OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, 12 August 2003 — Israel threatened Syria yesterday after Hezbollah militants in Lebanon fired anti-aircraft shells that killed an Israeli teenager on Israel’s northern border, but said it hoped to defuse tension through diplomacy.
Israeli Deputy Defence Minister Zeev Boim said Israel held Syria, the main powerbroker in Lebanon, responsible for Hizbollah’s actions. “Syria is definitely the umbilical cord from which Hezbollah feeds,” he told Army Radio. “If there is escalation from their side, there will be definitely be a clear military response from Israel that could inevitably be against Syrian targets.”
The death of the 16-year-old in the Israeli border town of Shlomi on Sunday was the first fatality from Hezbollah shelling since Israel withdrew its forces from south Lebanon in May 2000 after a 22-year occupation, amid daily attacks by the group.
In the Lebanese capital, Hezbollah threatened renewed anti-aircraft fire if Israeli aircraft entered Lebanese airspace again. Boim said Israeli flights, which he called reconnaissance missions, would continue.
Staffan de Mistura, the UN special envoy for Lebanon, told reporters in Beirut: “We are appealing to all sides... to stop this type of potential escalation. Overflights should not take place over Lebanon.” He complained about the danger of anti-aircraft fire, which he said was “most of the time correlated to overflights.” Israeli warplanes bombed an anti-aircraft battery on the edge of a south Lebanon village on Sunday in retaliation for the Shlomi shelling. Israeli warplanes later flew over Beirut, breaking the sound barrier.
Israel called the air raids a “warning signal” and Boim appeared to signal that Israel did not for now plan further military action. He said diplomatic pressure “could be an effective tool as well.”
The flare-up along the border, which had been quiet since January, followed a vow by Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah to retaliate for the killing of a Hezbollah operative in a car bombing in Beirut, which he blamed on Israel. Israel has denied complicity in the attack.
Israel appeared to have an economic interest in avoiding further hostilities that could spell disaster for its summer tourism industry in the Galilee, which has been sluggish for the past two years of national recession. Danny Buzaglo, manager of a holiday club in northern Israel, told Israel Radio:
“I don’t think we should strike now. We attacked them for 20 years, so it’s possible to hold back and let the summer pass peacefully so tourists come up north.”
