Middle Orient

TYRE — The artillery fire echoing at the city gates of this south Lebanese port has revived barely buried memories for its people, as Israeli troops battle Hizbollah fighters in the surrounding hills.

PARIS — Lebanese reporters based in Paris — willing to share their experience of the region’s wars and brimming contact books — have set up a one-stop-shop to help foreign colleagues cover the conflict with Israel.

DUBAI — When Arab news channels raced to cover Israel’s retaliation against Hizbollah’s capture of two soldiers on July 12, they had little idea that they were in for a long, all-out war.

TEHRAN (Fars News Agency)- Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said that the US and Britain are well informed that the equations of balance have changed in the Middle-East.

TYRE (Agencies) — Israel shut down road traffic in south Lebanon on Tuesday, declaring a no-drive zone below the Litani River and threatened to blast any moving vehicle as a target. Only pedestrians ventured into the streets of Tyre and country roads and highways were deserted throughout the region.

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — A draft Security Council resolution on ending the war between Israel and Hizbollah would only complicate the crisis and result in “grave ramifications” for Lebanon and the entire region, Qatar’s foreign minister said Tuesday.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) — Four separate roadside bomb attacks killed at least 19 people in Baghdad on Tuesday, police sources said, as US troops made new efforts to try to rid the capital of powerful factions and insurgents.

RAMALLAH — A three-month-old baby and a 26-year-old man were wounded early Tuesday when an Israeli tank shell hit their house in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip.

BEIRUT — The embattled Lebanese government was Tuesday hoping an offer to deploy its troops to the international border would secure Israel’s agreement to ceasefire and withdraw its troops from the south.

DAMASCUS (AFP) — When Hizbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah launched “Operation Kept Promise” the day after his fighters captured two Israeli soldiers to use in a prisoner swap, little did he know the same name would be bestowed on a newborn refugee girl two weeks later in Damascus.