Syrian, Hezbollah Troops Fight Rebels  05/21 13:17

   BEIRUT (AP) -- Backed by elite troops of Lebanon's militant Hezbollah group, 
Syrian government forces fought rebels in a strategic opposition-held Syrian 
town near the Lebanese border for the third straight day Tuesday.

   Lebanese security officials said fighting between Syrian troops and rebels 
over the town of Qusair had spread to the village of Hit, on the Syrian side 
near the border with Lebanon. Two opposition fighters were killed and several 
others wounded, said the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity in line 
with army regulations.

   The Syrian conflict also spilled into Lebanon as factions supporting 
opposing sides in Syria's civil war fought in the Lebanese port city of 
Tripoli. The National News Agency said one person was killed and two others, 
including a Syrian citizen, were wounded in the clashes. Earlier in the day, 
six people were wounded in another border area close to Qusair after Syrian 
shells landed on the Lebanese side, the Lebanese officials said.

   Qusair, which had been in rebel hands for more than a year, has been the 
target of a government offensive in recent weeks, with the surrounding 
countryside engulfed in fighting as regime troops backed by Hezbollah fighters 
seized nearby villages and closed in. On Sunday, Assad's forces pushed deep 
inside the town, taking control of more than 60 percent of it, according to a 
Syrian official.

   At least 31 fighters from the Hezbollah group, a staunch ally of Syrian 
President Bashar Assad, have been killed in the struggle for the town of Qusair 
since Sunday, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The 
group, which relies on a wide network of activists on the ground in Syria, said 
at least 68 rebels and 9 army soldiers were also killed in fighting on Sunday 
and Monday. There were no reports of casualties in Tuesday's fighting in the 
area.

   The government has not confirmed the soldiers' deaths because Damascus does 
not publicly acknowledge its own losses in the civil war. Now in its third 
year, the conflict has claimed more than 70,000 lives.

   UNICEF said it was "extremely concerned" about the safety of civilians in 
Qusair. In a statement Tuesday, the UN child protection agency said up to 
20,000 civilians, many of them women and children, could be trapped there by 
the fighting.

   In recent days, hundreds of families have fled into Lebanon, while many 
others have sought shelter in safer parts of Syria, UNICEF said, adding that it 
and other aid agencies are providing much needed humanitarian assistance 
including food, clothes, water and hygiene kits to many of those who have been 
displaced.

   The fighting in Qusair reflects the importance both sides attach to the area.

   The town of about 40,000 residents lies along a strategic land corridor 
linking Damascus with the Mediterranean coast, the heartland of Assad's Alawite 
sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam. For the rebels, who like the town are 
predominantly Sunni, the area has served as a conduit for shipments of weapons 
and supplies smuggled from Lebanon to the opposition inside Syria.

   Hezbollah, a Lebanese Shiite movement, is heavily invested in the survival 
of the Damascus regime and is known to have sent fighters to aid government 
forces. The group's growing role in the conflict next door points to the deeply 
sectarian nature of the war in Syria, in which a rebellion driven by the 
country's Sunni majority seeks to overthrow a regime dominated by the Alawite 
minority.

   Hezbollah's growing role in the Syrian war has raised tensions considerably 
in Lebanon and strengthened concerns of the conflict spilling over the 
country's volatile border.

   The Observatory also reported clashes and shelling elsewhere on Tuesday, 
including in the north, where the opposition holds large swathes of territory 
and whole neighborhoods inside Aleppo, Syria's largest city. In Aleppo 
province, clashes were concentrated around the Kweiras and Mannagh military air 
bases, the Observatory said.

   In Damascus province, three people were killed and 24 others were wounded in 
mortar attacks on the town of Mleiha, near the capital, state-run SANA news 
agency said. The report said "terrorist groups" operating near Damascus, the 
seat of Assad's government, were behind the attacks that also caused 
significant material damage.

   The Syrian government refers to the rebels fighting to overthrow Assad's 
regime as terrorists and Islamic extremists that are part of a foreign-backed 
conspiracy against the country.

   Also Tuesday, Syria said it destroyed an Israeli vehicle that crossed the 
cease-fire line in the Golan Heights overnight. The Israeli military however 
said gunfire from Syria had merely hit an Israeli patrol, damaging a vehicle 
and prompting its troops to fire back.

   Sporadic fire from Syria has occasionally hit the Israeli-controlled area, a 
strategic plateau Israel captured in the 1967 war. Israel assumes most of the 
incidents are accidental but its forces have responded on several occasions. 
Tuesday's incident, however, was the first time the Syrian army acknowledged 
firing at Israeli troops across the frontier.


(KA)