"The fighting is continuing. There is no cease-fire and there will be no cease-fire in the coming days," the prime minister declared Monday evening in Tel Aviv.

Meanwhile, ground forces continue to battle Hezbollah guerrillas, bulldozers are changing the landscape along the international border, and the Ministerial Defense Committee was reportedly considering the army's request to allow more troops into southern Lebanon.

Last Thursday the ministers authorized a call-up of three reserve divisions. Now the army reportedly wants to send several brigades that were drafted into southern Lebanon.

These developments suggest that U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's upbeat talk Monday morning in Jerusalem, about achieving an urgent cease-fire and a lasting settlement -- this week -- was a bit premature.

Israel undertook to restrict its air activities for 48 hours, from 2 a.m. Monday, as it was shocked by the results of the bombing of a three storey house in Qana. Fifty-seven people, including 34 children, were killed there.

Ten years ago, in another round of hostilities, Israeli artillery erroneously shelled an area near a United Nations' camp in Qana, killing 106 people.

Qana became a code word for "with all these bombardments, be careful not to hit innocent civilians," but at 12:30 a.m. Sunday, it was hit yet again.

The head of Israel's Operations Directorate, Maj. Gen. Gadi Eisenkott, maintained Qana is in a war zone, that Hezbollah had fired 150 rockets from there, that Hezbollah's headquarters and rocket depots were there and that Israel had dropped leaflets warning residents to leave. The Israelis did not know civilians had taken shelter in that building, he added. The air force produced footage showing rocket launchings and said that was from a site near the bombed house.

Still, Israel was roundly condemned; the TV pictures from the area affected public opinion and after Rice met Prime Minister Olmert, Israel agreed to suspend most of its aerial attacks for 48 hours.

"This was imposed on us," President Moshe Katsav confirmed to the army's radio station, Galei Tsahal.

It is not a total suspension. Israeli decision makers had to balance the international pressure against domestic pressure.

They have been severely criticized for not providing enough air and artillery cover for ground troops who fought last week in Bint Jbail and Maroun e-Ras. Consequently, tougher battles raged between Israeli infantrymen and Hezbollah guerrillas, and more Israelis were killed and wounded. One of the dead was Maj. Roi Klein, who deliberately fell on a hand grenade hurled at his men and saved them. He then said a short prayer and told his radioman to report his death, Olmert said.

The 48-hour suspension banned air attacks on roads, bridges, and buildings unless those buildings clearly contained weapons, Hezbollah forces and headquarters.

It allowed air cover for ground troops and strikes against targets "about to attack Israeli targets."

Since hostilities began, Israel's air force has carried out more than 6,000 sorties, so Monday was a relatively quiet day, but still air force and the artillery provided cover for infantry, tank and engineering units fighting in Taibeh. The air force attacked a car the army said it thought carried a senior Hezbollah commander. It erred, killing a Lebanese soldier traveling in it.

The hostilities, which will enter their third week on Tuesday, erupted after Hezbollah militants crossed the U.N. delineated international border, kidnapped two soldiers, killed eight and shelled civilian communities. That has led Israel to seek basing changes along the border, and Olmert told Rice Israel needs 10 days to a fortnight to complete its operation.

"We found rockets and missiles in residential homes. Sometimes special rooms were built to conceal them," Defense Minister Amir Peretz Monday told the Knesset. "We located launchers of Katyushas that were fired from the yards of mosques, churches, schools and launchers fired from the yards of houses (where) families lived. We found terrorists and fighting equipment in every village," Peretz said.

Israel seeks to create a "special security zone" along the border. It should be one to two kilometers wide depending on the topography, Eisenkott told United Press International. The idea is not to have a "permanent Israeli presence there" but to control the area by observation systems and fire, he said.

Sixty D-9 bulldozers are operating along the border, knocking down all Hezbollah positions and facilities and changing the landscape so that Hezbollah can no longer open flat trajectory fire into Israel.

The army hopes to complete those activities by Thursday.

That, however, will not solve the problem of Hezbollah's buildup elsewhere in Lebanon, which makes the deployment of a strong multi-national force so important.

Olmert and Peretz have been advocating a force of more than 10,000 soldiers, trained for combat, who would have significant enforcement capabilities and be deployed not only in southern Lebanon, but also along Lebanon's border with Syria, to prevent Damascus from rearming Hezbollah.

Countries from Austria to Fiji have sent soldiers to U.N. peacekeeping forces in the Middle East, but none of them have really fought.

A stronger force with a tougher mandate is envisaged, but who would want to send over his soldiers if that means having to fight Hezbollah's, whose men are dedicated and well armed?

Israelis doubt foreign soldiers would risk their lives and reckon that Israel should therefore weaken Hezbollah to a point where it would accept the foreign troops.

That point hasn't been reached yet. Hezbollah has fired 100 to 150 rockets a day (except Monday) and continues fighting Israeli troops in villages even though it has lost 200 to 300 fighters, according to Eisenkott. It still has many short-range rockets.

Olmert and Peretz thus stressed the fighting is not about to end.

Earlier Peretz told the Knesset: "If an immediate cease-fire is announced, the extremists will raise their heads again. Then, within a few months, we shall find ourselves in a similar situation.

"However, if we complete the operation -- and we shall complete it -- a new situation will be created, one in which the Lebanese government is capable of assuming responsibility and in the future open direct negotiations with the State of Israel."

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