Israel, Hezbollah ratchet up fighting
BEIRUT, Lebanon – Israel and Hezbollah sharply intensified fighting Saturday with airstrikes, rocket attacks and brutal ground fighting – an apparent bid to inflict maximum mutual damage even as the United States and France agreed on a draft U.N. resolution calling for a halt to the violence.
As it became clear a U.S.-French agreement on the text was drawing near, Israeli-Hezbollah fighting grew particularly intense over the past few days.
Israeli commandos battled Hezbollah guerrillas in a dramatic raid on an apartment building in the southern port city of Tyre on Saturday, while warplanes blasted south Beirut. The fighting across Lebanon killed at least eight Lebanese and two Israeli soldiers, while a Hezbollah rocket volley killed three women in northern Israel.
In the past two days, Hezbollah has fired 365 rockets into Israel, including the deepest strike of the conflict – on Hadera, about 50 miles south of the border. Six civilians were killed.
Over the same period, Israel conducted as many as 170 airstrikes on targets in Lebanon, killing at least 45 people.
The Israeli army also said Hezbollah has fired 3,000 rockets into northern Israel since fighting broke out July 12.
The U.N. peacekeeping force in the south of the country, known as UNIFIL, reported what it called “intense shelling and exchanges on the ground” along the border. Israel has taken control of a band of territory a few miles deep right across the frontier.
Israel has resumed nightly airstrikes on Hezbollah strongholds in south Beirut, and on Friday struck in the Christian heartland north of the capital, rocketing bridges and severing the last major road link to Syria and the outside world.
In the most dramatic operation, Israeli commandos battled Hezbollah guerrillas in a pre-dawn raid on an apartment building in the southern Lebanese port city of Tyre. The raid was the latest Israeli commando operation deep inside Lebanese territory aimed at taking out Hezbollah positions.
Both Israel and Hezbollah claimed victory in the Tyre battle – with Israel saying it was “very successful” in taking out a key guerrilla unit involved in firing long-range rockets into Israel – including one that hit Hadera.
Lebanese military and rescue workers said at least five Lebanese – including a soldier at a nearby checkpoint – were killed in the raid. The Israeli military reported eight soldiers wounded, two seriously.
So far, at least 575 people have died in the fighting in Lebanon, including 497 civilians, 28 members of the army and 50 Hezbollah guerrillas. Added to the total deaths were five Syrian farm workers killed in an Israel airstrike just inside the Lebanese border in the Bekaa Valley whose deaths were not counted when the attack occurred Friday. A total of seven civilians and one soldier were killed Saturday. Three Syrian farm workers wounded in the Israeli airstrike also died.
The Israeli military said late Saturday it had killed more than 400 Hezbollah guerrillas since the fighting began.
Seventy-nine Israelis have died, including 46 soldiers and 33 civilians killed by Hezbollah rockets. The latest deaths were three Israeli women in a direct hit on a house in an Arab village and one Israeli soldier killed in fighting with Hezbollah.