Israelis battle in Lebanon, Hizbollah fires rockets

BEIRUT, Aug 2: Hizbollah guerrillas bombarded northern Israel with rockets and fought up to 6,000 Israeli troops in south Lebanon today after Israel vowed to pursue the war until a strong international force arrived.

Israeli commandos snatched suspected Hizbollah members from the ancient city of Baalbek in a helicopter-borne raid backed by air strikes that killed 19 people, including four children.

In Jerusalem, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Reuters he wanted the international force to be mandated to enforce a U.N.

resolution calling for Hizbollah to be disarmed, adding that Israel had already destroyed much of the group's military power.

Soon after he spoke, one of more than 80 rockets fired by Hizbollah today, landed just inside the West Bank after flying further than any fired at Israel in the past three weeks.

Hizbollah said it had hit the Israeli town of Beit Shean, almost 70 km from the border, with ''Khaibar 1'' rockets to avenge Israeli attacks on civilians in Lebanon.

The Hizbollah barrage, which killed one person in the northern Israeli city of Nahariya, followed a relative lull in its attacks over the previous two days.

Battles raged on five fronts in south Lebanon, security sources said. Israeli planes and artillery pounded villages as tank-led forces pushed in and Hizbollah guerrillas fought back.

Olmert confirmed Israel would carry on fighting until an international force was on the ground in south Lebanon and listed the flight of civilians from the area as among the accomplishments of the Israeli military campaign.

''The infrastructure of Hizbollah has been entirely destroyed.

More than 700 ... command positions of Hizbollah were entirely wiped out by the Israeli army,'' he said.

''All the population which is the power base of the Hizbollah in Lebanon was displaced.'' At least 643 people in Lebanon and 55 Israelis have been killed in the conflict, now in its fourth week. Lebanon's health minister puts the toll at 762, including unrecovered bodies.

At least 750,000 Lebanese, almost a quarter of the population, have been driven from their homes. Israeli bombardment has devastated many southern villages.

Three weeks of Israeli bombardmen thas so far inflicted 2 billion dollars of damage on Lebanon's infrastructure, Transport and Public Works Minister Mohammed al-Safadi said.

FRANCE, U.S. AT ODDS The U.N. Security Council has yet to agree on a mandate for an international force and France said it would not attend a meeting of potential troop contributors in New York tomorrow. France has been touted to lead the force, but it wants a truce and an agreement on a framework for a permanent ceasefire before any troops deploy. That is at odds with the U.S.-Israeli view that the ceasefire can wait until the force moves in.

''We do not want to discuss the international force before a political agreement,'' French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy told Le Monde daily newspaper.

Israel has sent mixed signals on the duration and scale of its offensive in Lebanon, but it has sent thousands of troops across the border to tackle Hizbollah guerrillas, who were fighting back with mortars, anti-tank rockets and machineguns.

Hizbollah said it had destroyed four tanks and a military bulldozer. The Israeli army had no immediate comment.

Israeli troops in helicopters landed near a Hizbollah-run hospital near Baalbek, setting off about four hours of fighting.

The Israeli army said commandos seized five suspected Hizbollah militants before returning safely to base. Hizbollah denied any of its militants were taken.

Security sources said two Hizbollah fighters were killed in Baalbek. It was unclear if they died in clashes or air strikes.

It was the first helicopter-borne assault deep inside Lebanon in the conflict that flared after Hizbollah guerrillas captured two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid on July 12.

At least 13 civilians were killed when Israeli warplanes hit Jammaliyeh, a village near Baalbek, security sources said.

''We are all with the resistance. We are against any ceasefire. This conflict must run its course,'' said Ali Jamal-Eddine, whose uncle died in Jammaliyeh.

The Baalbek attack followed the expiry of a 48-hour bombing pause agreed by Israel under U.S. pressure after a raid killed 54 civilians, mostly children, in the southern village of Qana.

Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos arrived in Beirut on Wednesday with humanitarian aid, diplomats said. He also plans to travel to Damascus. The foreign ministers of Jordan and Egypt also arrived in Beirut.

REUTERS