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CNN Sunday Morning

Israeli Planes Attack Syrian Positions in Lebanon

Aired July 01, 2001 - 08:02   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Lethal force is rumbling across parts of the Middle East today. The focus right now is the Israel-Lebanon border, with Israeli war planes striking Syrian positions in Lebanon and Hezbollah guerrillas reportedly firing back on Israeli troops.

CNN Beirut bureau chief Brent Sadler is on the line with the latest -- Brent?

BRENT SADLER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Thanks, Miles.

Israeli war planes attacked a Syrian Army radar base in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, reportedly destroying the installation and injuring three Syrian soldiers. A fourth casualty was a Lebanese Army conscript manning a checkpoint nearby. This renewed cycle of violence has erupted over southern Lebanon in the wake of that Hezbollah guerrilla attack on Friday against Israeli occupation troops in a flash point area known as the Shebaa Farm at the foot of the Golan Heights.

After this latest Israeli response against the Hezbollah guerrillas, the guerrillas themselves retaliated by firing salvos of rockets and mortars against Israeli troops in Shebaa.

Israel holds Syria directly responsible for Hezbollah attacks and this latest Israeli attack against the radar base in the Bekaa was almost a carbon copy of what happened in this region last April when Hezbollah mounted a deadly attack against Israeli troops in the Shebaa and Israel responded in kind with another air strike against a Syrian radar installation, again in the Bekaa Valley.

Now, Hezbollah has launched sporadic raids on Israeli troops in Shebaa over the past year, claiming Israel's military withdrawal from South Lebanon last May was incomplete without the return of Shebaa, thereby justifying further guerrilla attacks. That's a claim which the United Nations firmly rejects, asserting that Shebaa is Syrian territory and is therefore a matter for the Israelis and the Syrians, not the Lebanese, whose guerrillas based here in Lebanon vow to continue fighting that Israeli occupation force, they say, in that Shebaa region -- Back to you, Miles.

O'BRIEN: All right, that's CNN's Brent Sadler in Beirut with us.

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