|PIC2|United Nations General Secretary Kofi Annan has expressed his shock as four UN observers were killed in an Israeli air strike on an observation post in south Lebanon. The attack came as Christians in the region continue to assist civilian victims caught up in the cross-fire.

Mr Annan said in a statement from Rome: "I am shocked and deeply distressed by the apparently deliberate targeting by Israeli Defence Forces of a UN Observer post in southern Lebanon.”

Israel said it expressed “deep regret” at the event which killed the four observers, from Austria, Canada, China and Finland, as they took shelter in a bunker under the post which had already been shelled 14 times by Israeli forces.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Mr Annan will attend international crisis talks in Rome Wednesday to discuss the deployment of international forces in southern Lebanon.

Lebanon and its Arab allies will call for an immediate truce at the talks, although Washington has said a lasting solution needs to be agreed first.

Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has meanwhile rejected US truce terms and expressed his intent to take the war deeper into Israel, Reuters reports.

|PIC1|Aid to the Church in Need has promised to send 15,000 euros to assist the most vulnerable people in the conflict zone.

The aid agency received an ‘SOS’ from Melkite Catholic Archbishop Elias Chacour of Akka, Haifa, Nazareth and all of Galilee, in which the archbishop described the plight of civilians in the face of the conflict.

“The whole Galilee region is practically paralysed: no jobs, no circulation and people stay at home waiting for deliverance and sometimes receiving a rocket or a cachucha instead.

"This is the case in the villages: Jish, Buqaia, Fasuta, Tharsheeha, Miilya and also Haifa and Shefa’amr, where people were hit directly or indirectly, some are hospitalised,” said Archbishop Chacour, who appealed to the aid agency to help him support 30 families in need.

“I never imagined that a day will come that I have to make an appeal, a kind of SOS for us Christians in Galilee. We wish to wipe away the tears of the children and parents in these difficult times,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Rt Rev Elias Nassar, the Maronite Bishop of Saida in south Lebanon, sent an urgent appeal to Aid to the Church in Need requesting prayers and support.

|TOP|Bishop Nassar spoke of the fear and desperation of communities in his diocese as they remain caught up in the cross-fire between Hezbollah and Israeli armed forces.

He reported that predominantly Christian villages were opening up their schools and other public buildings for Shia Muslims fleeing the worst-affected areas close to the Israeli border.

According to Bishop Nassar, Christian communities were also providing food and other supplies but expressed concern that the stocks would soon empty.

Just five months since his Episcopal ordination, Bishop Nassar said the task before him was huge.

|AD|“I have a great suffering in my heart now,” he said. “Some Christian villages are going through a terrible time right now. Israeli troops are bombarding these villages and some troops from Hezbollah are entering and firing rockets towards Israel. There is a great deal of damage.

“Factories and other buildings have been bombarded by Israeli troops, as have the bridges and some of the main roads and the Christians cannot leave for the time being.”

He made an urgent appeal for prayer, telling Christians, “The first support that you can give right now is your prayer. I very much trust in prayer and we need the prayers of the whole world.”

Israeli forces have been targeting suspected Hezbollah strongholds in a conflict which erupted after Hezbollah captured two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid on 12 July.

The two weeks of conflict in Lebanon have left more than 380 Lebanese and 42 Israelis dead.