The Foreign Ministry today denied reports in Western newspapers that Israel was supplying arms to right-wing Christians battling Moslem leftists in Lebanon. The Ministry stressed that the only form of assistance being rendered to Lebanese was of a humanitarian nature consisting of medical aid and food supplies for refugees coming to the security fence along the Israeli border.
The Ministry also confirmed that goods and services are being exchanged with Lebanese villagers through gaps in the fence, an unanticipated form of trade that has arisen as a result of the civil war in Lebanon. Christian Arabs in Israel have been gathering food supplies for their co-religionists in Lebanon which are transported in convoys to the border every few days. The last convoy was sent last week and another one is scheduled to go to the border over the weekend or early next week.
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