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Sharon for swift Lebanon pullout

JERUSALEM: Ariel Sharon, architect of Israel's invasion of Lebanon, joined calls for a swift withdrawal on Sunday following the killing of a seventh Israeli soldier in three weeks.

A Maariv newspaper survey found at least half of Prime Minister Ehud Barak's cabinet favoured an early pullout from Israel's northern neighbour where Hizbollah fighters are trying to oust Israeli troops.

Sharon, a former general who as defence minister in 1982 led the invasion of Lebanon, told Army Radio that Israel must exact a price on the infrastructure, including Syrian economic interests, in Lebanon.

Israeli warplanes attacked three electricity plants, wiping out power, in retaliation for the killing of soldiers last week.

"But that's just part of the matter. The departure from Lebanon must begin immediately. The posts in Lebanon today have become anachronistic and we must get out," said Sharon, leader of the rightwing opposition Likud party. "Situations change."

Opinion polls in recent days have shown growing popular support to act ahead of a July 7 target date set by Barak for withdrawing the soldiers stationed in Lebanon for the declared purpose of preventing attacks on northern Israel.

The father of 19-year-old Tzahi Itah, a soldier killed on Friday, wept on Israel Radio on Sunday while begging Barak to end a situation in which good soldiers fall victim to missiles fired by guerrillas from Lebanese villages.

Reserve Colonel Aryeh Itah, the father, who helped form the military unit in which the son was serving, appealed to Barak to forge a timetable for pulling the soldiers out, saying: "Take them out, take them out of there."

Barak came to power last year on a pledge to pull the troops out of Israel's occupation zone in south Lebanon by this July as part of a peace deal with Lebanon and with Syria, the main power broker in Lebanon.

Under pressure from an Israeli public weary of Hizbollah guerrillas picking off their soldiers, Barak has also hinted that he could act unilaterally if by April or May there is no hope for an accord with them.

Seven Israelis have been killed this year compared with 13 all of last year.

Regional Cooperation Minister Shimon Peres said: "In fact there is agreement on pulling out of Lebanon, with or without an agreement. The dispute is over whether we should wait another four to five months in order to try to reach an agreement.

"Now I understand the four to five months have been trimmed to two or three," Peres told Army Radio.

Right-wing Interior Minister Natan Sharansky and leftist Education Minister Yossi Sarid both backed an immediate departure but not on any terms. Sharansky said he wanted to ensure northern Israel would not become a battleground.

Sarid suggested that Sharon could be backing a unilateral withdrawal with an eye to having to rush back in and so try to justify his own unpopular 1982 campaign.

"It could very well be that one who calls for an immediate and unilateral withdrawal could at the same opportunity be wanting to rewrite history," Sarid said.

Sharon was forced out as defence minister in 1983 after being found indirectly responsible for the massacre of Palestinians by Israel's Christian militia allies at two Beirut refugee camps surrounded by Israeli troops.

The United States hopes to coax Israel and Syria back to the peace table abandoned last month in a dispute over Syria's demand that Israel guarantee in advance a full withdrawal from the Golan Heights, captured in the 1967 Middle East war.

While violence appeared to ease in Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinians missed Sunday's target date for an outline accord meant to pave the way to a planned September 13 peace treaty.-Reuters