No Cease-Fire For Israel

Israel, Hezbollah Intensify Attacks; U.S. Blocks U.N. Resolution On Gaza

(CBS/AP)  The main highway linking Beirut to the Syrian capital has been damaged, further tightening the Israeli blockade on Lebanon.

The Lebanese government, caught in the middle, pleaded for a ceasefire.

But Israel says it is determined to beat Hezbollah back and deny the group's fighters positions they traditionally held along the northern border.

"If the government of Lebanon fails to deploy its forces, as is expected of a sovereign government, we shall not allow Hezbollah forces to remain any further on the borders of the state of Israel,” Israeli Defense Minister Amir Peretz said.

Israel's offensive - its heaviest in Lebanon in 24 years - was launched after Hezbollah guerrillas snatched two Israeli soldiers in a brazen cross-border raid Wednesday. Two days of Israeli bombings killed 45 Lebanese and two Kuwaitis and wounded 103. Two Israeli civilians and eight Israeli soldiers have also been killed, the military's highest death toll in four years.

Israel said its attacks are intended to prevent the movement of the captured soldiers and hamper Hezbollah's military capacity, reports CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan. The army told Logan that it believes the two abducted soldiers are still alive and they are afraid the captives will be moved to Iran.

With the airport closed, many tourists were trapped while others drove over the mountains to Syria.

The State Department says that about 25,000 Americans live in Lebanon. If the conflict gets worse, the U.S. government has a responsibility to evacuate those who want to leave, which might mean sending in the Marines, reports CBS News correspondent David Martin.

Now that the airport has been bombed, the options for evacuating Americans are a lot more complicated. Marines would have to fly helicopters from Cyprus to Lebanon, or from amphibious ships in nearby waters.

Fears mounted among Arab and European governments that violence in Lebanon could spiral out of control in a volatile region already torn by conflicts in Iraq and in Gaza. Israel launched an offensive in Gaza against Hamas, whose fighters are holding another Israeli soldier captured two weeks ago.

The shockwaves from the fighting on two fronts began to be felt as oil prices surged Thursday to a record above $78 a barrel in world markets, also agitated by the threat of supply disruptions in the Middle East and beyond.

Thursday, after Israeli Army chief Brig. Gen. Dan Halutz warned that "nothing is safe" in Lebanon, President Bush backed Israel's right to defend itself and denounced Hezbollah as "a group of terrorists who want to stop the advance of peace."

But he also expressed worries the Israeli assault could cause the fall of Lebanon's anti-Syrian government. "We're concerned about the fragile democracy in Lebanon," Mr. Bush said in Germany.

Later, a Lebanese government statement said Mr. Bush has promised Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora that he will press Israel to halt its attacks on Lebanon.

A statement from Saniora's office said that Mr. Bush phoned Saniora at midday Friday to discuss the deteriorating situation in Lebanon. Saniora asked Mr. Bush to push Israel to halt its airstrikes on Lebanese infrastructure.

"President Bush affirmed his readiness to put pressure on Israel to limit the damage to Lebanon as a result of the current military action, and to spare civilians from harm," the statement said.

The European Union took a harsher tone, criticizing Israel for using what it called "disproportionate" force. EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said he is planning a peace mission.

Thursday, the United States cast the first U.N. Security Council veto in nearly two years, blocking an Arab-backed resolution that would have demanded Israel halt its military offensive in the Gaza Strip.

The Arab League called an emergency meeting of foreign ministers in Cairo on Saturday, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas warned that Israel's Lebanon offensive "is raising our fears of a new regional war."

Egypt launched a diplomatic bid to resolve the crisis, amid apparent frustration among moderate Arab nations that Hezbollah — and by implication its top ally Syria — had started the fight with Israel.

The last time Israeli strikes targeted Beirut was in 2000, when warplanes hit a power station in the hills above the city after a Hezbollah attack killed Israeli soldiers. Israel has not hit Beirut's airport since its 1982 invasion of Lebanon and occupation of the capital.