BEIRUT - Israel showed no sign of easing its bombardment of Lebanon on Monday, killing 57 civilians in a blistering of targets across the country despite UN moves to call for an end to the fighting.
Prime Minister Fuad Siniora, who had earlier accused Israel of killing more than 40 people in an attack on the Lebanese village of Hula, later said just one person had been killed in the strike, which demolished six buildings.
A UN spokesman later said five people had been killed in the Hula attack.
As clashes between Hezbollah militants and Israeli forces along the border intensified, the Israeli army warned Lebanese living south of the Litani River not to go outdoors after 10:00 pm (1900 GMT) Monday.
A wave of attacks severed the southern port city of Tyre from the rest of the country, while the military carried out a deadly evening raid on the southern suburbs of Beirut.
In the deadliest attack, 14 civilians, including women and children, died in Ghaziye near the city of Sidon, when three buildings and a villa were hit by an Israeli air strike.
In other attacks, at least eight people were killed when the Israeli military launched two strikes on Beirut's southern suburbs, a rescue worker with the Lebanese Red Cross said.
The bombardments targeted the southern Shiyah district which until now had been spared attacks and was still inhabited by some residents.
An AFP photographer on the scene said a three-storey building had collapsed. A neighbouring building had also been sliced in two while a fire was raging in a nearby mosque.
At least five civilians were killed in Tyre in two successive early afternoon raids on three buildings, which collapsed.
The housing complex hit was the same as that targeted by a helicopter-borne commando operation at the weekend that the Israeli military said left three Hezbollah militants dead.
Seven people were killed and five wounded at dawn when Israeli fighter-bombers struck a house in Ghassaniyeh, south of the port of Sidon, the main city in the southern region, completely destroying the three-storey building.
Police said Israeli air strikes had destroyed six buildings in the attack on Hula, a village caught in the centre of Israel's ground push into southern Lebanon.
The renewed fighting came despite moves at the United Nations to agree a resolution proposed by the United States and France that urges an end to "offensive" Israeli military operations as well as Hezbollah attacks on the Jewish state.
Intense clashes erupted in the south as the Israeli army pressed on with a bid to eradicate the Shiite Hezbollah militant fighters from the border area and halt the rocket attacks on Israel that killed 15 people on Sunday alone.
Residents of Tyre reported hearing the thuds of battle on the western end of the front, with the sound of cannon fire shaking walls in the city itself.
Israel has massed thousands of soldiers in several major incursions stretching from the flashpoint town of Aita al-Shaab in the west to Taibe in the central sector, facing fierce resistance from Hezbollah militants.
The UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) said that while the Israeli army appeared to be holding the same positions as a day earlier there were intense ground exchanges in the region, mainly in built-up areas.
"There has been no change in terms of territory. But there has been an intensification of exchanges of fire on the ground in different areas all along the border," said spokesman Milos Strugar.
He said that the intensification was especially marked in sectors including the area around the village of Bint Jbeil -- already largely levelled by Israeli bombardment -- and around Taibe in the east, the site of days of fierce fighting.
Hezbollah said it had killed four Israeli soldiers in a pre-dawn attack in south Lebanon. The army denied the claim, saying that "four soldiers were slightly wounded and an officer was more seriously injured".
But the army did say three Israeli soldiers were killed in clashes with Hezbollah around Bint Jbeil Monday.

08/07/2006 20:20 GMT