Israeli government ministers said a much deeper land assault approved by the security cabinet Wednesday remained on hold to allow more time for diplomacy but there was no breakthrough in New York on the wording of a ceasefire call by the UN Security Council.
Washington was meanwhile considering a request by Israel to send more weapons to sustain its air war, this time controversial cluster bombs, the New York Times reported.
Eleven civilians were killed and nine wounded in the dawn raid on a bridge in the northern Akkar plain close to the Syrian border, hospital officials said. Many of the casualties were inflicted when the Israeli aircraft returned for a second bombing run when residents had gone out to the bridge to inspect the damage.
Israeli fighter-bombers also carried out repeated strikes on Beirut's Shiite southern suburbs, a Hezbollah stronghold. The raids brought down three buildings at a major crossroads, blocking all traffic on the area's main thoroughfare.
The Israeli air force said it had hit more than 130 targets in Lebanon in the 24 hours to Friday morning, including "five rocket launchers and Hezbollah buildings and command posts in the Dahiya area of Beirut."
The army said 16 soldiers been wounded in clashes with Hezbollah Friday. There was no immediate confirmation from the Israelis of a report by Arabic television Al Jazeera that one soldier had also been killed.
The Lebanese government prepared, with the help of UN peacekeepers, to evacuate some 350 police and troops whose barracks in Marjayun was overrun in the Israeli advance, officials said.
"The interior ministry has decided to evacuate the troops, in consultation with the Lebanese army command," interior minister Ahmed Fatfat said.
A total of 82 Israeli soldiers have been killed in Lebanon since Israel launched its offensive on July 12. There have also been 38 Israeli civilians killed by Hezbollah rocket fire since the Shiite militant group sparked the Israeli offensive by capturing two soldiers in a deadly cross-border raid.
Two Israelis were wounded in a new salvo against the port of Haifa Friday that also caused substantial damage in and around Israel's third city.
The military's failure to stop the rocket fire after a month of fighting is causing mounting skepticism among Israelis about its ability to deliver on its war aims, two new opinion polls suggested.
In a survey published by the Ha'aretz daily, 73 percent of respondents said Israel could not claim to have won the war against the Lebanese militant group if the fighting stopped now.
Only 48 percent of those polled said they were satisfied with the performance of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, while 40 percent said they were not.
In Lebanon, more than 1,000 civilians - some 30 percent of them children aged under 12 - have been killed by Israeli attacks and nearly 1 million have fled their homes, sparking what relief agencies described as a humanitarian crisis.
As talks at the United Nations on a draft ceasefire resolution faltered, Russia submitted a rival text calling for a 72-hour truce to help tackle the "catastrophic" situation of those trapped by the fighting.
Russian ambassador Vitaly Churkin said the world could no longer wait for France and the United States to resolve their differences over amendments to an earlier draft they co-sponsored.
"The Americans and the French have failed to agree, they're still negotiating," Churkin told reporters. "We have had repeatedly optimistic statements that any day a solution might be available," he said, adding "War is raging in Lebanon and the humanitarian situation is getting catastrophic."
The United States bristled at Moscow's initiative. "I don't think it is helpful to divert attention, we are seeking to get a permanent, sustainable solution based on the approach that we and the French have been taking," US ambassador John Bolton said.
Israel too swiftly dismissed the Russian proposal. "It would be a very bad solution" to the crisis, because "it would allow Hezbollah to regroup," Israel's representative to the United Nations Dan Gillerman told public radio.
Israel is still holding out for the Franco-US draft which was rejected by Lebanon because it requires Israel to stop only offensive operations and does not demand its withdrawal until a new international buffer force has been deployed.
France has been pushing for amendments to take into account Lebanon's reservations but the United States is backing its ally Israel's insistence that there will no immediate withdrawal after any ceasefire.
US Middle East envoy David Welch was back in Beirut on his third visit in a week to try to sell the latest proposals to Prime Minister Fouad Siniora. Afterwards, Siniora said there had been progress albeit at a snail's pace.
"There is progress, even if it is ... centimeter by centimeter," he said.
French foreign minister Philippe Douste-Blazy was meanwhile due in New York to try to speed up the Security Council discussions.
As the diplomatic wrangling dragged on, the New York Times reported that Washington was considering an Israeli request for M-26 artillery rockets with cluster munitions it wants to use against suspected Hezbollah missile sites.
A senior US official said the request was likely to be approved shortly, but other officials said the State Department was delaying approval amid concerns the munitions might cause civilian casualties and complicate diplomatic efforts to end the war.
The senior official said there was discussion to block the sale because during Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon civilians were killed with the weapon, but added that the rockets would likely be delivered and that Israel would be told to "be careful."
© 2006 Agence France-Presse
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