Lebanese celebrate Israel's withdrawal

Hezbollah fighters parade on a captured Israeli tank

There have been jubilant scenes across southern Lebanon after Israel's 22-year occupation ended in the early hours of Wednesday.

Thousands of people streamed back to their villages in the former occupation zone, while Hezbollah guerrillas advanced to the Israeli border, firing in the air and taunting Israeli soldiers.

This is our day of victory

Hezbollah commander

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak warned that Israel would hold Syria and Lebanon responsible for calm in south Lebanon and warned that any attacks on its soldiers or civilians would be treated as an "act of war."

US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said that Syria had a special responsibility to ensure peace on the Israeli-Lebanese border.

SLA collapse

Celebrations: The car shows pictures of prominent Shi'ite leaders

The last Israeli soldier left southern Lebanon at 0345 GMT on Wednesday, closing the gate behind him.

Many Israeli military posts in south Lebanon were blown up as convoys ferried hundreds of soldiers across the frontier.

Hezbollah guerrillas swept south to fill the vacuum, following the near total collapse of Israel's allied militia, the South Lebanon Army (SLA).

The Lebanese President, Emile Lahoud, has toured towns and villages in the south, and walked along the international border.

Civilians swarmed over abandoned Israeli military posts looking for souvenirs.

Rushed withdrawal

22-year tragedy

1978

First Israeli invasion

1982

Israel seizes Beirut

Palestinians killed at Sabra and Shatila

1985

Security zone set up

1993

S Lebanon emptied by Israeli blitz

1996

Israel's "Operation Grapes of Wrath"

"April ceasefire"

1999

Barak pledges July 2000 pullout

An Israeli army officer described the pull-out as a "complete success". He said troops had abandoned all their positions with no casualties.

But Israeli papers have spoken of "the scent of humiliation", and compared the pull-out to the final American helicopter withdrawal from the embassy in the South Vietnamese capital, Saigon.

There was a desperate and chaotic rush for the Israeli border by SLA soldiers and their families who feared retribution at hands of Hezbollah.

On Wednesday morning, some 180 SLA members surrendered to Lebanese police in Marjayoun, the former headquarters of both Israel and the SLA forces, as Hezbollah moved in.

UN role

Israel soldiers also celebrate their departure from southern Lebanon

Moves are under way to strengthen the United Nations peacekeeping force in south Lebanon to fill the vacuum left by the Israelis and their SLA militia allies.

The UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, said UN troops should move into the former security zone until the Lebanese Government was able to reassert its authority.

A UN special envoy is going to Beirut to assess whether UN forces would be safe to patrol in areas vacated by the Israelis.

The UN says its priority is to protect civilians, particularly Christians, and then to certify that Israel has withdrawn to the international border.

Hezbollah leaders have made statements aimed at reassuring Christians in the southern Lebanon that they are safe.

Fighting on

But Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah, has vowed to continue fighting to force Israeli troops from a strip of land known as the Shabaa farms, which adjoins the Golan Heights.

Israel has said that the Shabaa lands are not part of Lebanon, but part of an area they captured from the Syrians in 1967.

The United Nations has also ruled that they were not part of the Israeli occupation.

However, Syria says it ceded the land to Lebanon.