The US and France reached agreement today on a UN Security Council resolution calling for an end to the fighting between Israel and Lebanon as the first step toward a political settlement of the conflict, French and British officials said.
The full 15-nation Security Council was scheduled to meet later today to review the text, which is expected to be adopted within the next few days, the officials said.
It is understood that the draft resolution agreed by the US and France does not include a requirement for an "immediate" cessation of violence.
This will be seen as a victory for the US and Israel, who were unwilling to contemplate the immediate unconditional ceasefire demanded by France and many other nations.
Meanwhile Israel said it planned to bomb suspected "Hizbollah rocket launching sites" in Sidon and warned the inhabitants of south Lebanon's biggest city to leave.
An Israeli army spokesman said leaflets dropped on Sidon, whose normal population of 100,000 has been swollen by refugees from war zones further south, had warned all residents to leave.
"We dropped leaflets warning residents to leave because the army will attack Hizbollah rocket launching sites in Sidon," he said.
Other army officials confirmed the warning had been given. A local official in Sidon, who asked not to be named, said Hizbollah's Shia guerrillas were not present in the mainly Sunni Muslim city.
One resident said he had seen a leaflet that warned people to leave, but that did not mention Sidon by name.
Elsewhere three people were killed when a Hizbollah rocket hit a house in northern Israel, Israel's Channel 10 Television reported. It said the strike occurred in the Galilee region.
Lebanon says a million people, a quarter of the population, have been displaced by the war launched after Hizbollah seized two Israeli soldiers in a cross-border raid on July 12th.
US Assistant Secretary of State David Welch said after meeting Prime Minister Fouad Siniora that the solution lay in a "lasting political framework backed by an international force".
Mr Welch, who was in Beirut to discuss a draft UN resolution that world powers hope will halt a conflict that killed at least 734 people in Lebanon and 75 Israelis, said after talks with Siniora that Lebanon needed a lasting peace.
"We want to end and put behind us forever the terrible violence we have witnessed in the past three weeks," he said in a statement to reporters.
"With a lasting political framework supported by an international force to help the Lebanese armed forces, I hope we can all work together to realise an agreement with the people of Lebanon for a better future," he added.
He took no questions. He earlier held talks with Nabih Berri, the Shia speaker of parliament who has acted as the main contact between the government and Hizbollah since the violence began.
The Israeli army said eight Israeli naval commandos had been wounded in the raid near Tyre, aimed at Hizbollah fighters believed to be responsible for yesterday's rocket strikes near the Israeli city of Hadera, the deepest such missiles have reached.
The head of Israel's northern command, Major-General Udi Adam, told Israel Radio the operation was also an attempt to target senior Hizbollah figures but gave no details.
The army said a "good number" of Hizbollah fighters were killed in the raid. Lebanese security sources said four civilians and a Lebanese soldier were killed during the fighting in citrus groves just north of Tyre.
Hizbollah said one Israeli soldier had been killed and many wounded in the battle.
Its al-Manar television station showed spent bullets strewn over the bloodstained concrete floor of a compound.
An Israeli air strike later killed two men on a motorcycle on the outskirts of Tyre, witnesses said. The Israeli army also said one soldier had been killed and one wounded just inside Lebanon overnight when Hizbollah mortar rounds hit their vehicle. They had been hunting for rocket launchers across the border from the Israeli village of Metula.
Hizbollah, in what it said was retaliation for Israeli attacks on civilians, fired more rockets into Israel today and medics said five people had been wounded north of Haifa.
Rocket fire killed three Israeli civilians yesterday. Israel said it had unleashed 70 air strikes on Hizbollah targets in south Lebanon overnight.
A blast echoed over Beirut at dawn and al-Manar said bombs had hit southern suburbs.
In Paris, President Jacques Chirac's Elysee Palace said a deal had been reached seeking a total halt to hostilities and would work towards a permanent ceasefire and a long-term solution.
US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton said that this resolution deals with the immediate issue of bringing an end to the fighting which has raged between Israel's armed forces and Hezbollah guerillas in southern Lebanon.
A second resolution is expected to spell out a wider political framework for long-term peace in the area, including the introduction of an international stabilisation force in a buffer zone in the south of Lebanon.