An Israeli air raid has killed at least 13 Lebanese civilians who were fleeing southern border areas.

Women and children were among those killed when the convoy was hit.

The Israeli raids began on Wednesday after Hezbollah fighters seized two Israeli soldiers. More than 70 Lebanese have been killed in the past four days.

Hezbollah has responded with rocket attacks. On Saturday, several rockets hit the town of Tiberias in the deepest such attack inside Israeli territory.

Three Israeli sailors are missing after their ship was hit by a Hezbollah missile on Friday. The body of a fourth was found, according to Israeli media.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said the offensive will continue until Hezbollah releases the two captured Israeli soldiers and stops firing rockets at Israel.

Speaking after crisis talks on the violence at the Arab League headquarters in Cairo, the Lebanese Foreign Minister, Fawzi Salloukh, said the Israeli assault amounted to war.

City deserted

In fresh strikes, Israeli warplanes hit the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, Beirut, which are a Hezbollah stronghold.

They also carried out raids in the north and the north-east of the country for the first time on Saturday.

A number of bridges, petrol stations and key roads have also been hit, including the main road linking northern Lebanon to Syria.

Earlier, Hezbollah's al-Manar TV says three civilians were killed in an Israeli attack in Hermel, on the border with Syria.

Thousands of foreigners have fled Beirut - a city normally packed with foreign holidaymakers, many from Arab states, at this time of the year.

Instead they have returned home in droves, leaving cafes and restaurants deserted, and the Beirut economy in tatters.

After an emergency government meeting on the crisis, French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin said France was ready to evacuate its nationals from Lebanon.

Estimates put the number of French nationals in Lebanon at about 19,000 including 5,000 tourists.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah promised "open war" on Israel in an address broadcast after his Beirut offices were bombed on Friday.

In a statement broadcast on al-Manar TV on Saturday, Hezbollah said that its forces had carried out the attack which sank the Israel vessel.

The ship caught fire after it was hit by either a rocket, the Israeli military said.

The Israeli military said a civilian vessel was also hit by rockets during the attack, but could not confirm its nationality or if there were casualties.

The BBC's Ian Pannell in Beirut says that many of the city's residents approve of Sheikh Nasrallah's defiant statement and feel that the attack on the Israeli boat indicate that not only is he willing to defend the people who live there, but that he is also willing to go on the attack.

Bush and Putin differ

Speaking at the G8 meeting in St Petersburg on Saturday, US President George W Bush said that both he and Russian President Vladimir Putin "share the same concerns" about the resulting violence.

But Bush said that in order to bring the conflict to an end it was important to understand why it had started in the first place, "and that's because Hezbollah has been launching rocket attacks out of Lebanon into Israel and because Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers".

Bush also called on Syria to put pressure on Hezbollah to end the violence.

Syria has said it will support Hezbollah and Lebanon against Israel's attacks.

Putin was more critical of Israel's massive bombing campaign, saying that the "use of force should be balanced", But he added that it was unacceptable that Hezbollah was trying to reach its goals with abductions and strikes against an independent state

PHOTO CAPTION

Bodies of civilian villagers are seen next to the wreckage of their vehicles on the main road near the southern border village of Ter Harfa , Lebanon Saturday July 15, 2006. (AP)

BBC