WORLD / Middle East

Israeli airstrike kill 7 civilians
(AP)
Updated: 2006-07-25 18:24

Israeli forces kept up their offensive in Lebanon on Tuesday, with troops battling Hezbollah for control of a southern town as their jets flattened a house in an unrelated strike and killed seven civilians.

For the first time since their offensive began July 12, the Israelis put a limit on how far their troops and tanks would advance in Lebanon. Israeli commander Col. Hemi Livni said Tuesday he knew of no plan "to go 42 miles into Lebanon."


Civilians collect their belongings from their shop that was damaged by Israeli air strikes in southern Beirut July 25, 2006. [AP]

In Jerusalem, US Secretary of State

Condoleezza Rice held talks with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who said his government was determined to carry on fighting Hezbollah.

"We will ... stop them. We will not hesitate to take severe measures against those who are aiming thousands of rockets and missiles against innocent civilians," Olmert told reporters before the start of his talks with Rice.

There was no letup from Hezbollah either. The group's television channel Al-Manar broadcast Tuesday that its guerrillas were mounting a strong defense in the vicinity of Bint Jbail, a Hezbollah stronghold that the Israeli have been trying to capture since early Monday.

"The resistance fighters are engaged in heroic confrontations with elite troops of the (Israeli) Golani Brigade, who are attempting to advance under heavy bombardment from the air and land," Al-Manar said.

Rice, who is on the second leg of a Middle East tour, is pushing a plan that would produce both a cease-fire and the deployment of international and Lebanese troops in southern Lebanon to stop Hezbollah attacks on Israel.

In Beirut on Monday, Rice met disapproval. Lebanese parliament speaker Nabih Berri, a Shiite Muslim politician close to Hezbollah, rejected Rice's plan, arguing that the cease-fire should be imposed immediately and other issues could follow.

Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, who government is backed by the US, took a similar stance and complained bitterly to Rice that Israeli airstrikes were destroying the country.

Israel "is taking Lebanon backward 50 years and the result will be Lebanon's destruction," Saniora told Rice, according to the prime minister's office.


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