Israel Raids Lebanese Villages as Warning to Shia Muslims

Hundreds of Israeli troops backed by tanks and helicopter gunships raided three southern Lebanese villages near the border Wednesday in what Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin described as a warning signal to members of Amal, the Shia Muslim militia.

According to U.N. and Israeli sources, two Lebanese were wounded, eight arrested, one house destroyed and a large number of weapons seized during what was described as the largest such cross-border action since Israel withdrew the bulk of its forces from Lebanon in early June.

The raids on the villages of Qabrikha, Majdel Selm and Chaqra, just west of the large Israeli town of Kiryat Shemona, followed what an army spokesman described as “several actions against our forces” that had originated in the area.

Two Israelis were killed and two wounded in an Aug. 5 clash near Majdel Selm, and over the last weekend, three Katyusha rockets fired from the area landed in Israel’s Galilee panhandle. The rockets caused no injuries or damage.

Won’t Tolerate Incursions

“We wanted to make it clear by signaling to the Amal forces that we are not going to tolerate any extension of their actions over the security zone into Israel,” Rabin told Israel radio in an interview broadcast Wednesday night.

If attacks from the area against Israel continue, the defense minister added, “there will be no normal life for anyone in southern Lebanon.”

Timur Goksel, spokesman for the U.N. peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, said the major Israeli action appeared to be against the village of Qabrikha, which was surrounded Wednesday morning by two mechanized army companies. Troops interrogated about 70 residents and conducted searches in and near the village.

According to U.N. observers who arrived on the scene later, two Israeli helicopter gunships fired between 50 and 60 rounds into terrain just north of the village. The U.N. observers found one villager with a bullet wound in his leg, and a second wounded man turned up later at a U.N. post, Goksel reported.

Bombs Found

The Israeli army spokesman said that among weapons seized were Soviet-made Katyusha rockets, roadside bombs ready for use and rocket-propelled grenades.

The raids coincided with a suicide car-bombing farther north, near Jezzine, which reportedly left at least two people dead and an undetermined number wounded.

The attack occurred at a post of the Israeli-backed South Lebanon Army militia, according to Israel radio. Quoting reports from the scene, the broadcast said that the driver and one militiaman were killed in the blast and that more are believed to be either dead or wounded. Wire service reports from Lebanon quoted unnamed security sources as saying that 15 people were killed or wounded in the attack.

The attack was the seventh suicide car-bombing directed against the Israelis and their South Lebanon Army allies since the June withdrawal.

113 Prisoners Freed

In other Lebanon-related developments:

--Israel on Wednesday released 113 more Lebanese Shia Muslims from the Atlit prison near Haifa, where they were transferred last spring from another detention facility north of the border.

The prisoners, who were handed over by the Israelis to the International Red Cross for transfer back to Lebanon, were among those whose freedom was demanded by the hijackers of a TWA jetliner to Beirut last June. About 150 Lebanese prisoners remain at Atlit, but a senior Israeli official said they are expected to be freed soon.

--The Israeli military announced early today that a navy patrol boat intercepted a vessel carrying a Palestine Liberation Organization terrorist squad toward the Lebanese port of Sidon on Saturday night. The guerrillas were captured and disclosed in interrogation that they had intended to infiltrate into Israel from Lebanon by land in order to perpetrate an unspecified “spectacular” terrorist action, the army said.