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Israel bombs beirut airport hezbollah tv { June 2006 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
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Israel Bombs Beirut Airport, Hezbollah TV Station (Update3)
July 13 (Bloomberg) -- Israel's air force battered Lebanon in the first incursion into the country since the army withdrew in May 2000, knocking out runways at Beirut's international airport a day after Hezbollah captured two soldiers. At least 40 people have been killed in the conflict so far.
Hussain Nabulsi, a Hezbollah spokesman, warned in a phone interview that the Shiite fundamentalist group would respond to an Israeli bombing of the southern suburbs of Beirut with rocket attacks on Haifa, Israel's third-largest city.
The Israeli strikes killed 30 civilians and one soldier, Lebanon's state-run National News Agency said. Al-Jazeera television put the death toll at 47, including 12 people from the same family in the south. In Israel, one woman was killed by rockets fired by Shiite fundamentalist Hezbollah gunmen from Lebanon, the army said. Eight Israeli soldiers died yesterday.
The fighting in Lebanon opens a second front for Israel, whose incursion into the Palestinian-ruled Gaza Strip is now in its third week. Israel launched air and ground strikes against Gaza after Palestinians, including the Islamic Hamas organization, kidnapped a soldier. The fighting may embroil other countries in the conflict. Hezbollah is backed by Syria and Iran.
Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz said in remarks broadcast on Israel Radio that Israel would no longer tolerate Hezbollah forces deployed along its border with Lebanon.
Lebanese Government
``Only the Lebanese government can put forces along that line,'' Peretz said. ``Even if they decide not to do so we will no longer allow the Hezbollah forces to sit on Israel's fence.''
Currencies and exchanges in emerging markets and the Middle East fell as the confrontation widened.
The benchmark TA-25 index fell 3.4 percent to 755.80 after declining 4.2 percent yesterday. The Dow Jones DIFC Arabia Titans Index, a measure that tracks 50 stocks in 10 Arab countries, fell 0.7 percent as of 1:28 p.m. in Cairo. Egypt's CASE 30 Index dropped 3.5 percent. Jordan's Amman Stock Exchange General Index slid 1.5 percent.
The Turkish lira led a slide in emerging-market currencies, falling 1.9 percent to 1.5847 per dollar at 10:38 a.m. in Istanbul. The forint slipped 1 percent to 220.77 and the rand dropped to a one-week low of 7.25. The shekel lost 1.3 percent, trading at 4.5045, its weakest since April.
Bank of Israel
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert called Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fisher to assure him that the fighting would not cause the government to exceed limitations on spending growth and the deficit. Finance Minister Avraham Hirschson said the government will take ``whatever steps are required'' to keep to its fiscal targets.
Israel blockaded naval access to Lebanon, an army spokesman said. He said Beirut's Rafik Hariri International Airport was used by the Hezbollah to transfer weapons and supplies, a claim denied by spokesman Nabulsi. The air force also destroyed a Hezbollah television relay station. A Lebanese rocket hit the Israeli town of Safed, Israeli police said, the 12 community to be hit.
Peretz blamed Hezbollah's military strength on Lebanese indecisiveness and Syrian and Iranian guidance. Al-Jazeera said Hezbollah was acting on instructions from Syria, citing Lebanon Telecommunications Minister Marwan Hamade.
Lebanon Withdrawal
Israel withdrew from Lebanon in 2000 after occupying a strip in the southern part of the country in an 18-year conflict led by Hezbollah forces. Israel's military unilaterally withdrew from the Gaza Strip in September 2005, razing Jewish settlements established there after it seized the area from Egypt in the Six- Day War of 1967.
President George W. Bush called Hezbollah's abduction of the soldiers and attacks on Israel a ``pathetic'' attempt to derail the Middle East peace process and said Syria ``needs to be held to account'' for its support of terrorism.
At a news conference in Stralsund, Germany, Bush also said that while Israel has a right to defend itself, it must be careful not destabilize Lebanon's government.
``Democracy in Lebanon is an important part of laying the foundation for peace in that region,'' Bush said. ``The concern is that any actions by Israel to protect itself will topple that government.''
In Russia, the Foreign Ministry issued a statement accusing Israel of using ``disproportionate'' force in responding to the Hezbollah attacks. France issued a similar statement.
``We are going back to a deep involvement in the Lebanon conflict,'' Eyal Zisser, a research fellow at Tel Aviv University's Moshe Dayan Center, said. ``Up to now Israeli forces were fighting Hezbollah in a combat that was run in an area restricted to one kilometer from each side of the border. Now the combat is going to be much bigger.''
All Runways Hit
All the Beirut airport's runways were hit and the airport was closed, Hamdi Shawk, director general of Lebanon's civil aviation said by phone. The air force also bombed Hezbollah's Manar Television station in Beirut, Hussain Nabulsi, a spokesman for the group, said in a telephone interview. No one was hurt, he said.
It was the second day of fighting in the area, which began early yesterday when Hezbollah militants crossed into Israel, killing three soldiers and capturing two. That prompted an Israeli incursion into Lebanon in search of the two soldiers in which five additional soldiers were killed.
Israeli Air Force
Israel's air force today struck what it called ``rocket storage facilities,'' in addition to the airport and the television station.
Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah's secretary general, said at a news conference in Beirut yesterday that the captured soldiers will only be returned in a prisoner exchange. Olmert said there would be no negotiations. Israel holds both Lebanese and Palestinian prisoners.
Hamas and Hezbollah both started as Islamic opposition movements, committed to violence to achieve their goals. They gradually entered politics while retaining their armed wings. Hamas won Palestinian parliamentary elections in January, the first time it fielded candidates, and Hezbollah has had lawmakers in Lebanon's National Assembly since 1992.
Hezbollah controls 23 of 128 seats in Lebanon's legislature and holds two cabinet posts.
Israeli warplanes struck the Palestinian Foreign Ministry last night as it continued operations in Gaza to win the release of the soldier held there and stop rocket attacks from the strip into southern Israel. Palestinian witnesses said two floors of the six-story building were destroyed.
Last Updated: July 13, 2006 08:24 EDT
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