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Israel strikes beirut suburbs { July 23 2006 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200607/s1694288.htmhttp://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200607/s1694288.htm
Last Update: Sunday, July 23, 2006. 4:04pm (AEST)
Israel strikes Beirut suburbs
Israel has bombed Hezbollah's stronghold in Beirut and civilian targets in east and south Lebanon, hours after seizing a strategic frontier village.
Israeli aircraft have repeatedly bombed the Haret Hreik neighbourhood in south Beirut, flattening scores of buildings, many of them used by the guerrilla group.
At least seven blasts have echoed across Beirut as jets roared over the southern suburbs.
Strikes have also destroyed a Shiite centre in the southern port city of Sidon, wounding three people.
At least 12 strikes in the eastern Bekaa Valley have destroyed three factories, a house and several bridges, starting large fires and killing at least one civilian and wounding two.
Another civilian has died in a raid on a south Lebanon village.
Israel's 12-day-old onslaught in Lebanon to cripple Hezbollah has claimed 357 lives, mostly civilians, while Hezbollah attacks and rockets have killed 35 Israelis, 15 of whom were civilians.
Israeli air raids have also hit transmission stations used by several Lebanese television channels and a mobile telephone mast north of Beirut, cutting mobile phone services in northern Lebanon and killing an employee of broadcaster LBC.
Israel's army says the strikes were on a Hezbollah radio and TV transmitter and an antenna relaying frequencies used by Hezbollah, whose al-Manar television is still broadcasting, despite the attack.
Village seized
Meanwhile, an Israeli general says soldiers yesterday took control of hilltop village Maroun al-Ras, which overlooks both sides of the border, where six Israeli commandos have been killed in heavy fighting this week.
The Israeli army has also found the body of a soldier who went missing last week during fighting in south Lebanon.
Israel's Army Radio says Defence Minister Amir Peretz has decided to continue with the current military incursions into southern Lebanon close to the border.
Israeli forces have urged residents of 14 villages in south Lebanon to leave ahead of more air raids.
It has built up its forces at the border and called up 3,000 reserves but is wary of mounting another invasion only six years after ending a costly 22-year occupation of the south.
In the town of Marjayoun, about eight kilometres from the border, cars packed with people waving white flags have fled north, fearing Israel will step up the war.
Aid appeal
Cyprus is bracing to take in nearly 10,000 more fugitives from Lebanon, as the United Nations (UN) urges international donors to send aid swiftly to the far greater numbers of people left behind.
About 14 crowded vessels are expected at the Cypriot ports of Larnaca and Limassol over the next 30 hours, as part of a days-old mass evacuation involving dozens of countries from India to Sweden that shows no sign of slowing.
An estimated 500,000 people have fled their homes.
UN emergency relief coordinator Jan Egeland says at least $133 million is needed to avert a humanitarian disaster in Lebanon over the coming months.
He says Israel must allow the establishment of aid corridors in Lebanon because the destruction of roads and bridges and the danger of attack mean the UN cannot even deliver its current stocks.
"For us, it's good to get supplies to Beirut but we have to get it out to the people," he said.
"We need, therefore, several staging grounds along the coast but we need corridors inside the country where we can get our humanitarian supplies through or humanitarian workers.
"And time is now of the essence."
Lebanese Social Affairs Minister Nayla Mouawad says there is now a real humanitarian disaster in the country.
"We sometimes feel we are doomed," he said.
"We are fed up to be the ones paying the most heavy price for the Israeli-Arab war and we are fed up with paying the price for all the regional contradictions."
International talks
Envoys from France, Germany and Britain will hold talks with the Israeli Foreign Minister later today ahead of the arrival of US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in a new round of diplomacy aimed at ending the fighting.
Resisting growing calls for a cease-fire, US President George Bush is stressing the need to tackle what it sees as the root cause of the conflict - Hezbollah's armed presence on Israel's border and the role of its allies, Syria and Iran.
"Resolving the crisis demands confronting the terrorist group that launched the attacks and the nations that support it," he said.
The war began when Hezbollah captured two soldiers and killed eight in a July 12 raid into Israel, which had already launched an offensive in the Gaza Strip to try to recover another soldier seized by Palestinian militants on June 25.
- Reuters
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