Planes continue to pound Beirut: Israel threatens buffer zone
BEIRUT, July 25: Israeli warplanes blasted Beirut on Tuesday and troops battled Hezbollah guerillas as Israel effectively ruled out any chance of a rapid ceasefire to end the two-week-old Lebanon conflict, and warned it could set up its own border buffer zone.
The bombing on the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, a Hezbollah stronghold, ended a 24-hour lull that coincided with a lightning visit to the region by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
With no end in sight to warfare that has already claimed 390 lives in Lebanon alone, Defence Minister Amir Peretz warned Israel could establish its own security zone in southern Lebanon if multinational troops were not deployed.
In the latest bloodshed, an entire family of seven was killed when an Israeli missile slammed into their home in southern Lebanon while troops besieged a key border town where Hezbollah has a military headquarters.
“Israel is determined to carry on the fight against Hezbollah,” Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said at a press conference with Ms Rice. “We are not fighting the Lebanese government or the Lebanese people. We are fighting against Hezbollah.”
Ms Rice, who left the region for Rome to attend an international meeting on the crisis, said it was ‘time for a new Middle East’ and underlined the US stance that an immediate ceasefire would only put off a long-term settlement.
“A durable solution will be one that strengthens the forces of peace and democracy in the region,” she said. “The people of this region, Israelis, Lebanese, and the Palestinians have lived too long in fear, and in terror, and in violence.”
On a surprise visit to Lebanon on Monday, Ms Rice said she was ‘deeply concerned’ about the plight of civilians, who have been forced to flee their homes in their hundreds of thousands and make up the bulk of the dead.
The US delivered a first shipment of aid on Tuesday under a 30-million-dollar package.
President George Bush said he saw no contradiction in sending assistance in the face of Israeli strikes while at the same time speeding arms deliveries to Israel.
Ms Rice also met Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas, who called for a ceasefire to end Israel’s similarly aggressive offensive on the Gaza Strip, where 114 people have been killed in an operation to free a captured soldier and halt rocket attacks.
“Rice, Rice, you are a crow, what misery you bring with you,” a crowd of about 2,000 protesters chanted before her arrival in Ramallah.
Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniya railed against the US view of a new Middle East, saying it was one that began with ‘destroying Lebanon’ and killing the maximum number of Palestinians.
On a visit to the Gaza Strip’s main power plant, which was bombed by Israel, leaving many of its 1.4 million residents without power, UN humanitarian coordinator Jan Egeland said it was a ‘clear’ example of excessive force.—AFP
