ISRAEL has called up thousands of reservists to its northern border to establish a buffer zone against Hezbollah fighters, even as Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, was last night putting forward a diplomatic initiative to end the fighting.
Announcing that she would travel to the Middle East tomorrow and attend an international conference on Lebanon next week in Rome, Dr Rice said that the US would back a “robust” international force for Lebanon.
She rejected, however, calls for an immediate ceasefire, blaming Hezbollah’s “illegal attack” for the crisis. Any ceasefire before Hezbollah was disarmed would merely offer a “false promise,” she said. “If we don’t . . . deal with the root cause then we will be back here in six months to get another ceasefire.”
Washington’s intervention came as Israeli officials revealed plans to create a mile-wide “sterile” zone along the Lebanese side of the border. Special forces backed by armour and thousands of soldiers were already on the ground, engaged in firefights with guerrillas. Their commanders said they were surprised by the fierce resistance put up by Hezbollah and by the complexity of its defences.
Armoured bulldozers prepared to demolish anything that Hezbollah could use as cover. It was unclear if houses would also be razed in the proposed zone, but civilians are unlikely to be permitted to live inside it.
Israel issued warnings to those civilians still in the area by telephone, text message and in leaflets, telling them to move above the Litani river, 15 miles north of the border. Israeli troops could be deployed deep into Lebanon to protect logistics teams clearing the buffer zone.
As the fighting continued, Britain and the United States, facing growing pressure to halt the violence, proposed a UN Security Council statement vowing to “create conditions” for an end to the fighting.
Jan Egeland, the UN’s emergency relief co-ordinator, briefed the Security Council on the worsening humanitarian situation. “The war, the terror, the attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure has to stop in Lebanon, northern Israel and Gaza,” he said.
But in Tyre, the biggest town in southern Lebanon, the few remaining residents were braced for an escalation of hostilities. Airstrikes continued yesterday, massive explosions in the hills creating pressure waves and rattling windows while thick columns of smoke hung in the air.
An hour after the latest Israeli leaflet drop the area’s Maronite and Catholic churches had closed their doors and a convoy of more than 20 cars, most with white sheets fluttering from windows, left the Christian quarter. Families lugged suitcases down the narrow alleys to their cars. “We just don’t know if they will hit this area,” an elderly man said. “People are panicking.”
The initial victims of Israel’s ten-day onslaught were removed yesterday from makeshift mortuaries and buried in convoy of more than 20 cars, most with white sheets fluttering from windows, left the Christian quarter. “We just don’t know if they will hit this area,” an elderly man said. “People are panicking.”
The initial victims of Israel’s ten-day onslaught were removed yesterday from makeshift mortuaries and buried in a mass grave on the edge of Tyre. Almost a quarter of the victims were killed in a helicopter attack last weekend on three vehicles filled with residents fleeing the border hamlet of Marwahine. One missile hit a lorry carrying 25 people.
“Israel is an evil state that cannot confront the resistance and retaliates against civilians,” said Kamel Abdullah, 35, who lost his pregnant wife, six children and his father.
As the Lebanese refugees moved north one Israeli official told The Times that no civilians would be permitted to enter the cleared border area. However, Ehud Olmert’s Government insists that its troops have no intention of staying longer than it takes to get a multinational or Lebanese force in place to ensure that Hezbollah will not return.
“The objective is not to stay there or to conquer. The objective is to dismantle infrastructure,” Isaac Herzog, the Tourism Minister and member of the Israeli Cabinet’s security committee, said. “It is not a buffer zone.” He refused to say if soldiers would remain after those areas were cleared.
A UN plan released on Thursday proposed an enlarged peacekeeping force to help the Lebanese Army to deploy in the south and international forces to oversee a settlement. Dr Rice indicated that the US would support such a force would not be involved.
Brigadier-General Ido Nehushtan said that Hezbollah had fired more than 1,000 missiles into Israel, killing 15 people. Israeli warplanes have killed least 335 people, say Lebanese officials.
A senior Israeli source said of Hezbollah’s defences: “Those positions were apparently much more fortified than we expected them to be. Give them credit, they are good fighters. They don’t run away.”
Additional reporting by Nicholas Blanford in Tyre and Ned Parker in Jerusalem
