Lebanese soldiers prevent anti-Israel protests on border

The Lebanese army yesterday prevented Palestinians from holding anti-Israeli protests at flashpoints along the border with the Jewish state. Soldiers at checkpoints stopped vehicles and refused to permit young Palestinians from going south to the frontier area.

This amounted to a reversal of the policy of the government which had previously refused to intervene on the grounds that it was not prepared to "protect" Israel from refugees who have a "right to go home". During his visit to Beirut on Thursday, the UN Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan, proposed to the Lebanese President, Mr Emile Lahoud, "a security formula" involving the urgent deployment of the army to halt protests which could provoke border clashes.

While Mr Lahoud rejected this proposal on the ground that deployment could draw Lebanon into a full-scale war, yesterday's intervention by the army was clearly designed to prevent large scale Israeli strikes against this battered country.

The military's firm action was welcomed by most Lebanese, particularly the half million inhabitants of the south who are just beginning to rebuild their homes and lives and are not prepared to become targets once again.

Although the secretary general of Hizbullah, Mr Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, called for a "day of rage", Beirut remained ominously peaceful after Friday prayers in the capital's mosques. Palestinians held demonstrations in refugee camps in Baalbek and the southern city of Sidon. A Palestinian source said refugees had been told that if they left their camps the army would "use live ammunition" to disperse them.

No action was taken, however, when Palestinians mounted a small demonstration in the southern port of Tyre and stoned the UN headquarters near the seafront, presumably because the town is far from the confrontation zone. Israeli warplanes exacerbated tension by making mock air raids and breaking the sound barrier over Tyre, the mountain town of Nabatiyeh and the border area, breaching the terms of UN Security Council resolution 425.

Comdt Joe McDonagh of Irishbatt said the aircraft also dropped flares to attract any heat-seeking missiles that might be fired by the Lebanese army or Hizbullah. The UN spokesman, Mr Timor Goksel, told The Irish Times that the aircraft overflew the headquarters of the peacekeeping force at Nakoura "for the first time since 1982". During his visit to Beirut on Thursday, Iran's Foreign Minister, Mr Kamal Kharrazi, proposed an early meeting of the foreign ministers of the Organisation of Islamic Conference with the goal of forming an Islamic front against Israel.

Mr Kharazzi raised with Mr Annan the issue of four Iranian diplomats who went missing in Lebanon in 1982. Tehran has accused Israel of holding them. Hizbullah has added the Iranians to its list of demands for the release of the Israelis. Mr Kharazzi conveyed a message concerning the captured Israelis from Mr Annan to Hizbullah. Nevertheless, the movement maintained silence on the three Israeli soldiers seized last Saturday.