October 28, 2003	Tuesday	Ramazan 1, 1424

KIRIAT SHMONA (Israel), Oct 27: Israeli warplanes bombed Hezbollah positions on Monday after their forces came under fire from the militia in the disputed Shebaa Farms border area.

“The IDF (Israeli Defence Forces) returned fire at Hezbollah targets and the sources of fire,” an Israeli military source said.

“Israeli aircraft were used in the operation,” he added, without giving details about the numbers of planes involved.

Another Israeli source described the ongoing exchanges between the two sides as “pretty intense”, raising fears of a new spiral of violence in the region after a period of relative calm.

Lebanese police said that two Israeli jets fired six air-to-surface missiles at two suspected Hezbollah positions near the villages of Kfar Shuba and Meri, on the Lebanese side of the border.

The Israeli action came after Hezbollah fired a barrage of rockets and shells at Israeli military positions in the area, but without causing casualties.

The militia targeted positions with anti-aircraft fire in the Shebaa Farms area, which is occupied by the Jewish state, another Israeli source said.

“These attacks ... were aimed at two army positions in the Har Dov sector (within the Shebaa Farms district) and at the moment we have no reports of casualties or damage,” he said.

Hezbollah confirmed in a statement that its armed wing, the Islamic Resistance, “bombarded positions of the Zionist enemy with rockets and shells”.

The group said it fired 35 mortar rounds and 107-millimetre rockets at positions in Roueyssat al Aalam, Sammaqa and Ramta, on the flanks of Mount Hermon, and facing the village of Shebaa in Lebanese territory.

Hezbollah later said that the militia’s artillery gunners also targeted an Israeli post in the divided village of Abassiyeh on the border, in retaliation for the air strikes.

It was the first time that Hezbollah announced a bombing of Abassiyeh since the militia launched attacks on the Shebaa Farms in Oct 2000.

Three-quarters of the Lebanese village, which lies a few kilometres outside the Shebaa Farms area, remains under Israeli control.—AFP