LEBANON: Israeli aircraft attack Beirut airport and kill more than 20 civilians in attacks on southern Lebanon.

Record ID: 341423

  • Title: LEBANON: Israeli aircraft attack Beirut airport and kill more than 20 civilians in attacks on southern Lebanon.
  • Date: 13th July 2006
  • Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (English) CHIEF OF STAFF DAN HALUTZ SAYING: "If, if rockets are launched towards Israeli cities, Beirut will be included among the targets and yesterday we strike the Beirut international airport to hint to the Lebanese government that nothing is safe once they are operating against Israel. And nothing is safe, as simple as that."
  • Embargoed: 28th July 2006 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Lebanon
  • Country: Lebanon
  • Topics: War / Fighting,International Relations
  • Reuters ID: LVABKXJTGE6G2CI0ZCR4P2TRA40Y
  • Story Text: Lebanese president Emile Lahoud chaired an extraordinary session meeting shortly after Israeli warplanes struck Beirut airport and Hizbollah television.
    In its second day of offensive on Lebanon Israel began enforcing a naval blockade of Lebanon on Thursday, intensifying reprisals after Hizbollah seized two Israeli soldiers and killed eight a day earlier. The Israeli attacks have killed 36 Lebanese civilians.
    Hizbollah retaliated for Israeli "massacres" by firing 60 Katyusha rockets at Nahariya in northern Israel. A civilian was killed and at least 21 were wounded, Israeli medics said.
    The violence was the worst between Israel and Lebanon since 1996 when Israeli troops still occupied part of the south. It coincided with an major Israeli offensive into the Gaza Strip to retrieve a captured soldier and halt Palestinian rocket fire.
    Israel aircraft bombed runways at Beirut's Rafik al-Hariri International Airport, forcing flights to divert to Cyprus.
    The attack followed dawn air strikes in south Lebanon which killed 34 civilians, including eight young children, and wounded 52 people, security sources said.
    Ten members of one family were killed in Dweir village and seven family members died in Baflay. A Lebanese army soldier was also killed. Israeli air strikes on Wednesday killed two civilians and a Hizbollah fighter.
    Two hours after the airport raid, an Israeli helicopter fired a missile at the headquarters of Hizbollah's al-Manar TV in the Beirut suburb of Haret Hreik, wounding six people.
    One of the wounded was an al-Manar employee, the station's director said. The building, in a Shiite neighbourhood where Hizbollah leaders also have offices, was slightly damaged.
    Israeli aircraft later attacked an al-Manar transmission tower south of Baalbek in eastern Lebanon, witnesses said.
    Israel had promised a "very painful" response to Hizbollah's action of seizing two soldiers and killing eight.
    Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora has said on Tuesday his government did not endorse the Hizbollah attack.
    Hizbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said the two soldiers had been seized to force Israel to release prisoners. Israel insisted it would discuss no such swap.
    Seven rockets fired from Lebanon hit the northern Israeli town of Safed on Thursday (July 13), wounding 11 people, two seriously and causing severe damage, medics said.
    Safed is some 15 km (10 miles) inside the Israeli border with Lebanon. It is among the deepest towns struck by rockets since tensions escalated between Israel and Lebanon after Hizbollah guerrillas seized two Israeli soldiers on Wednesday.
    The guerrillas have fired at least 70 rockets across northern Israel from Lebanon, Israeli media have reported.
    Israeli army Chief of Staff Dan Halutz said that if Israeli cities were hit Israel Israel would consider Beirut a legitimate target.
    "If, if rockets are launched towards Israeli cities, Beirut will be included among the targets and yesterday we strike the Beirut international airport to hint to the Lebanese government that nothing is safe once they are operating against Israel. And nothing is safe, as simple as that," Halutz told reporters at Israel's Northern Command.
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