Hizbollah kills 11 on Israel's deadliest day

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Written by david

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Hizbollah guerrillas killed eight people in a rocket barrage on Israel and three Israeli soldiers in fighting in Lebanon on Thursday, the deadliest day of the war for Israel, as world powers struggled to end the conflict.

Hizbollah has continued to unleash rockets and battle on the ground in Lebanon despite Israeli assertions that 23 days of air and ground attacks have dealt the guerrilla group a heavy blow.

Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said the war had killed 900 people in Lebanon and wounded 3,000, with a third of the casualties children under 12. He said a million Lebanese, a quarter of the population, had been displaced and infrastructure devastated. The Reuters tally of Lebanon deaths is at least 683.

Sixty-seven Israelis have been killed in the war including 40 soldiers. Al Arabiya television said a fourth Israeli soldier had been killed in Thursday's fighting.

The United States, France and Britain hope for a U.N. Security Council resolution within a week that would call for a truce and maybe strengthen existing U.N. peacekeepers until a more robust force can be formed, U.N. officials said.

"I'm now hopeful we will have such a resolution down very shortly and agreed within the next few days," Prime Minister Tony Blair said. "The purpose of that will be to bring about an immediate ceasefire and then put in place the conditions for the international force to come in."

But splits between the the United States and France, a possible leader of the new force, over the timing of a ceasefire have complicated diplomatic efforts to end the fighting.

France's U.N. ambassador said he was less confident that a Security Council resolution could be adopted within days.

"Yesterday morning I was confident that we could have a resolution adopted in the coming days, but by the end of the day I was less confident," Jean-Marc de la Sabliere said.

The Lebanon war, launched after Hizbollah snatched two Israeli soldiers in a raid across the border on July 12, has coincided with an Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip to recover another captured soldier and halt Palestinian rocket fire.

Israeli forces killed five Palestinian gunmen and three civilians, including a 10-year-old boy, in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, witnesses said. Israel's offensive in the Strip, which it quit last year, has cost at least 161 Palestinian lives.

AIR STRIKES

Israeli aircraft launched strikes on 70 targets in southern Lebanon and Beirut overnight.

Jets bombed Hizbollah-dominated suburbs of Beirut for the first time in days and hit a bridge in the northern Akkar region, as well as targets in the eastern Bekaa Valley and roads near the Syrian border, a Lebanese security source said.

Planes repeatedly bombed targets around the southern town of Nabatiyeh and shelling cut a road in the southern Bekaa Valley. Heavy Israeli air strikes and shelling also hit the area around the southern village of Blat, north of Marjayoun.

Israel is expanding the ground war in southern Lebanon. Seven brigades, or up to 10,000 troops, were fighting Hizbollah on Thursday, Israeli army radio said.

The army has carved out a "security zone" of 20 villages in south Lebanon up to six km (four miles) from the border and will stay until an international force arrives, Israeli TV said.

U.N. peacekeepers of the UNIFIL force said the Israelis had made two new incursions into Lebanon in the past 24 hours and kept hold of five other areas previously seized. Lebanese security sources said Hizbollah fighters attacked Israeli units using anti-tank rockets, mortars and assault rifles.

A Lebanese security source said 80 Hizbollah fighters had been killed so far -- well below the Israeli estimate.

An Israeli inquiry into Sunday's bombing of Qana, where up to 54 Lebanese civilians died, said the military had made a mistake, but accused Hizbollah of using civilians as human shields.

Amnesty International said the probe was inadequate.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in remarks published on Thursday he expected a U.N. vote on a truce next week.

He said U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice did not expect a truce to end fighting in Lebanon in the next few days.

The United States and France, diplomats said, are ironing out differences on an initial resolution calling for a truce, a buffer zone and the disarmament of Hizbollah.

But Paris has insisted it will not send troops without a truce and an agreement in principle on the framework for a long-term peace deal by Israel, Hizbollah and the Beirut government. Washington wants a force as soon as fighting stops.

Once fighting ended, talks would begin at the U.N. on a second resolution for a permanent ceasefire all combatants could accept and authorising an international force in the south.

Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos, on a visit to Damascus, said after meeting President Bashar al-Assad that Syria indicated it was willing to "play a positive role" in resolving the crisis.

Jordan's King Abdullah, among the staunchest U.S. allies in the region, said the war had turned Hizbollah into heroes in the eyes of ordinary Arabs.

"A fact America and Israel must understand is that as long as there is aggression and occupation there will be resistance and popular support for the resistance," he said.

(Additional reporting by Jerusalem, Damascus, U.N. and Milan bureaux)