LEBANON: Israel bomb mobile telephone and television masts in Lebanon and pledge to pursue its war on Hizbollah with more military incursions

Israel bombed mobile telephone and television masts in Lebanon on Saturday (July 22) and pledged to pursue its war on Hizbollah with more military incursions, but said it plans no full-scale invasion for now. The streets of Beirut were relatively calm in the morning, as thousands of Lebanese civilians have fled north fearing Israel will invade and expand an 11-day-old bombardment of Lebanon which has killed 349 people, mostly civilians. "We come and go we hide in shelters, it's torture during the nights but God is protecting us and protecting his people and this country and the children, what is the children's fault," said Beirut resident Thuraya Erslan. Some Lebanese casualties were taken to the Hayat Hospital in the Gallery Semaan area of Beirut, where medics were treating wounded as well as many others with mental illness brought on by the bombardment. "We have received until now 150 wounded people some of them suffering form a nervous breakdown and hysteria," Kasem said. People searched through the rubble of destroyed buildings in southern Beirut after its infrastructure was extensively damaged by Israeli bombardment. Amongst the ruined buildings a banner spelt out a defiant message, "We are people that do not fear eradication ... and our history is the history of martyrs." But this part of the city is almost completely destroyed. Hizbollah had people carrying out doing civil defence work in the city. One member of the organisation said that their support for Hizbollah was absolute. "Thank God our spirit is very high and we are proud of the resistance work. We will support the resistance and we will stay with them until the last breath," said the man. Three Israeli air raids struck a transmission station used by several Lebanese television channels, including Hizbollah's al-Manar, and a mobile telephone mast in Christian areas north of Beirut, cutting mobile phone services in northern Lebanon. The official in charge of the station transmitting LBC programmes was killed, the channel said. A nun at a nearby church said two French nationals were also lightly wounded. An Israeli army spokeswoman said Israel hit a transmitter broadcasting Hizbollah radio and television programmes and a second transmitting telephone frequencies "used by Hizbollah". Three people were killed in air strikes in south Lebanon. Witnesses said Israeli warplanes launched repeated raids on the town of al-Khiam, just north of the border. They also struck near the port of Tyre and destroyed five trucks in east Lebanon. Women from the Lebanese Civil Women's Associations demonstrated outside the UN building in Beirut on Saturday. One of the demonstrators, Suhair Khalil, outlined why they were there. "We are gathered here to stop the war and the Israeli aggression against Lebanon ... because they are killing children and never care about it," said Khalil. The war started when Hizbollah captured two soldiers and killed eight in a July 12 raid into Israel, which had already launched an offensive in the Gaza Strip to try to recover another soldier seized by Palestinian militants on June 25.

ITN Source | July 22, 2006

Tags:. .absolute. .port. .recover. .expand. .palestinian