At least 10 Israeli soldiers were killed today when a suicide bomber crashed his explosives-laden car into a troop-carrying truck, part of an Israel Defense Force convoy in south Lebanon.
Military sources who announced the attack said it occurred just north of the Israeli border town of Metullah. There was no immediate report of how many soldiers may have been wounded. The announcement was delayed for several hours so that next of kin could be informed.
A Shiite Moslem extremist group claimed credit for the suicide blow, saying it was in retaliation for the car bombing of an apartment house in a Shiite suburb of Beirut last Friday which killed at least 75 persons and injured 250. Yesterday, thousands of Moslem demonstrators rallied outside the shattered building blaming Israel and the United States for the carnage.
PERES DEFENDS’IRON FIST’ POLICY
Israel denied any connection with the terrorist act. Premier Shimon Peres declared, in a statement which he read to the Cabinet today, that “Israel condemns such acts which have been perpetrated of late in Lebanon and regrets that innocent people have fallen victim to such terrible methods.” He said Israel is totally opposed to “any method of car-bombing or murder of innocent people.”
At the same time, the Prime Minister defended the “iron fist” policy of harsh retaliation and preemptive measures for attacks on the IDF while it is carrying out its three-stage withdrawal from south Lebanon. “Every army is entitled to defend the lives of its men. There will be no compromise over anything to do with attempts on the lives of our soldiers,” Peres said.
Today’s car bomb attack was the most serious and costly assault on the IDF since it began its phased pullout from south Lebanon in January. It was precisely to avert such suicide missions that the IDF recently banned any vehicle with fewer than two occupants from the roads in south Lebanon.
There has been a growing debate in Israel over the efficacy of the “iron fist” policy inasmuch as attacks on IDF units have increased in recent weeks although–until today–casualties were fewer.
Opponents of the hard-line policy say the house-to-house searches of Shiite villages believed to be guerrilla bases, mass interrogations and arrests of suspects, destruction of buildings and dusk-to-dawn curfews, have not paid off. Those who favored the policy noted that IDF casualties were down.
ISRAEL DRUZE SOLDIER BURIED
An Israeli soldier was killed last Thursday in a clash with Lebanese army regulars. He was identified as an 18-year-old Druze, Nebouani Amad, who had volunteered to serve with a paratroop battalion. He was buried Friday in his home village of Julis. Amad was the 36th Druze soldier in the IDF to be killed in Lebanon since Israel invaded that country in June, 1982. There were four attacks on IDF units Thursday night in the Tyre area, all without casualties.
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