ISRAEL/ LEBANON : Israel's air force strikes Lebanese targets as troops prepare for another day of shelling.

Israeli troops prepared for another day of shelling into southern Lebanon as Israel's airforce pressed ahead with its devastating strikes on Hizbollah targets across Lebanon. After battering the country from the air and shelling into the south, Israel's army refused to rule out a massive ground invasion of south Lebanon only six years after it ended its occupation of the area. As Israel vowed to press on with its campaign, thousands of foreigners fled Lebanon -- some by road to Syria, others seeking places on U.S. and European ships after Beirut's international airport was closed by Israeli fire. The fighting was triggered when Hizbollah, the guerrilla group which is backed by Syria and Iran and is part of Lebanon's government, seized two Israeli soldiers and killed eight in a cross-border raid on northern Israel on July 12. The Israeli retaliation has killed 215 people, all but 14 of them civilians, and inflicted the heaviest destruction in Lebanon for two decades, with attacks targeting ports, roads, bridges, factories and petrol stations. Hizbollah responded by attacking a naval vessel off Beirut and firing hundreds of rockets at northern Israel, killing 24 people, 12 of them civilians. ends

ITN Source | July 18, 2006

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