Israel Calls Up Reserves, a Sign of Wider Ground Raids
By STEVEN ERLANGER and JAD MOUAWAD
nytimes.com
( I find myself deeply ashamed the our leader condones this destruction )
JERUSALEM, July 21 — Israel called up a few thousand reservists today, in possible preparation for a more extensive ground operation in southern Lebanon, as its warplanes continued to hit targets there and to drop leaflets warning residents of villages to leave their homes and head northward.
Over the last two days, there has been an increase in ground clashes as Israeli troops have moved about a mile or so inside Lebanon to demolish Hezbollah outposts and fortifications. Four Israeli soldiers were killed in fierce battles with Hezbollah guerrillas north of Avivim on Thursday, the Israeli army said. On Wednesday, two Israeli soldiers were killed in the same area, as Israel discovered a warren of storage rooms, bunkers and tunnels near Maroun al-Ras.
Hezbollah said it has lost three fighters, but the Israelis say scores of Hezbollah fighters have died. Israel also said two of its Apache helicopters collided near the Lebanese border, killing a pilot and injuring three crewmen.
All day today, the 10th day of the conflict, Israeli jets continued to drop bombs, hitting Beirut’s Shiite districts, the eastern Bekaa Valley and southern Lebanon and striking the Mdeirej bridge on the main Beirut-Damascus highway four more times; it had already been bombed twice.
Five people were killed and 15 wounded in the bombings, according to Agence France-Presse. In all, more than 330 people have been killed by the Israeli air, sea and ground barrage of bombs and rockets throughout Lebanon.
Also today, a new wave of Hezbollah rockets hit Haifa and other towns in northern Israel. At least 10 people were wounded when one missile hit a Haifa apartment building.
Israel continued to warn residents of southern Lebanon to leave their homes if they are in areas of Hezbollah activity
As the Israeli defense minister, Amir Peretz, visited northern towns hit by scores of Hezbollah rockets on Thursday, he hinted at a broader ground operation. “We have no intention of occupying Lebanon, but we also have no intention of retreating from any military measures needed,” he said. “Hezbollah must not think that we would recoil from using all kinds of military measures against it.”
Mr. Peretz continued, “You can mark one thing down: Hezbollah flags will not hang over the fences of Israel.”
The Israeli assault is meant to break Hezbollah’s military capacity and decapitate its leadership. But its leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, appeared on television late on Thursday in an interview with Al Jazeera, taunting the Israeli forces and vowing that he would release two abducted Israeli soldiers only in exchange for Lebanese prisoners held in Israel.
“Even the whole universe would not be able to secure the release of the two Israeli soldiers unless there are indirect negotiations and an exchange of prisoners,” he said. “All of Israel’s claims to have hit half of our missile potential and arsenal are nothing but erroneous words. The leadership of Hezbollah has not been touched.”
Lebanon’s prime minister, Fuad Siniora, who has appealed desperately for help from the international community, said that no settlement was in sight to end the violence. He accused the United States of giving Israel a green light to bomb Lebanon.
“The United States is allowing Israel to pursue its aggression,” he told Agence France-Presse.
Lebanon’s defense minister, Elias Murr, said on Thursday that the Lebanese Army — which has so far remained on the sidelines — would go into battle if Israel invaded. “The Lebanese army will resist and defend the country and prove that it is an army worthy of respect,” he said.
On Thursday in New York, Kofi Annan, the secretary general of the United Nations, called for an immediate ceasefire and spoke of the human suffering caused by the offensive, which has displaced hundreds of thousands of Lebanese from their homes.
He proposed that Hezbollah release the two soldiers, that attacks by both sides be halted and that an international peacekeeping force be deployed. And he condemned the Israeli operation as an “excessive use of force.”
Russia, which reduced parts of Chechnya to rubble in its fight against rebels there, also sharply criticized Israel: the Russian Foreign Ministry called Israel’s actions in Lebanon “far beyond the boundaries of an antiterrorist operation” and urged a cease-fire.
At the White House, President Bush’s press secretary, Tony Snow, said, “I’m not sure at this juncture we’re going to step in and put up a stop sign,” although he called on Israel to “practice restraint” and said Mr. Bush was “very much concerned” about a growing human crisis in southern Lebanon.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is arranging a trip to Asia and the Middle East; she could be visiting this region as early as Sunday.
Diplomats are investigating the idea of creating a more robust international peacekeeping force than the current, largely ineffectual Unifil force, which has occupied a narrow strip along the Lebanese-Israeli border for decades. The new force would be under United Nations auspices, but made up largely of European troops, and would help the weak Lebanese government move its army to the Israeli border and push back a weakened Hezbollah.
About 4,500 Americans were preparing to leave today, with the help of United States Marines who landed in Beirut on Thursday.
