Hizbullah guerrillas peppered towns in northern Israel yesterday with barrages of Katyusha rockets, killing two people and injuring more than 100. After the northern city of Haifa was hit by two rockets towards evening, Israeli naval vessels hit Beirut airport for a second time and planes dropped leaflets on southern Beirut warning residents to keep clear of Hizbullah positions.
A 40-year-old woman sitting on her balcony was killed yesterday morning when a rocket slammed into her apartment building in the northern Israeli town of Nahariya. Another civilian was killed in a rocket attack in the town of Safed. The army ordered Israelis in the north into bomb shelters or special reinforced rooms in their homes.
The rocket attacks came after Israel bombed two runways at Beirut airport overnight. Later in the morning, Israeli planes hit two army bases in Lebanon. Israel also imposed a sea and air blockade on Lebanon, with Israeli naval vessels turning away ships carrying goods to Lebanon. Lebanese officials said at least 50 civilians were killed in the Israeli strikes.
The Israeli military action, the most intense in Lebanon in a decade, came a day after Hizbullah militants ambushed an Israeli border patrol, killed eight soldiers and took two captive. Hours after the soldiers were snatched, Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah named his price for their release: the freeing of Arab prisoners in Israeli jails, including three Lebanese.
Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert rejected the demand, saying he would not yield to "extortion". The strike on the port city of Haifa, which is some 50km from the Israel-Lebanon border, is the furthest south a rocket fired from Lebanon has hit inside Israel.
Earlier in the day, Israeli leaders had warned that an attack on Haifa would be met by missile strikes on a neighbourhood in Beirut where Hizbullah operatives live. Signalling that Israel planned to make good on its threat, veteran politician Shimon Peres last night warned residents in the area to leave their homes.
Defence minister Amir Peretz said Israel's aim was to "break" Hizbullah. Army chief Lt Gen Dan Halutz warned that "nothing is safe" in Lebanon.
US officials reportedly asked their Israeli counterparts not to hit civilian infrastructure installations in Lebanon and Israeli officials said last night the military would direct its strikes at Hizbullah targets.
The last time Israel launched a major offensive in Lebanon was in 1996, when ground forces pushed deep into the south of the country, but there has been no sign so far that the government plans to launch a similar offensive.
In May 2000, Israel withdrew from a security zone it occupied for 18 years in south Lebanon, largely as a result of incessant Hizbullah attacks, and Israeli leaders are loath to get bogged down again as a result of a ground invasion.