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Hizbollah missiles pound Israel

Military operation in south Lebanon has no pre-determined limit, says Olmert

MAALOT (Israel): A massive wave of Hizbollah rockets pounded northern Israel on Thursday, killing five persons, including three children, and injured many others, Israeli rescue officials said.

A total of 132 rockets hit the country, 100 of them in a matter of minutes on Thursday afternoon, police said, and air raid sirens rang out across northern Israel. They showed that after 23 days of fighting, Hizbollah guerillas still had the capability to carry out unrelenting strikes on northern Israel. Israeli officials said the attacks did not mean their offensive was unsuccessful.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Le Monde newspaper on Thursday that the offensive against Hizbollah has no predetermined limit.

Asked if the Israeli objective was to reach the Litani river, Mr. Olmert told the French newspaper that ``there is no limit.''

``We are not going to fight all the way to Beirut. But as for the rest, I don't think I have to announce my plans,'' he said.

``Beirut is not a target. What is a target — and will remain one — is a single neighbourhood, Hizbollah's. But we shall not attack Beirut. We are not fighting the Government of Lebanon,'' Mr. Olmert said.

PHOTO: AP

MOURNING: Israeli soldiers comfort each other at the gravesite of a colleague in Jerusalem on Thursday.

In Maalot, three Israeli Arabs were riding in a car when rockets started hitting the town. They ran out of the car seeking shelter and were hit by a rocket, police said. The Israeli army said on Thursday that its soldiers had taken up positions in or near 11 towns and villages across south Lebanon, as Israel tried to carve out a 7-km-wide Hizbollah-free zone ahead of what it hopes will be a speedy deployment of a multinational force there.

Most of the villages are close to the Israel-Lebanon border; the one deepest inside Lebanon, Majdel Zoun, is about 6 km from the frontier.

However, scores of tanks pushed even further north, controlling open areas from higher ground, security officials said.

The zone reaches from the Mediterranean coast in the west to the Galilee Panhandle in the east.

Six Israeli army brigades, or roughly 10,000 troops, are fighting in south Lebanon against several hundred Hizbollah guerillas.

Syria to help end war

Syria is ready to help put an end to the war and is eager to take part in talks on a ``comprehensive and lasting peace'' for the region, Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos said on Thursday.

Asked if Syria was willing to use its influence with Hizbollah to stop the fighting, the former West Asia envoy said Damascus ``will play a positive role'', without saying how. He was speaking after talks with President Bashar al-Assad. Mr. Moratinos later left for Spain after a two-day trip to the region. He met the Lebanese Cabinet, including two Ministers from Hizbollah, in Beirut on Wednesday.

OIC demands truce

The Islamic world's biggest bloc on Thursday demanded an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hizbollah.

Key leaders in the 56-nation Organisation of the Islamic Conference, including those from Indonesia, Pakistan and Turkey, warned that Israel's warfare would stoke Muslim radicalism and breed new terrorists.

The OIC issued a declaration after an emergency summit in Malaysia that voiced solidarity with the Lebanese people ``in their legitimate and heroic resistance against the Israeli aggression.'' — Agencies

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