Lebanon could become new front

T. CHRISTIAN MILLER, LOS ANGELES TIMES

Originally published Sunday, April 14, 2002

AVIVIM, Israel -- Razor wire curls around the nectarine and almond trees flowering in this tiny farming community a few yards from Israel's border with Lebanon.

Local farmers are buying guns. The children spend afternoons in bomb shelters. Bullet holes pockmark the local military base. And many families are thinking of leaving.

"People are terrified now," said Haim Briton, 32, who heard shots whiz by his head last week as he tended the fruit trees he has growing along the border fence. "All day, every day, we are in great danger."

For the first time in decades, Hezbollah and Palestinian guerrillas are repeatedly attacking small Israeli border towns and military bases outside of the traditionally disputed territory along the frontier.

Launched in response to Israel's offensive in the West Bank, the attacks threaten to broaden the conflict into a wider war with Lebanon and Syria, which back the radical groups.

And they could draw the Israeli army into a demanding, two-front conflict that would drain resources and invite more intensive activity by Palestinian militants within the country.

"This place could escalate in minutes," said Maj. Dinor Shavit, an officer in the northern command responsible for the border.

23 attacks this year

In the last two weeks, Hezbollah batteries have launched Katyusha rockets against several small towns along Israel's borders with Lebanon and Syria. Guerrillas have fired machine guns and launched mortars at Israeli listening stations and military outposts.

There have been 23 attacks against the border since January, including those against a disputed region that Hezbollah claim belongs to Lebanon. That compares with 19 for all of the last two years. Mortar and rocket attacks have long taken place in the disputed region, known as Shabaa Farms, but now occur almost nightly.

So far, the attacks have failed to do serious damage. Several soldiers have been wounded, and some military buildings have been hit. No civilians have been killed or injured.

As a result, many Israeli political and military figures speculate that the attacks are intended to divert Israeli military forces from the West Bank, or as a political gesture by Hezbollah to demonstrate support for the Palestinians.

The danger remains, however, that a stray round or a rogue militant could end up killing a civilian. And that would bring retaliation of some sort against Lebanon, Syria or both.

Yosee Sarid, the leader of the opposition in Israel's parliament, is intimately aware of the dangers. During a recent visit to his second home in the border town of Margaliyot, he stepped outside his front porch to watch mortars burst against a distant mountain.

From his kitchen window, he can see Hezbollah guerrillas at a border post a few hundred yards away prepare their morning breakfast. Rockets have sailed over his home in recent days.

"One shot through a window, and the Israelis will come. Once a border village is attacked, retaliation will be inevitable," he added. "The whole Middle East will be in a war that no one intended to launch."

The Olympian Copyright 2002

back to Terror in America index