Hezbollah Leader Threatens Tel Aviv
The leader of Hezbollah, for the first time since fighting began 22 days ago, offered Thursday to stop rocket attacks on northern Israel in return for an end to air strikes throughout Lebanon.
Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, however, vowed to fire rockets into Tel Aviv if Israel were to strike at Beirut proper. Israeli warplanes have hit Hezbollah strongholds in southern Beirut suburbs repeatedly, most recently before dawn on Thursday.
"If you bomb our capital Beirut, we will bomb the capital of your usurping entity... We will bomb Tel Aviv," he said.
Early Friday, Israeli warplanes pounded south Beirut, launching 15 bombing runs in a half hour, local media reported.
Fighter jets flew over the capital's Ouzai neighborhood, a Hezbollah stronghold, where the highway leading south begins, reported the Lebanese Broadcasting Corp. television channel.
While threatening Tel Aviv for the first time, Nasrallah offered his first gesture toward diminishing the conflict, which has taken more than 500 Lebanese lives and killed more than 50 Israelis.
"Anytime you decide to stop your campaign against our cities, villages, civilians and infrastructure, we will not fire rockets on any Israeli settlement or city," he said in a taped television speech.
Nasrallah said his forces were succeeding in inflicting "maximum casualties" on Israeli forces in the south of the country, and said his guerrillas would not back down from the brutal fighting around towns and villages across the rugged region.
"We naturally prefer that it is a military against military fight, on the ground, on the battlefield — we are ready for it," he said.
In other developments:
Nasrallah's message came as Hezbollah rocket attacks on northern Israel killed seven people on Thursday and injured many others, Israeli rescue officials said. There were conflicting reports about whether children were among the dead.
The deluge of rockets came a day after the guerrillas fired more than 230 rockets into Israel after a two-day lull, underscoring Hezbollah's continued ability to carry out unrelenting strikes here despite Israel's 23-day offensive in southern Lebanon.
The six fatalities were the most in a single day since eight people were killed July 16 when a rocket struck a train maintenance depot in Haifa.
At least 100 rockets hit northern Israel in a matter of minutes during the deadly barrage, police said, and air raid sirens rang out across northern Israel. A total of 132 rockets hit Israel throughout the day.
In response to the attacks, Defense Minister Amir Peretz told top army officers to begin preparing for the next stage of the offensive in south Lebanon, a push to the Litani River, about 18 miles from the border, senior military officials said. Such a push would require further approval by Israel's Security Cabinet.
Two people were killed in Acre and three in Maalot. The death toll marked the most fatalities in a single day since eight people were killed July 16 when a rocket struck a train maintenance depot in Haifa.
In Acre, some people came out of their shelters after an initial rocket barrage to see where the missiles fell, when a new batch of rockets struck the town, killing two people who were standing on their balcony, Mayor Shimon Lankry told Israel's Channel 2 Television. Five other people were injured in the town, one critically and four seriously, he said.
Israeli officials said they would not back off their offensive in southern Lebanon despite the ongoing rocket attacks.
"The Hezbollah will find that Israel will pursue it relentlessly without letting up, and that Israel will take whatever steps necessary to stop these attacks," said David Baker, an official in Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office.
Meanwhile, CBS News correspondent Charlie D'Agata reports Israeli warplanes, battered southern Beirut with new strikes Thursday and warned residents to evacuate three neighborhoods, as commanders ordered troops to prepare to drive even deeper north.
An Israeli missile slammed into a house in a Lebanese border village, killing a family of three, and air strikes across the country's south wounded at least six people, Lebanese security officials said.
Another Lebanese woman was killed when a missile hit her house near the Christian town of Marjayoun, they said.