Israel claims Hizbollah stronghold seized in Lebanon

MARJAYOUN, Lebanon - Israel ousted Hizbollah guerrillas from a stronghold just inside Lebanon overnight (NZ time) after several days of fierce fighting, the army said, as it bombarded targets across the south of the country.

Ground forces commander Major-General Benny Gantz said Israeli soldiers took control of Maroun al-Ras, a hilltop village overlooking both sides of the border, where six Israeli commandos have been killed this week.

Israel said it planned no full-scale invasion of Lebanon for now, but warned villagers near the border to leave.

In the town of Marjayoun, about eight km from the border, cars packed with people waving white flags fled north fearing Israel will step up an 11-day-old war which has killed 354 people, mostly civilians.

Gantz said Israeli soldiers inflicted dozens of casualties on Hizbollah. The Shi'ite Muslim group said on Saturday one guerrilla had been killed but did not say where.

An Israeli army spokesman had said troops backed by around a dozen tanks and armoured vehicles had been fighting in Maroun al-Ras, one km inside Lebanese territory, and found Hizbollah bunkers and weapons stores.

He said Israel might widen its military action, but was still looking at "limited operations". "We're not talking about massive forces going inside at this point," he said.

Resisting growing calls for a ceasefire, the United States stressed the need to tackle what it sees as the root cause of the conflict -- Hizbollah's armed presence on Israel's border and the role of its allies, Syria and Iran.

"Resolving the crisis demands confronting the terrorist group that launched the attacks and the nations that support it," US President George W Bush said, one day before Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was to head to Israel.

Israeli forces had urged residents of 14 villages in south Lebanon to leave ahead of more air raids.

"Do you know where we should go? Which roads are safe?" asked a veiled woman in the back of a white Mercedes crammed with people fleeing from the border village of Tallousi.

Israel has built up its forces at the border and called up 3000 reserves, but is wary of mounting another invasion only six years after ending a costly 22-year occupation of the south.

Already, 19 soldiers have been killed in the latest conflict. Another 15 civilians have been killed in Hizbollah rocket attacks since the fighting started.

Israeli air raids hit transmission stations used by several Lebanese television channels and a mobile telephone mast north of Beirut, cutting mobile phone services in northern Lebanon.

One LBC employee was killed. A nun at a nearby church said two French nationals were lightly wounded.

Israel's army said it hit a Hizbollah radio and TV transmitter and an antenna relaying frequencies used by Hizbollah, whose al-Manar television al-Nour radio was still broadcasting after the strikes.

Israeli medics and the army said at least 40 Hizbollah rockets hit towns in northern Israel, wounding 16 people.

Across south Lebanon, families piled into cars and trucks and clogged roads north after Israel warned residents to flee beyond the Litani river, about 12 miles from the border.

But witnesses said an Israeli air strike hit one of the few remaining crossings over the river early on Saturday.

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.

Washington supports proposals for an expanded international force on the Israel-Lebanon border but details were not fixed, a senior US official told Reuters on condition of anonymity. A 2000-strong UN force monitors the border at present.

Amid growing concern about the plight of civilians in Lebanon, Israel said it would ease humanitarian access.

UN relief agencies have called for safe passage to take in food and medical supplies. An estimated half million people have fled their homes.

Jan Egeland, the United Nations' emergency relief coordinator, said at least US$100 million ($162 million) was urgently needed to help avert a humanitarian disaster in Lebanon over the coming months.

Foreigners have flooded out of the country. Ships and aircraft scooped more tired and scared people from Lebanon and taking them to Cyprus and Turkey in a mass international effort which has so far evacuated more than 25,000 people.

- REUTERS