- JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Buoyed
by White House support for what it called Israel's right to defend itself,
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said on Tuesday the Jewish state was ready
to hit its enemies anywhere following an air raid deep in Syria.
-
- Speaking at a memorial service marking the anniversary
of the 1973 Middle East war, Sharon took a tough line but made no specific
threats after Sunday's strike on what Israel said was a training camp for
Palestinian militants.
-
- "Israel will not be deterred from defending its
citizens and will hit its enemies any place and in any way," Sharon
said. "At the same time we will not miss any opening and opportunity
to reach an agreement with our neighbors and peace."
-
- Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, breaking his silence
on the attack near Damascus, accused Israel of trying to drag Syria and
the rest of the Middle East into a wider conflict. Syria said Israeli warplanes
hit a civilian site.
-
- It was Israel's deepest air raid in Syria in three decades
and followed a Palestinian suicide bombing that killed 19 people in a restaurant
in the Israeli port city of Haifa a day earlier.
-
- Yasser Arafat, facing fresh Israeli threats to "remove"
him after the Haifa blast claimed by the Islamic Jihad group, swore in
an emergency eight-member cabinet led by Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie, who
has close ties to the Palestinian president.
-
- Sharon adviser Raanan Gissin said Israel would judge
the new cabinet by its actions but added: "In all likelihood, if it
is established by Arafat it will not fight terror."
-
- U.S. URGES ISRAEL TO AVOID ESCALATION
-
- Israel accuses Syria of giving safe haven to Palestinian
militants spearheading a three-year-old uprising for statehood and President
Bush insisted on Monday that Israel should not feel constrained in defending
itself.
-
- But Bush said he urged Sharon to avoid an escalation
of violence.
-
- After Sharon spoke on Tuesday, White House spokesman
Scott McClellan said: "We've always said Israel has a right to defend
itself, but they should always take into account the consequences of any
actions they may take."
-
- Political analysts saw the Israeli air raid as a warning
shot to Syria, whose military is no match for Israel's, and said it was
unlikely to escalate into a full-blown conflict.
-
- But the analysts said they expected heightened tensions
between the two countries and sporadic clashes with Lebanese Hizbollah
guerrillas backed by Syria and Iran.
-
- Israeli military sources said "terror groups"
in southern Lebanon fired missiles and rockets on Tuesday that landed near
an army base and a communal farm in northern Israel.
-
- A missile also hit a house in southern Lebanon, killing
a boy. Security sources in Beirut said it was probably fired at Israel
from inside Lebanon but fell short.
-
- Israel's army said a soldier was shot dead at the border
on Monday. Military sources blamed his death on Hizbollah, which denied
any involvement.
-
- Commenting on tensions with Syria and the violence on
the Lebanon frontier, the Israeli military's chief of staff, Lieutenant-General
Moshe Yaalon, told reporters: "I don't think we are heading toward
escalation."
-
- In an interview with the daily al-Hayat, Assad said Syria
would not yield to U.S. demands to expel Palestinian organizations on Washington's
list of terrorist groups.
-
- "(The raid) is an attempt by the Israeli government
to extract itself from its big crisis by trying to terrorize Syria and
drag it and the region into other wars," he said.
-
- Syria called an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security
Council on Sunday, but Washington, which has a veto, said it would not
support a resolution that condemned the Israeli raid without mentioning
the Haifa suicide attack.
-
- The Palestinians are required to rein in militants under
a stalled U.S.-backed peace "road map," but Qurie has ruled out
a crackdown for fear of starting a civil war.
-
- Under terms of the peace plan, Israel at this stage is
supposed to begin easing the hardships of Palestinians and stop building
settlements.
-
- The Palestinian resistance groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad
issued a statement in Beirut warning that the new cabinet should not be
used to "take oppressive measures." (Additional reporting by
Mohammed Assadi)
|
