Hezbollah Attacks Israeli Positions in Shebaa FarmsThe Lebanese resistance group Hezbollah launched an overnight attack against Israeli positions in the disputed Shebaa Farms, the As Safir newspaper reported on Thursday.Hezbollah, or Party of God, fired 10 to 15 anti-tank missiles and 20 mortar rounds at two Israeli outposts in the Shebaa Farms, an area bordering Lebanon, Israel and Syria. Israeli army responded with artillery and tank shelling at Hezbollah firing positions. There have been no reports about casualties on both sides. The attack was the first by Hezbollah since the end of June on the Shebaa Farms, which Beirut and Damascus say belong to Lebanon. Hezbollah vows to continue fighting against Israel before the Jewish state withdraws from the area. But Israel insists that the Shebaa Farms is an area it occupied from Syria in the 1967 Middle East War and that its fate be resolved in future negotiations between Israel and Syria. United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan's personal representative in south Lebanon Steffan de Mistura has condemned the Hezbollah attack, saying that "any violent attack across the Blue Line is wrong because it is an infringement of a clear U.N. position." The Blue Line was drawn by the U.N. to authenticate Israel's withdrawal from south Lebanon in May 2000 after a 22-year occupation. |
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