'US rushes precision-guided bombs to Israel'

New York, Jul 22: The Bush administration is rushing a delivery of precision-guided bombs to Israel, which requested the expedited shipment last week after beginning its air campaign against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, The New York Times reported today.

Citing US officials who spoke yesterday on condition of anonymity, the Times said the decision to ship the weapons quickly came after relatively little debate within the administration, and noted in its report that its disclosure threatens to anger Arab governments and others who could perceive Washington as aiding Israel in the manner that Iran has armed Hezbollah.

The munitions are actually part of a multimillion-dollar arms-sale package approved last year which Israel is able to tap when it needs to, the officials told the Times. But some military officers said the request for expedited delivery was unusual and indicated that Israel has many targets it plans to hit in Lebanon.

The arms shipment has not been announced publicly. The officials who described the administration's decision to rush the munitions included employees of two government agencies, one of whom described the shipment as just one example of a broad array of armaments that the United States has long provided Israel, the Times said.

Pentagon and military officials declined to describe in detail the size and contents of the shipment to Israel, the newspaper said, and they would not say whether the munitions were being shipped by cargo aircraft or some other means.

But one US official said the shipment should not be compared to the kind of an ''emergency resupply'' of dwindling Israeli stockpiles that was provided during the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, according to the Times report.

A spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Washington told the Times: ''We have been using precision-guided munitions in order to neutralise the military capabilities of Hezbollah and to minimize harm to civilians. As a rule, however, we do not comment on Israel's defence acquisitions.''

REUTERS

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