Guerrillas Kill 6 Israeli Soldiers in S. Lebanon

Six Israeli soldiers were killed and one was injured in southern Lebanon on Sunday in the second fatal bombing attack in four days by Islamic guerrillas operating in Israel’s self-proclaimed security zone.

Sunday’s bombing--the deadliest attack by Lebanese guerrillas on Israeli soldiers this year--sent shock waves through the government. Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin canceled all appointments, dispatched his chief of staff to the scene and huddled much of the day with security advisers.

The opposition Likud Party called on the government to retaliate in southern Lebanon, where Israel and its allied Lebanese militia, the South Lebanon Army, have been engaged in a low-level war with the Islamic group Hezbollah for years.

All day Sunday, there were media reports from Lebanon of Israeli warplanes flying low over villages, of increased sea patrols by the Israeli navy and of a buildup of ground troops near the border. But Lt. Gen. Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, the chief of staff, denied that any large-scale operation was under way.

While touring the border, Lipkin-Shahak said that Israeli “activity” in the eastern area of its security zone will continue for several days but that there has been no buildup of troops there. The last two Hezbollah attacks were on military convoys traveling in the eastern part of the zone.

In sharp contrast to the gloom that descended upon the nation after the news of the Lebanon attack, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat ended talks Sunday on a decidedly upbeat note, with Peres agreeing to speed up Israel’s timetable for pulling its troops out of West Bank towns and villages.

After the session, held at the Erez checkpoint on the Israeli-Gaza border, Peres said that Israel will withdraw its troops from the northern West Bank town of Janin on Oct. 25, several weeks earlier than planned. He said that he believes troops will have evacuated all Palestinian cities except Hebron by the end of the year.

Peres and Arafat said they also agreed that Palestinian elections for a self-rule council in the West Bank and Gaza Strip should be held before Jan. 22. And Peres promised that on Tuesday, Israel will lift the closure it imposed last month on Gaza. Arafat said the closure, which has also applied to the West Bank, has been very costly to the Palestinians.

Of Sunday’s attack, Peres told Israel Radio: “The escalation in Lebanon is very dangerous to all sides. I want to address the question: Who can prevent this flare-up? There is no doubt that Syria must participate in preventing this flare-up [and] the Lebanese government must participate.”

Rabin called an emergency Cabinet session for Tuesday to discuss the escalation in fighting. Under a 1993 U.S.-brokered agreement, Hezbollah and Israel are supposed to refrain from shelling civilian populations. Hezbollah leaders in Beirut warned that they would attack Israeli civilians if Israel shelled Lebanese villages in retaliation for Sunday’s bombing.

Israeli leaders have long blamed Syria for allowing Hezbollah to step up attacks on Israeli troops in the security zone. The Syrians say that Hezbollah is carrying out a legitimate war against foreign occupiers and deny any responsibility for its actions. But with 35,000 troops in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley, the Syrians control Hezbollah fighters’ access to arms, supplies and funds from Iran, whose revolutionary government ardently supports Hezbollah.

“Syria’s support for Hezbollah, if it continues like this, may cast a shadow on Syria’s negotiations with Israel and raise questions about how serious Syria is about making peace,” Health Minister Ephraim Sneh warned.

Syrian-Israeli negotiations have been stalled for months over the question of security arrangements on the strategic Golan Heights, a plateau Israel captured from Syria in the June, 1967, Arab-Israeli War. The Syrians want all of the Golan returned to Syria and have refused Israel’s demand that the Jewish state be allowed to maintain early warning ground stations on the Golan after a pullout.

An army spokesman said that Sunday’s bombing occurred near the town of Jezzine, only a few miles from where Thursday’s bombing of another military convoy took place. Early Sunday morning, a bomb reportedly exploded directly under an armored personnel carrier filled with Israeli troops from the Golan infantry brigade. The vehicle reportedly burst into flames, and five soldiers died almost immediately. Two others were helicoptered to an Israeli hospital, where one died and another was said to be injured.

In Thursday’s attack, three soldiers were killed and six were injured; they were also from the Golan brigade, which is considered an elite fighting group.