helpforhomeschoolers
Advanced Member
Member # 15
|
posted
ul. 18, 2006 10:52 | Updated Jul. 18, 2006 18:21
IDF: One week to remove threat in North
By YAAKOV KATZ, JPOST STAFF, AND AP
Forty to fifty percent of Hizbullah's military capability has been destroyed in the six days of the IDF counter-attack following last Wednesday's Hizbullah raid in northern Israel, The Jerusalem Post has learned.
The IDF, it is understood, believes it needs another week or so minimum to achieve its military goals in terms of alleviating Hizbullah's capacity to threaten Israel.
The IDF further believes, it is understood, that it will be given at least that long to continue its actions, in light of the G8 nations' essential support for Israel and those nations' branding Hizbullah and Hamas as being responsible for the current escalation.
Operations in Lebanon, the Post has learned, are costing Israel NIS 50-100 million a day.
The IAF reported that it hit 52 targets in Lebanon during Tuesday.
Only Tuesday afternoon, IAF aircraft attacked two weapons-filled trucks parked on the coastal road in the town of Byblos, north of Beirut. They also hit two similar trucks on the narrow mountain road between Beirut and Syria, which has become the main route to Damascus since the air attacks made the highway unusable.
The IAF has recently begun targeting vehicles in Lebanon it suspects of transporting missiles for Hizbullah.
Television showed pictures of one truck on fire and another damaged on the mountain road. One driver was reported wounded.
In other attacks Tuesday, IAF jets carried out two raids on southern Beirut - where Hizbullah is known to occupy many buildings - and the eastern city of Baalbek.
Earlier, Deputy IDF Chief of General Staff Maj.-Gen. Moshe Kaplinsky said in an interview to Army Radio that the offensive against Hizbullah would reach its completion "in a matter of weeks."
Meanwhile, Defense Minister Amir Peretz approved a call-up of three additional reserve battalions.
The reservists are set to replace troops currently operating in the West Bank, allowing those soldiers to be deployed in the north, to assist in the conflict with Hizbullah. The orders were expected to be distributed on Tuesday.
Nevertheless, Kaplinsky said a massive ground incursion was not necessary at the moment.
"At this stage we do not think we have to activate massive ground forces into Lebanon but if we have to do this, we will. We are not ruling it out," Kaplinski told Israel Radio.
The deputy chief of staff added that Hizbullah had a very large system of different types of rockets. "The (group) still has the ability to fire at the north and residents still feel this. We will do everything to shorten this suffering," he said.
On Monday night, the IDF continued its assault on Lebanon, attacking some 100 targets throughout the country, including five rocket launching sites. The IAF bombed bunkers in the neighborhood of Dahiya in southern Beirut. Also, a weapons cache and trucks used to carry arms were also hit near Ba'al Bek in eastern Lebanon.
Eleven Lebanese soldiers were killed and 41 others wounded in an overnight strike on a Lebanese army base, Lebanese security officials said Tuesday, as Israel renewed its attacks on Beirut and northern Lebanon.
The security officials said warplanes swooped down on the area of Kfar Chima early Tuesday, firing missiles near a local army base.
As the soldiers were rushing to their bomb shelters, the base took a direct hit, said the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because the army had not issued a communique.
In one attack in southern Lebanon, a building collapsed and 13 people were killed, witnesses reported. The bombing of the southern region continued into Tuesday morning.
Also on Monday night, the IDF thwarted an infiltration attempt when the forces identified a Hizbullah cell attempting to enter Israel along the central region of the border. The soldiers opened fire at the infiltrators, striking the target.
The IDF stepped up its offensive against Hizbullah on Monday and, in pinpointed ground incursions, razed the group's military outposts along the northern border as IAF fighter jets bombed stockpiles of long-range missiles capable of reaching Tel Aviv.
Posts: 4684 | From: Southern Black Hills of South Dakota | Registered: Jun 2002
| IP: Logged | 
|
Printer-friendly view of this topic
