Israeli bombardment of Lebanon lined up near Beirut’s port as a massive evacuation operation picked up speed. Up to 5 000 US citizens were expected to leave on Friday — the largest number in three days.