BEIRUT, Lebanon - Israeli airstrikes destroyed several
houses in a southern Lebanese town Sunday, killing at least 20 people, Lebanese
officials said.
Israeli soldiers walk on a highway along the
border with Lebanon after crossing Israel after overnight operations in
Lebanon Sunday, July 30, 2006. [AP] |
The Israeli army said it targeted the town of Qana because missiles have been
repeatedly launched from the area.
"We were attacking launchers that were firing missiles," said Capt. Jacob
Dallal, an Israeli army spokesman, adding that the army had dropped leaflets
several days before warning civilians to leave Qana.
Lebanese security officials said they had pulled out 20 bodies from the
rubble. They said at least three houses were destroyed, and dozens were trapped
inside.
Israeli troops pulled back from a Lebanese border town Saturday after a week
of heavy fighting with Hezbollah guerrillas who hailed the retreat as a victory.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice returned to the Middle East to push a
refined U.S. peace plan.
The Israeli pullback from the town of Bint Jbail appeared to be in
preparation for a new incursion along a different part of the border zone. Hours
later, troops and tanks massed farther to the east on the Israeli side of the
frontier, Lebanese security officials said early Sunday. Hezbollah's TV station
said clashes broke out between guerrillas and Israeli troops about 2 miles
inside Lebanon, but the Israeli army could not immediately confirm the report.
Lebanese civilians were suffering the most from the fighting, which erupted
after Hezbollah kidnapped two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid July 12.
On Sunday, Israeli jets bombed the southern town of Qana, destroying several
houses in which dozens of people were trapped, Lebanese media reported.
A day earlier, warplanes struck outside the market town of Nabatiyeh,
crushing a house and killing a woman, her five children, and a man in a nearby
house, Lebanese security officials said. In the southern port city of Tyre,
volunteers buried 31 victims of the bombardment in a mass grave, among them a
1-day-old girl.
Israel made its closest strike to Hezbollah ally Syria yet. Warplanes hit the
Lebanese side of a Syrian-Lebanese border crossing, forcing the closure of the
main transit point for refugees fleeing and humanitarian aid entering Lebanon.
Two more missiles hit the area early Sunday.
The Israeli army said rockets fell Sunday on the northern Israeli towns of
Nahariya, Kiryat Shemona and an area close to Maalot. The rockets mostly fell in
open areas, and no injuries were reported. Hezbollah said it had shelled Israeli
outposts long the border.
Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah marked Rice's
arrival with a threat to fire rockets even deeper into Israel. Appearing on
Hezbollah television, Nasrallah claimed victory, saying Israel had failed to
make a "single military achievement" during its 18-day offensive.
