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Israeli Air Force Strikes Terrorist Targets in Lebanon

March 14, 1988
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Israeli air force jets raided terrorist bases in the Mieh Mieh and Ein Hilweh refugee camps east of Sidon in southern Lebanon Saturday morning, a military spokesman announced.

All aircraft returned safely to their bases despite encountering anti-aircraft fire.

A police spokesman in Sidon said the targets were bases used by Al Fatah, the mainstream terrorist group of the Palestine Liberation Organization. Reports from Sidon said two members of the group died in the air strike.

Al Fatah claimed responsibility for commandeering a bus in the Negev on March 7 in which three Israeli civilians were killed and 10 wounded. The three terrorists who carried out the attack were killed by Israeli border police.

Sources in Lebanon said the terrorists had been expecting some sort of retaliation by Israel and were on full alert.

The air strike came a day after the United Nations Human Rights Commission, meeting in Geneva, condemned Israel for what it said were human rights violations in southern Lebanon. It specifically criticized Israel for bombings and arrests of civilians.

The resolution calls on Israel to withdraw immediately and unconditionally from southern Lebanon, where Israel has established a security zone along the border.

Twenty-six nations sitting on the commission voted for the resolution and 15 abstained. Only the United States voted against it. Israel is not a member of the commission.

(Geneva correspondent Tamar Levy contributed to this report.)

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