The Battle is at its earnest as hezbolla and Israeli forces clash is intensified on friday. The Israeli Prime-Minister promises us that thousands of Israeli units will not fall into a trap set by Hezbolla militants and enter lebanon “to quickly”, as he put it together.
“Israel is going to do it at our own pace, at our own time, to make sure that when we go in, we go in carefully, and that we don’t walk into their booby-traps,” Israeli government spokeswoman Miri Eisin said. “We want to stop the rocket fire, but we also want to make sure that Hezbollah will not be there afterward.”
Since Israel left Lebanon in 2000, Hezbollah has built up the area around Bint Jbeil in southern Lebanon, according to Eisin.
“Not only [do they have] a terrorist army, but they are sort of waiting for us to come in,” she said. “They have booby-trapped the entire area. They want us to walk into those booby traps.”
The Israeli Security Cabinet on Thursday authorized the call-up of three divisions of reserves, saying an additional vote by the Cabinet is needed before troops could be deployed. A division can include as few as 5,000 troops, or as many as 10,000.
So far only the officers of those brigades have put on their uniforms and begun to train for possible military action, military sources indicated.
The Security Cabinet said the troops were being called up “to prepare the force for possible developments,” including Syria’s involvement in the fighting.
Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz on Thursday went to pains to say Israel does not want a conflict with Syria.
Israel has warned Hezbollah not to try to transfer the two Israeli soldiers it abducted July 12 — sparking the current crisis — to Syria. Syria is seen as the transfer point for Iran, which intelligence officials have said is supplying Hezbollah with missiles.
Militants tout new rocket
Northern Israeli towns spent another tense day under a rain of rockets fired from across the Lebanese border. By Friday afternoon, 84 Hezbollah rockets hit the region, wounding 34 people, police said.
A Hezbollah rocket that hit the Afula area Friday carried 100 kilograms (220 pounds) of explosives, making it the most powerful rocket the Lebanese-based militant group has lobbed into Israel since the crisis began 17 days ago, Israeli police said.
Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said the rocket landed in an open area outside Afula, which is southeast of Haifa and just north of the West Bank.
Police said five Hezbollah rockets hit around Afula on Friday. It was unclear if the others were Katyusha rockets, which already have hit the area. Katyushas carry about 22 kilograms (49 pounds) of explosives.
On its TV network Al-Manar, Hezbollah said it fired a new rocket, the Khaybar-1, with a longer range “that will go beyond Haifa.” The northern Israeli city is a frequent target of Hezbollah.
Aerial footage showed sparsely populated highways and little activity in northern Israel, including in Haifa.
A Hezbollah rocket also hit a hospital in Nahariya on Friday, damaging the facility but causing no casualties, Israeli police said.
In southern Lebanon, Israeli warplanes struck at least 110 Hezbollah targets before dawn Friday. Among the sites targeted were rocket launchers, structures, tunnels, a gas station and a base in the Bekaa Valley where the Israel Defense Forces said Hezbollah launched long-range missiles.
Israeli airstrikes near Nabatiye killed three people and wounded nine, including four children, The Associated Press reported, citing Lebanese security officials. The raid apparently targeted an apartment belonging to a Hezbollah activist, according to the AP.
The three women killed in the strikes came from the villages of Talouseh, Sheitiyeh and Bazouriyeh — the hometown of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, security officials told the AP.
Near Naqoura, also in southern Lebanon, two civilians and a journalist were slightly wounded when their convoy was struck, according to a BBC cameraman who was traveling with the convoy. It was unclear whether Israeli or Hezbollah fire hit the convoy, which had been organized to help civilians escape the fighting.
Aid agencies say they are finding it impossible to get food and medicines safely into the region, Reuters reported.
Also in southern Lebanon, the United Nations is removing unarmed observers from two outposts along the Israeli-Lebanese border as a protective measure, U.N. officials said Friday.
The move comes after Israeli airstrikes struck a separate U.N. observer outpost earlier in the week, killing four peacekeepers. The Israeli government has expressed deep regret and said it is investigating.
An Italian soldier was wounded by Hezbollah fire, leading to the evacuation of a fourth outpost in the area, U.N. officials said.
Fifty-one Israelis — including 33 soldiers — have died and 1,267 Israelis — mostly civilians — have been wounded, Israeli ambulance service officials said Friday.
Lebanese security forces said Friday that 398 Lebanese have been killed and 1,661 have been wounded since the attacks began. An unspecified number of people also are trapped under rubble, they said. The Lebanese toll was lowered from 405 deaths after the discovery of a duplication in the names of the deceased.
Hezbollah has not officially released any casualty figures, but Israeli military sources estimate about 200 of its fighters have been killed.
Bush, Blair back multinational force
President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair on Friday called for an international force to be sent to Lebanon to help ease the crisis in the Middle East.
After talks at the White House, Bush told reporters that the two leaders “agree that a multinational force must be dispatched to Lebanon quickly” and that U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will return to the region Saturday to resume her diplomatic efforts there.
Bush said he and Blair’s “top priority” in Lebanon is to provide immediate humanitarian relief and reconstruction.
