By Afif Diab CHTOURA, Lebanon Dec 9 (Reuters) – Lebanon’s Hizbollah guerrilla group accused Israel of carrying out a failed attempt to kill one of its officials on Friday and said it would do "what is necessary" to defend itself.
Israeli officials denied any Israeli military involvement in the incident. Hizbollah guerrillas cordoned-off the roads leading to the blast site. Security sources said a bomb wrecked the car seconds after the official, identified as Hussein Assaf, and a bodyguard parked the car and entered the house of Hizbollah leader Sheikh Mohammad Yazbek in the ancient town of Baalbek, a Hizbollah stronghold. SIMILAR ATTACKS Two Hizbollah officials were killed in similar attacks over the past two years. The group, backed by Syria and Iran, has blamed Israel for the killings despite Israel’s denial. Hizbollah, key in ending Israel’s 22-year occupation of south Lebanon in 2000, said last month it had a duty to abduct Israeli soldiers to swap them with Arab prisoners. That announcement followed a fierce clash between the group and Israeli forces along the tense border in which four guerrillas were killed and 11 Israelis, mostly soldiers, were wounded. Lebanese security sources had said the operation was a failed attempt by the group to kidnap Israeli soldiers. In Friday’s statement, Hizbollah said the explosion was an implementation of Israeli threats. "The blast is a translation of the announced and repeated threats by the Zionist enemy’s officials," it said. The Beirut government has been unable to disarm Hizbollah as demanded by a United Nations Security Council resolution in 2004. Hizbollah says it would not disarm even if Israel withdrew from the occupied Shebaa Farms, an area that United Nations needs Syrian unless Damascus and Beirut amend their border. Syria, Lebanon and Hizbollah say the farms, on the foothills of the Golan Heights, are Lebanese.
