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| By israelinsider staff and partners July 20, 2006 |
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Israel's army chief said Thursday that an offensive in Lebanon would not end until Israel's security is restored, and vowed to destroy Hezbollah's arsenal and military capabilities.
"The fighting in the north ... could last much longer," Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, the army's chief of staff, said in a letter to soldiers and offiers. "We are being tested at this time. Our moral strength and value will reflect on the state of Israel and its residents and on their ability to continue to stand up to the threat on the front."
"We will operate for as long as necessary until security is returned to the state of Israel," he added.
The letter was released to the media several hours after Hezbollah guerrillas wounded three Israeli soldiers in two separate clashes in southern Lebanon on Thursday, the army said.
Two of the soldiers were in serious condition and the third was lightly wounded, the army said.
Hezbollah guerrillas also fired about 15 missiles into northern Israel on Thursday, hitting four separate areas but causing no casualties, the army said.
In one of the clashes in southern Israel, an Israeli unit sent in to ambush Hezbollah guerrillas had a fierce gunbattle with a cell of militants and an Israeli soldier was seriously wounded.
In a separate incident near the Israeli border town of Avivim, Hezbollah guerrillas fired an anti-tank missile at an Israeli tank sent in to destroy Hezbollah's infrastructure in southern Lebanon, the army said. One soldier in the tank was seriously wounded and a second was lightly hurt.
The fighting was the latest in nine days of violence that erupted after Hezbollah launched a cross-border attack on an Israeli military patrol, killing eight soldiers and capturing two.
The Israeli army said that in both incidents Hezbollah guerrillas were wounded, but they had no information on how many were hit or on their condition.
Israel responded with an air assault and a ground thrust into Lebanon, and Hezbollah guerrillas have since fired hundreds of rockets at northern Israel.
Twenty-nine people had been killed on the Israeli side of the border, including 14 soldiers and 15 civilians. About 300 people have died and 1,000 have been wounded in Lebanon, with half a million people displaced.
Shaul Mofaz, a former Israeli defense minister, said on Israel's Army Radio Thursday that about 50 percent of Hezbollah's arsenal of weapons and buildings has been destroyed by the Israeli offensive. Israeli Brig. Gen. Alon Friedman gave the same estimate on Wednesday.
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