Israelis Reluctantly Giving Up Peak With a View--of Key Syrian Posts

To a first-time visitor approaching from the Bekaa Valley far below, the structure on the snow-covered zenith of southern Lebanon’s highest mountain ridge looks like something out of science fiction.

Large antenna towers reach skyward from the four corners of what appears from a distance to be a squat, rectangular building. On the roof are space-age devices that look a bit like giant blue beach balls. And off to one side more electronic hardware scans the horizon.

Exactly what goes on inside the building--heart of the occupying Israeli army’s electronics and communications center here--is top secret. And a small group of foreign journalists was allowed to approach no closer than several hundred yards during a visit Monday. But as one officer who has been inside put it, only half in jest, “There’s everything there--including EKG.”

“We are going to lose a very important observation point when we withdraw from here,” added the base commander, who cannot be further identified under Israeli military censorship rules.

Will Lose Key Area

Mt. Barouk is undoubtedly the most important area to be evacuated under last Sunday’s Israeli government decision to immediately begin the second stage of its planned three-phase withdrawal from Lebanon.

There is no announced deadline for completion of the pullout, but senior defense sources say the goal is to finish Phase 2 within 12 weeks. That will leave the Israel Defense Forces deployed along a new East-West line running north of Hasbayya and Nabatiyeh between the Syrian border and the sea.

The final stage of the pullback, which is to bring most Israeli troops back across the international border, is expected by late next summer, although the timing must still be approved by the Israeli Cabinet.

Phase Two More Complex

Defense sources said the second phase, during which Israel is to evacuate Mt. Barouk, the Bekaa Valley and the area around Jezzine, will be much more complex than the first-stage withdrawal from the port city of Sidon, which was completed Feb. 16.

Several thousand Israelis are deployed in the so-called central and eastern sectors of the occupation zone compared with the hundreds who were around Sidon, in the western sector. More soldiers mean more camps and more equipment to be evacuated.

Also, while the army’s main concern in the Sidon area was guerrilla attacks by Lebanese villagers, here in the east they face two mechanized divisions of the Syrian army--generally regarded as the best-equipped in the Arab world. So not only is there more equipment to be moved out, the equipment is bigger, more sophisticated and better fortified. Nowhere is that more true than here, 6,363 feet above sea level at what was originally a French-built radar station known in Arabic as Mashroua el Nana--or Mint Camp.

A popular travel map of Lebanon marks the spot, at the end of a narrow trail that climbs steeply from the village of Kafraiya, as a point de vue.

When the French left in 1941, the newly independent Lebanese took over. Next came the Syrians, during the early days of the Lebanese civil war in 1976, and then the Israelis, who invaded in June, 1982.

It takes no more than a few minutes here to understand why those who want to control southern Lebanon quickly seek to control

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this peak. On a clear day, according to the Israeli commander, it is possible to see the Syrian SAM-6 and SAM-9 missile batteries on the flanks of the mountains forming the eastern side of the Bekaa Valley.

Mt. Barouk is only about 25 miles from Damascus. “We don’t use binoculars,” the commander said. “We just have to look down and look at the Syrians from the back. When you understand this fact, you can see the strategic importance of the camp.”

From another vantage point only a few yards away, one can look west through a depression in the Shouf Mountains and “see the Coca-Cola signs in Beirut,” the Israeli officer added.

‘Strict Timetable’

The commander said there are “very detailed plans--a very strict timetable” already drawn up for the evacuation of Mt. Barouk. “We’ll take almost everything except the building and the roads,” he said.

He added that it has not yet been decided whether to blow up the station when the army leaves. Israel’s stated policy is not to destroy Lebanese civilian property when its forces withdraw. But the old radar station has clear military value, and “we can be sure that this place will be taken by the Syrians” as soon as Israel leaves, the officer said.

The commander said his “rough deadline” is to be off the mountain by the beginning of summer. But, he added, it will be the weather more than anything else that determines the timing of the final evacuation of Mt. Barouk.

While they wait for the spring thaw, the troops on Mt. Barouk have a combat role as well as intelligence and communications duties. They are expected to prevent infiltrators from moving through their positions on their way to attack either Israeli military targets in Lebanon or civilian ones in northern Israel’s Galilee region, the commander said.

Last Enemy Contact

Their last enemy contact, he said, was about two months ago, when his men battled a squad of Palestinians trying to cross from the Shouf towards Syria.

The Israelis have outfitted a partly completed prefabricated concrete building a few hundred yards from the electronics station as a barracks, cafeteria and offices. It even has a one-room synagogue.

The Israelis are not sure what the building was originally intended for--the commander said it might have been meant for a hotel. But it was here when the Israelis arrived, and the officer said it will be left standing when they leave.

Every two weeks, the men assigned here are allowed to go home for a weekend. As for entertainment while they are here, the officer noted with a smile that “as we are in a very high place, there is no problem to get television from all over--Israel, Jordan, even Turkey.” In fact, he complained, “people watch too much television here.”