Israeli map shows nearly 1,000 Hezbollah sites

[Spiraling Leopard]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110331/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_lebanon_4

JERUSALEM – The Israeli military on Thursday released a map detailing what it says are nearly 1,000 underground bunkers, weapons storage facilities and monitoring sites built by the militant Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.

Many of the sites on the map are located south of the Litani River in Lebanon, the zone where Hezbollah is banned from keeping weapons under the U.N.-sponsored truce that ended Israel's summer 2006 war with the guerrilla group.

The military says Hezbollah has set up some 550 bunkers, 300 monitoring sites and 100 weapons storage facilities. Military officials would offer no other comment.

The militant group, which controls the strongest armed force in Lebanon, did not acknowledge that the Israeli map was accurate and accused Israel of employing scare tactics.

"They are trying to tell us that they will destroy Lebanon. Let them do it if they can and I tell them they cannot," said Khodr Noureddine, a member of Hezbollah's political bureau.

He speculated that Israel might have released the map because Hezbollah's leader, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, told the group last month to be prepared to invade northern Israel if a new war between the two sides breaks out.

Israel has for years accused Hezbollah of rearming with the help of Iran and Syria, setting up "rocket villages" in southern Lebanon.

The militant group sent nearly 4,000 rockets crashing into northern Israel during the 2006 war, using up much of its estimated stockpile. But Israel says Hezbollah has since replenished its arms stores with even more powerful weapons.

The Israel-Lebanon border has been tense but largely quiet since the war, which killed around 1,200 Lebanese and 160 Israelis, according to official counts from each side.

[Spiraling Leopard]

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/143291

Hizbullah Fortifying South Lebanon

According the the Israel Defense Forces, Hizbullah has built bunkers and underground weapons depots in most southern Lebanese villages as it continues building its army, the Associated Press reports.

A memo from the IDF brass to Israeli embassies on Thursday to Israel details the acceleration of Hizbullah's fortification of the volatile border region since the end of the 2006 Lebanon war.

The memo says, "Hezbollah has built as many as 550 bunkers in the southern Lebanon region, holding various weapons. In addition, the organization has built 300 underground facilities and 100 storage units for munitions including rockets, missiles and other weapons."

"Many of these terror centers are located near hospitals, private homes and schools, Hezbollah's way of taking advantage of the civilian population of Lebanon," the memo said, citing Hizbullah's well-established tactic of placing fighters and munitions among civilians - a war crime - in order to create bad press for Israel when civilians become collateral damage in strikes on such targets.

A military spokesman also confirmed a map published by the Washington Post detailing the exact sites of these facilities was supplied by the IDF.

During second Lebanon War, which lasted for 34-days in 2006, Hizbullah used similar tactics. But the current build-up takes the stategy to an all new level as Hizbullah seeks to work out of the reach of UN peacekeepers -- and into heavily populated civilian areas, Israel says.

Current estimates show Hezbollah has an arsenal of 40,000 short- and medium-range rockets stored in towns villages south of the Litani River. Hizbullah has also obtained long-range rockets. In 2006 Hizbullah possessed only 14,000 rockets.

According to the IDF, Hizbullah has 20,000 fighters, more than a third of whom have undergone combat training in Iran, in southern Lebanon.

The war between Israel and Hizbullah destroyed much of Lebanon's major infrastructure and killed more than 1,200 people in Lebanon, mainly civilians, and 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers. Most Lebanese civilians killed were collateral damage in strikes against legitimate military targets Hizbullah had placed in their midst.