A de facto ceasefire was reported in south Lebanon for today's visit by the President, Mrs McAleese, to Irish troops serving with the United Nations here. It is understood the warring factions have agreed to UN requests for calm during the President's two-day visit.
The latest violence in the area was the bombing of an empty UN post at Beit Lif, a village outside the Irish UN Battalion area on Monday. The post is on the edge of the border zone in south Lebanon which is occupied by the Israeli Defence Forces. No group has admitted responsibility for the attack.
The area is tense over Israeli action on the edge of its occupied Lebanese zone, where its troops have imposed a blockade of the villages of Kfar Kila, Adaisseh, Taibe, Deir Mimas and Deir Serian. The Israelis claim the villages have provided cover for Islamic militias attacking their positions in Lebanon.
The Israelis have suspicions that members of the local Christian militias, which have backed the Israeli occupation of south Lebanon until now, might be collaborating with the Islamic militias making attacks on Israeli positions.
In the past year more than 40 Israelis and at least that number of Islamic militia and Lebanese civilians have been killed in retaliatory attacks. The area is the most volatile in the Middle East, and continued violence is expected while Israel continues to occupy the eight-mile-wide strip of south Lebanon it terms its "security zone".
Yesterday, an international monitoring group, set up after the last mass bombardment of south Lebanon by Israel, expressed "regret" at the killing of a shepherd in a landmine explosion near Majdel-Silm, a village on the edge of the Irish battalion's area. Locals claim the mines were Israeli.
The Daily Star newspaper in Beirut has reported that during President McAleese's visit Lebanon would be asking Ireland to restore the embassy it maintained in Beirut up to the civil war, and Lebanon also wants to open an embassy in Dublin.
It is expected these proposals will be raised when the President meets President Hrawi in Beirut tomorrow.
The President arrived in Beirut last night, on the first visit by an Irish head of state to Defence Forces serving abroad with the UN. She was met at Beirut Airport by the Lebanese Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Michel Murr. The Irish Ambassador to Egypt, Mr Hugh Swift, accompanied Mrs McAleese to her hotel, the Intercontinental on Beirut's Corniche.
The President, who is accompanied by her husband Martin and the Minister for Defence, Mr Michael Smith, will travel by helicopter this morning to the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) headquarters at Naqoura, near the Israeli border. She will then travel by helicopter to Tibnin, where 500 troops of the Irish UNIFIL Battalion are serving, and will stay there overnight.
Her tour of the Irish posts will continue tomorrow morning and she will return to Beirut for a lunch hosted by President Hrawi.