The small force of American marines who landed in Beirut on Thursday were the first to be deployed in Lebanon in any numbers since 1983, when a Hezbollah suicide bomb attack killed 241 Americans, mostly marines, in a Beirut barracks, prompting the withdrawal of American forces sent as peacekeepers after the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. The marines who landed Thursday were from the same unit that was attacked in the barracks 23 years ago.
Lt. Cmdr. Charlie Brown of the United States Naval Central Command in Bahrain said that about 40 marines from the unit, the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, anded on a beach north of Beirut Thursday morning near the grounds of the American Embassy. They helped American citizens board a landing craft that ferried them to the amphibious assault ship Nashville, waiting offshore.
By late afternoon, 1,052 evacuees had boarded the Nashville and the ship was preparing to head to Cyprus, Commander Brown said.
Citizens of Britain and other countries were also evacuated.
On Thursday, Israel continued its large-scale air attacks on Hezbollah positions and equipment. It also leafleted southern Lebanese villages, made taped phone calls, informed local leaders and broadcast messages in Arabic to warn residents to move north of the Litani River if their villages contained Hezbollah assets or rockets, but gave no deadline.
Israel dropped similar leaflets on Thursday in Gaza as well, possibly foreshadowing more attacks on populated areas where Israel believes Hamas is storing Qassam rockets.
The air attacks on Thursday also hit Beirut’s southern suburbs, following Wednesday night’s heavy attack by Israeli jets, using special burrowing bombs, to try to penetrate a bunker believed to be used by senior Hezbollah officials, including its leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah. Hezbollah said no one had been hurt in the bombing, which Israeli officials said had involved 23 tons of explosives in the Burj al Brajneh neighborhood.
Despite the continuous shelling of the Hezbollah strongholds of southern Beirut, the militia remains very much in control there, barring access to outsiders.
On Thursday, the militia led reporters on a tour of the area, where Hezbollah’s headquarters are. Buildings as high as 12 or 15 stories had collapsed; some were still smoking.
According to Lebanese reports, four civilians were killed in a strike on a car in the coastal city of Tyre. Israeli jets also attacked a detention center in the town of Khiam in south Lebanon on Thursday, according to local television reports. The prison, formerly run by Israel’s Lebanese militia allies during its occupation of south Lebanon, was destroyed.
Israeli planes also struck at Shiite areas in the eastern towns of Baalbek and Hermil, where some Hezbollah leaders are said to live, and several southern villages.
About 50 rockets hit Israel on Thursday, the Israeli Army said, a sharp drop from 150 the day before.
The Israeli military said two of its helicopters had collided Thursday night near the border with Lebanon; one pilot died and three crewmen were injured.
In Gaza, Israel continued its military operation in the central sector, killing at least three Palestinians and wounding six in fighting around the Mughazi refugee camp. An airstrike on the same refugee camp killed one fighter and wounded eight more. One of the dead was a Palestinian girl, 10, wounded in an airstrike on Wednesday, when nine Palestinians, eight of them militants, were killed, according to The Associated Press.
The Israeli Army dropped the leaflets Thursday throughout Gaza warning that “anyone who has, or is keeping an arsenal, ammunitions or weapons in their house must destroy it or will face dangerous consequences.”
On the West Bank, Israeli forces continued to surround the Mukata compound in Nablus, where Palestinians wanted by Israel have been taking refuge since Wednesday morning. About 15 wanted men gave themselves up but at least 10 remain inside. Tanks fired five shells at the buildings and army bulldozers worked to knock down the exterior walls, while warning those inside to come out or risk being buried underneath the rubble.
Israeli troops fired rubber-coated bullets at Palestinians who demonstrated against the troops, wounding five, one seriously, Palestinian medics said. About 4,000 Palestinians demonstrated in Nablus in support of Hezbollah, calling on the militia’s leader, Sheik Nasrallah, to attack Israel with rockets.
“Nasrallah, our dearest, strike, strike Tel Aviv!” the Palestinians shouted. Five Palestinians were killed in the Nablus operation on Wednesday.
The Lebanese government said it had so far sheltered as many as 120,000 refugees, mostly in schools. It is considering setting up tents and temporary barracks in public parks and sports fields. The United Nations estimates that a total of 500,000 people have been displaced.
“The losses are immeasurable,” said Nayla Moawad, the Lebanese minister for social affairs.
Ms. Moawad blamed Syria for setting off the crisis, saying that she was expressing her personal opinion. “The decision of the Hezbollah operation was not taken in Lebanon,” she said. “Lebanon was taken a hostage, a mailbox of other people’s interests. It has been taken in Damascus, probably with an Iranian coordination.”
Ms. Moawad was one of the leaders of the Lebanese revolt last year that led to the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon.
“Syria has tried to destabilize Lebanon since her troops pulled out,” she said.
Jad Mouawad reported from Beirut for this article, and Steven Erlanger from Jerusalem.
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