By Aluf Benn, Amos Harel, Yoav Stern and Eli Ashkenazi, and Agencies-22:23 11/08/2006

Senior Israel Defense Forces officers said Friday evening that despite the latest progress on the diplomatic front at the United Nations, the IDF "is continuing forward at full power."

The officers said that all forces slated to take part in the expanded incursion have already assumed forward positions in the field.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Amir Peretz on Friday ordered the IDF to implement an expanded ground operation in Lebanon.

The cabinet approved an operation Wednesday calling for a push to the Litani River, but delayed it until diplomatic efforts were exhausted. Apparently reports throughout Friday on a delay on a deal on a United Nations Security Council resolution on a cease-fire led to the decision.

A government source in Jerusalem said the IDF received instructions to proceed with the operation after officials viewed an updated version of the draft of the cease-fire resolution Friday, which included several points which Lebanon backtracked from one day after agreeing to them as spelled out in Thursday`s draft.

A government source in Jerusalem said that Israel agreed to a 48-hour lull in order to exhaust diplomatic efforts, it became clear that progress towards a cease-fire was not as significant as thought Thursday.

The draft of the text which arrived from Lebanon on Friday is a significantly altered version of Thursday`s draft. According to the modified document, Lebanon is opposed to a beefed-up contingent of UNIFIL troops and granting UNIFIL the authority to enforce the cease-fire, which is more problematic for Israel than the clause which refers to the Shaba Farms as well as the lack of border supervision over weapons smuggling.

Under these circumstances, the source said, Olmert decided to issue the order for the ground assault while continuing diplomatic negotiations in parallel.

Olmert`s spokesman, Asaf Shariv, told The Associated Press that the expanded incursion had already begun. A cease-fire deal being worked out by the Security Council fails to meet Israel`s basic requirements, such as stationing robust international combat troops in southern Lebanon once Israel withdraws, Shariv said.

"Yesterday we were very optimistic, but they (the Security Council) took the wrong turn," Shariv said.

Defense sources say that the cease-fire resolution is not ripe nor is it close to being decided upon, adding that the IDF will begin to push northwards. In the event that significant progress is made on the diplomatic front, the IDF would halt its advance.

Sources also said that restarting military operations could yield more favorable terms for Israel in the cease-fire resolution being discussed at the UN.

The prime minister updated a number of officials in the political echelon of his decision, including President Moshe Katsav, Knesset Speaker MK Dalia Itzik, the government ministers, and MKs Benjamin Netanyahu, Avigdor Lieberman, Effi Eitam, and Tzachi Hanegbi.

IDF were engaged in heavy exchanges of fire with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon on Friday. One soldier sustained moderate to light wounds after an anti-tank missile hit an IDF convoy near the village of Rajamin. A number of Hezbollah fighters were killed in the clashes.

Heavy gun battles continued in the nearby village of Rashef on Friday, and six soldiers sustained light wounds.

Major (res.) Nimrod Hillel, 32, from Rosh Ha`ayin was killed Thursday and another soldier was seriously wounded when anti-tank rockets hit a tank and a bulldozer in the village of Labuneh. Hillel was laid to rest at 2 P.M. Friday in Rosh Ha`ayin.

Israel and Hezbollah fighters clashed Thursday near the village of Marjayoun and neighboring Khiam and Kila.

Another reservist, Staff Sergeant Alon Smoocha, 35, from Hod Hasharon, was killed when an anti-tank rocket hit a Merkava tank Thursday morning adjacent to Kila.

Lebanon: IDF captured 350 Lebanese soldiers
Lebanon claims IDF troops have captured around 350 Lebanese soldiers and security personnel in a military base in Marjayoun. It appears that there are also Lebanese civilians taking shelter in the base.

The Lebanese interior minister told Arab reporters on Thursday that IDF troops had come to the base, asked to enter it, and then apprehended all of those present. The Al-Jazeera network reported that the IDF separated the soldiers from the officers and disarmed them.

The Lebanese soldiers who were being held were not members of combat units. The Lebanese minister said his government has called on France and the United States to help release the soldiers.

A reserve armored division began operating before dawn Thursday in the eastern sector of southern Lebanon. One report indicated relatively little opposition to the IDF entry and soldiers were said to have taken up positions in a village adjacent to Marjayoun, above the Litani River.

The IDF said the operation in the eastern sector is not part of the plans made Wednesday to expand the ground offensive, but merely a tactical maneuver.

Fifteen IDF soldiers were killed on Wednesday, the army announced early Thursday, as fierce fighting with Hezbollah guerillas raged in the southern Lebanon villages of Ayta al-Shaab and Debel.

The 15 IDF soldiers were killed in a series of firefights across the front. In the most serious incident, nine reserve paratroopers were killed and 11 were wounded by anti-tank missiles fired on a house in the village of Debel, in the central sector. Four reservists from an armored brigade were killed in a tank explosion, apparently caused by anti-tank missiles, in the town of Ayta al-Shaab. An infantryman was killed late Wednesday when he was hit by a mortar in Marjayoun.

Another soldier was killed by friendly fire from a tank in the eastern sector of south Lebanon.

Twenty-five soldiers were wounded in Wednesday`s actions, six seriously. Two of the seriously wounded were members of the standing army; the rest of the wounded were reservists.

They were evacuated to the Rambam Medical Center in Haifa, the Rebecca Sieff Hospital in Safed and the Western Galilee Hospital in Nahariya for treatment.

According to the IDF, some 40 Hezbollah fighters were killed on Wednesday. Another 20 or so Hezbollah fighters have been killed over the past two days at Bint Jbail and Tiri, in the western sector.

The guerillas are equipped with anti-tank missiles, which have previously caused losses among the IDF troops in the area.