Lebanese army helicopters stepped up raids today on al-Qaida-inspired Islamic militants barricaded in a Palestinian refugee camp in the country’s north, after five soldiers were killed, a senior military official said.

Lebanese authorities have arrested four Palestinians outside a southern refugee camp who allegedly confessed to planning bombings inside the country, a senior security official said today.

Lebanese troops pounded Islamic militants hiding in a Palestinian refugee camp in northern Lebanon today, on the fifth straight day of the military's sustained assault to crush the Fatah Islam fighters.

ISLAMIST gunmen killed two Lebanese soldiers at a Palestinian refugee camp in south Lebanon yesterday, in the first fatal spillover of fighting between the army and al-Qaida-inspired fighters in the north.

Lebanon’s army pounded Islamic militant hideouts in a northern Palestinian refugee camp as the military tried to flush out al Qaida-linked fighters who have been hiding there.

Anti-riot police scuffled with demonstrators in Cairo as Muslims marched in Jordan and Lebanon to express outrage over Israeli renovation work near Islam’s third-holiest shine.

Thousands marched through Middle Eastern capitals today to protest an Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip, their calls often spilling into a broader outcry against America’s policy in the region and its backing of Israel.

A Lebanese police officer and his bodyguard were wounded by a remote-controlled roadside bomb today in an apparent assassination attempt.

Traffic flowed again on previously deserted roads in northern Israel as soldiers left Lebanon and headed south, crossing paths with civilians travelling in the opposite direction, back to the homes they abandoned weeks ago under Hezbollah rocket fire.

Israel has begun thinning out its troops in southern Lebanon and plans to hand over the first of its captured positions to the UN-supported Lebanese army tomorrow, the army said.

Israel has begun slowly pulling out forces from southern Lebanon and made plans to hand over territory today – on the first full day of a tense ceasefire that already has been tested by skirmishes.

Hezbollah today distributed leaflets congratulating Lebanon on its “big victory” and thanking citizens for their patience during the 34-day war with Israel.

Israel ordered its army to halt its offensive against Lebanese-based Hezbollah guerillas in as a United Nations-imposed ceasefire went into effect today.

Israeli warplanes struck several targets in north and south Lebanon early today, hours after the United Nations Security Council adopted a resolution calling for an end to the war with Hezbollah.

Israeli forces took control of the strategic southern hub of Marjayoun today and warned that its fight against Hezbollah could grow wider and more severe if diplomacy fails.

Israel’s military struck Lebanon’s largest Palestinian refugee camp early today, killing at least two people and wounding five, officials said. In the eastern Bekaa Valley five people were killed and two feared dead in an Israeli raid.

Israel’s military struck Lebanon’s largest Palestinian refugee camp early today, killing at least one person and wounding three others, officials said.

Israel has bombed Lebanon’s largest Palestinian refugee camp, killing at least one person and wounding three others.

Israeli airstrikes hit near a funeral procession in south Lebanon today, sending some of the 1,500 mourners running in panic and killing at least six people in nearby buildings, witnesses and the town’s mayor said.

Israeli artillery pounded villages and hills throughout south Lebanon while a complete curfew was imposed on any civilians still trapped in the heart of the war zone.

Israel continued its bombardment of Beirut early today, while Hezbollah fighters repelled Israeli paratroopers trying to land in the southern city of Tyre, according to Hezbollah’s Al-Manar television.

ONE-in-five Lebanese has been made homeless by the ongoing violence between Hezbollah and Israel, the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) said yesterday.

British and American officials said their evacuations from Lebanon were wrapping up today, as ships continued to carry people to safety in Cyprus and Turkey.

France mobilised to send urgent aid to Lebanon, the Red Cross managed to get relief supplies to the south, and Israel agreed to allow a safe corridor for ensuring that food and medicine reaches those in need.

Israeli troops took control of a village just across the Lebanese border today, after the area was pounded by bombs and artillery through the night.

Two big explosions reverberated over Beirut early today, and missiles hit towns to the east and south of the capital in new overnight strikes.

ISRAELI forces yesterday withdrew from five villages in southern Lebanon and UN troops set up new checkpoints as Lebanese troops rolled into the area.

ISRAEL said yesterday it had destroyed most of the military positions of Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas along its northern border in the heaviest fighting since it ended its 18-year occupation of Southern Lebanon.

SECURITY officials said a car bomb on Friday killed a leader of Palestinian Islamic Jihad — an Iran-backed militant group that persisted in attacking Israel while other major factions adhered to a cease-fire.

The Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader in southern Lebanon died today from wounds from a car bombing that also killed his brother, security officials said.

LEBANON mourned assassinated former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri yesterday as opposition leaders bluntly implicated Syria in an attack that Lebanese authorities said might have been a suicide bombing.

As a stunned Lebanon grieved, dozens of angry mourners attacked Syrian workers in the home town of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, who was assassinated in a huge bomb blast, while others marched in streets draped with black banners.

RAFIK HARIRI, a billionaire who helped rebuild his country after decades of war but resigned as Lebanese prime minister last fall after a sharp dispute with Syria, was killed yesterday in a massive bomb explosion that tore through his motorcade.

Lebanon’s billionaire former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was killed in a massive bomb explosion that ravaged his motorcade on Beirut’s famed seafront corniche today.

Father-of-six Rafik Hariri, who died in a Beirut bomb blast today, was a business tycoon who became one of Lebanon’s most influential politicians and served as its prime minister for most of its post-civil war years. He was 60.

The Al-Jazeera satellite TV channel has said its Beirut office received a call from someone who said a previously unknown group carried out the car bomb attack in which former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and nine others died.

A military prosecutor has charged 35 Arab nationals and alleged members of an al-Qaida-linked terror group with plotting to bomb foreign targets in Lebanon, including the Italian and Ukrainian diplomatic missions, officials said today.

There was shock and disbelief at the fall of Baghdad among Arabs today – and also anger at marines wrapping an American flag around a statue of Saddam Hussein.

A Palestinian terror leader today called on Arabs to volunteer to help defend Iraq in the event of an Anglo-American invasion.

The man suspected of killing three American missionaries and wounding another in southern Yemen is believed to have ties to a cell plotting attacks on foreigners and secular-minded politicians, officials say.

From half a world away they watched, mesmerised like everyone by televised images of the soaring twin towers of the World Trade Centre disintegrating into pillars of smoke, dust and ash.

NEARLY 200 al-Qaida operatives, including several senior commanders, have settled in Lebanon with Syria’s permission, taking refuge in a large Palestinian refugee camp there, an Israeli newspaper reported on Monday.

Members of a radical Palestinian faction on Sunday clashed with Lebanese militants inside the largest Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon, leaving at least one person wounded, camp officials said.

Two men were killed and seven others wounded today in factional fighting in Lebanon’s biggest Palestinian refugee camp.