Jerusalem, Aug 01: Hours after the Olmert Cabinet agreed to widen ground offensive in Lebanon, Israeli warplanes today pounded villages and towns in south of that country resulting in fierce fighting with Hezbollah which suffered 20 casualties while the Jewish State lost three soldiers.

The Israeli warplanes launched several attacks across Lebanon, targetting Hezbollah rocket launchers and hideouts, and a road to Syria in the Bekaa Valley, which the army claims was hit to prevent weapons smuggling.

Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) said the troops had killed or wounded 20 Hezbollah guerrillas in battles in southern Lebanon.

However, Hezbollah said three of its cadre died in the fighting.

Three Israeli soldiers were also killed in the fighting in the region, Arab TV channels Al-Arabiya and Al-Jazeera reported.

Israeli Infrastructure Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer told Army Radio that Israel's offensive would be completed within a fortnight.

Earlier in the day, the Israeli Security Cabinet unanimously approved expanding its ground offensive in Lebanon.

The Israel radio reported that the aim is to push militants back to the Litani River, about 30 km north of the border.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said the offensive would continue until the threat from Hezbollah is over.

Prior to today's fighting, the 48-hour limited halt to Israeli air strikes was called to allow an investigation into the deaths of at least 54 civilians, many of them children, who died when Israeli warplanes hit a house in the town of Qana.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said the Government had restricted operations to targets where there was an immediate threat to Israeli civilians.

"We stopped targeting places where there was a danger of infrastructure, where there was a danger of civilians getting caught up in an unnecessary way," he told BBC.

"We never said that we were stopping our operation against Hezbollah.

We were saying that during the period of investigation into exactly what happened at Qana we were limiting the sort of use of air power that we had used up until then." Israel, Regev said, did not "want to see innocent civilians caught up in the combat" and was working closely with the UN to ease the situation.

Hezbollah said it continued to fight Israeli ground troops in Kfar Kila, Adaisse and Taibeh, near the town of Marjayoun, about eight kilometres from the border with the Jewish State.

Israeli forces have also been operating in Rab A-Tiltin area for the past two days.

The Israeli military said the areas have been used by Hezbollah fighters to launch missiles at northern Israel in the past two weeks.

US President George W Bush said in Florida yesterday there could be no ceasefire until Hezbollah was reined in and international borders respected.

Bush said Israel had the right to defend itself and called on Iran and Syria to stop aiding Hezbollah.

"Iran must end its financial support and supply of weapons to terrorist groups like Hezbollah," he said.

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