Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice earlier in the day said she expected a
U.N. resolution for a cease-fire within a week. But as she headed to Washington
after a visit to Jerusalem derailed by the Qana strike, she struck a more
pessimistic tone.
"There's a lot of work to do," she told reporters. "You have to get all the
work done, you have to get it done urgently."
The central focus for a peace deal has been the deployment of a U.N.-mandated
international force in southern Lebanon to ensure guerrillas do not attack
Israel. But details of the force still must be worked out. With talks
continuing, the U.N. postponed a Monday gathering meant to sound out
contributions to a force.
Hezbollah's allies Syria and Iran quietly entered the diplomacy. Egypt was
pressing Syria not to try to stop an international force in the south, diplomats
in Cairo said. Iran's foreign minister pulled into Beirut for talks with his
French and Lebanese counterparts.
Syrian President Bashar Assad called on his army Monday to increase readiness
to cope with "regional challenges." Travelers from Syria have reported that some
reservists have been called up for military duty - a sign that Syria is
concerned the fighting in Lebanon could spill over.
Thousands of Lebanese took advantage of the lull in airstrikes to make a dash
for safety farther north after weeks trapped in homes in the war zone, afraid to
move because of intense missile strikes on roads.
Across the south, cars and trucks packed with women and children, mattresses
strapped to the roofs and white flags streaming from the windows, made their way
to the coast, then turned north. They passed flattened houses, shattered trees
and burned-out cars strewn on the roadside.
At one point north of Tyre, vehicles gingerly made their way around a
gigantic crater half filled with water into which a car had toppled when a
missile struck.
In Qana, grocer Hassan Faraj, who had sworn a day earlier never to leave
jumped at the chance to escape. He shuttered his shop and loaded his wife and
child into a van to go north into the mountains.
"My mother is very unwell, I must go and see her," he said, explaining his
change of mind and insisting he was just dropping off his family to return.
Aid groups were caught off guard by the sudden break and struggled to rush
aid to the south.
Outside Marjayoun, a U.N. peacekeepers' convoy carrying food found the
bridges across the Litani destroyed. So the trucks drove across the knee-deep
waters. Indian peacekeepers assembled a ramp out of stones to get them up the
steep opposite bank.
Nearby, the battle raged between guerrillas and soldiers. Warplanes struck
around the village of Taibeh to give ground cover after Hezbollah fighters hit a
tank with an anti-tank missile. The guerrillas also fired mortars into the
nearby Israeli town of Kiryat Shemona, causing no casualties.
Hezbollah announced that five of its fighters were killed in the clashes,
bringing the group's acknowledged death toll to 43. Israel says dozens more
fighters have died.
Israel carried out two other airstrikes. One killed a Lebanese soldier in his
car outside Tyre, prompting Israel to express its regrets, saying it had
believed the vehicle was carrying a senior Hezbollah official. The other strike
hit the main Lebanon-Syria border crossing for the third day in a row.
Hezbollah also claimed to have hit an Israeli warship off the coast of Tyre
with a rocket, the second hit it would have scored on a ship. But Israel denied
any of its warships were hit Monday.
The guerrilla group did not shoot a single rocket into Israel as of early
evening, a remarkable turnaround for an area that had been hit by dozens of
missiles each day during the offensive.
At least 524 people have been killed in Lebanon since the fighting began,
according to the Health Ministry. Fifty-one Israelis have died, including 33
soldiers and 18 civilians who died in rocket attacks.
