The Daily Star - 23/02/2007
Israel continued to violate Lebanese sovereignty Thursday, with Israeli drones entering Lebanese airspace and Israeli forces patrolling the Lebanese-Israeli border, a day after drawing anti-aircraft fire from the Lebanese military.
An Israeli drone entered Lebanese airspace at 6:50 a.m., flying over Naameh and Khaldeh south of Beirut. The aircraft left Lebanon at 9:35 a.m., according to a statement issued by the Lebanese Army Command.
Israeli helicopters flew deep into the occupied Shebaa Farms Thursday at dawn, reaching demarcation lines with villages in the Arqoub district of southeast Lebanon, according to the National News Agency (NNA).
Israeli Humvees also patrolled the road linking the border region of Ghajar to the occupied Golan Heights in Syria, the NNA report said.
Israeli fighter-bombers had flown at low altitude over various Southern areas Wednesday. The Lebanese Army's anti-aircraft fire targeted an Israeli drone flying east of Tyre.
The NNA said an Israeli drone entered the South's central and western sectors at 9 a.m., flying over the qada of Bint Jbeil.
Another drone flew at a medium altitude over Zahrani.
In a related development, engineers from the Israeli military inspected surveillance devices along the barbed-wire fence separating Lebanon from the Israeli town of Metulla.
Separately, officials from the Lebanese and Israeli armies and the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) will meet Tuesday to discuss ways to ensure markers, set up along the UN-demarcated Blue Line in 2000 [after the Israeli withdrawal from most of South Lebanon], were still in place.
UNIFIL and the Lebanese Army have been replacing markers along the Blue Line that were damaged or destroyed during the summer war with Israel.