Four civilians snatched in their sleep by Israelis
Lebanon, Military, 10/6/1997

Israeli troops in occupied south Lebanon allegedly violated the April understanding agreement, which bans launching military attacks on civilians or civil targets. Security sources said Israeli artillery bombarded for one hour and a half densely populated areas in al Nabatieh.

Israeli troops used in their attacks internationally banned bombs hitting houses in Al Deir quarter, the source said.

Meanwhile four Lebanese civilians were kidnapped from the village of Arnoun on October 4 by Israeli soldiers, security sources said.

Abbas Mohammed Atieh, 25, Mustafa Jawad Tawba, 32, Qassem Lotfi Assaf, 20 and Mohammed Salim Qatbay, 64 were asleep at home when 16 Israeli soldiers riding in four intelligence cars raided several houses in Arnoun at 4 am.

Village residents condemned the act and called on the government and the International Red Cross to intervene.

Hizbullah's commander in the south, Sheikh Nabil Qaouq, said such behavior showed Israel's impotency in the face the resistance. "Any kind of violation committed outside of direct confrontation with the resistance is just an Israeli effort to curb the decreasing despair the Israeli military faces," he said in a statement.

Meanwhile, the mother of one of Speaker Nabih Berri's bodyguards was released from Khiam prison, ten days after her arrest by pro-Israeli militiamen.

While Souad Deeb Aqil, mother of Lt. Ali Shoueib, returned to her house in Khiam, her other son, 16 year-old Khanjar, who was arrested in August, remains in the prison run by the South Lebanon Army militia.

In Jerusalem, Israel lodged a complaint with the truce-monitoring panel in the south over a mortar attack by Hizbullah fighters on October 3, the Israeli army said.

An army spokesman said the resistance group fired on an Israeli army outpost and the SLA from a civilian village, in violation of the April 1996 truce accord.

An SLA militia man was killed on the same day in a Hizbullah rocket attack on an SLA post at Aytroun inside the occupied zone.

In Beirut the national committee for Lebanese detainees in Israeli prisons published a report by an Israeli newspaper on conditions at Khiam jail.

The report, which ran in the daily Haaretz, showed pictures of three Lebanese women detains standing at a wall with bags covering their heads. The paper quoted an Israeli soldier who inspected the jail as holding Israel responsible for atrocities there, "Cells which are three by three meters are packed with prisoners."

The committee also published a report by Amnesty International on the critical health situation of three Lebanese women held at the jail.

Previous Stories:
  Explosive device kills mother and son in the south   (10/6/1997)
  Israelis continue attacks on south Lebanon   (10/1/1997)

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