Israel threw leaflets on Tuesday warning it would strike any vehicle traveling south of the Litani. This new threat followed a curfew the Israeli army imposed on the area starting 10:00 p.m. Monday which excluded humanitarian traffic.
Meanwhile, Israel expanded air strikes around Lebanon, including the Bekaa Valley. Security officials identified eight people who were killed in raids Monday night on the town of Britel near Baalbeck. 23 others were wounded and at least 10 houses were destroyed, they said.
Rescue workers continued to work frantically to pull out 28 people who are feared buried under the rubble of a building in the Chiah district south of Beirut after heavy strikes last night destroyed four buildings there killing 28 people and wounding 65. Many of the victims were refugees who fled fighting in the south.
In response, Hizbullah gunners fired over 100 Katyusha rockets into northern Israel on Tuesday. At least 20 rockets slammed into the Upper Galilee town of Kiryat Shmona on Tuesday, causing damages to structures and starting a number of fires.
Two people were wounded, one moderately and one lightly, when a rocket hit a home in the Western Galilee town of Fasouta on Tuesday afternoon.
Also on Tuesday, four rockets landed in open fields in the northern region of the Golan Heights. No casualties were reported as a result of the rocket fire.
Ground fighting continued to rage in villages and strategic points near the Israeli border. Fierce clashes broke out around the town of Bint Jbail. An Israeli solider and 15 Hizbullah fighters were killed in the fighting, the Israeli army said.
Meanwhile, efforts to negotiate a cease-fire have come down to a step-by-step proposal backed by Washington and Lebanon's insistence - supported by Arab nations - that nothing can happen on the ground before Israeli forces leave the country. Arab diplomats and U.N. Security Council members were to meet later Tuesday at the U.N. in New York to try to hammer out a deal.
