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Israeli forces intensified attacks on Lebanon on Friday, striking at Beirut international for a second time, attacking the heart of Hizbollah’s headquarters in Beirut’s suburbs and bombing the main Beirut-to-Damascus highway – Lebanon’s main artery.

Reflecting the increasingly belligerent rhetoric of the Israeli government, Hamon Ramon, justice minister, told army radio Israel would fight Hizbollah with the “same means used by the Americans against Osama bin Laden” or by the Russians against “Chechen terrorists”.

Amir Peretz, defence minister, said on Thursday Israel intended to “break” Hizbollah, whose guerrillas snatched two Israeli soldiers from inside Israel’s northern border in attacks that also led to the deaths of eight servicemen.

On Thursday, Israeli aircraft and artillery pounded southern Lebanon in an attempt to force the release of the two soldiers. At least 52 civilians were killed. An Arab satellite television station broadcast images of rows of dead Lebanese children, shrouded in white sheets at a morgue.

One Israeli was also killed and as many as 91 were injured when Hizbollah responded with a barrage of Katyusha rockets, some of which landed on Israeli towns near the Lebanese border.

An evening rocket attack on the Israeli town of Haifa, about 40km from the border, looked set to provoke responses. “Those who fire into such a densely populated area will pay a heavy price,” said David Baker, an official in the Israeli prime minister’s office. Hizbollah denied it was responsible.

Early in the day, Israeli aircraft struck the international airport in Beirut and bombed two military airstrips, cutting off civilian and military air access.

Israeli defence forces also pursued military operations in the Gaza Strip, blowing up part of the Palestinian foreign ministry.

Brigadier-General Amir Eshel, deputy chief of the air force staff, told Reuters news agency that Israel expects to carry out a prolonged offensive.

The Lebanese government distanced itself from a Hizbollah raid on Wednesday that resulted in the death of eight Israeli soldiers and the abduction of two more. Mark Regev, spokesman for the Israeli foreign ministry, said there was concern that there could be an attempt to move the hostages to Iran, but gave no evidence to support this.

George W. Bush, US president, defended Israel’s right to retaliate but warned: “Whatever Israel does should not weaken the government in Lebanon.”

Condoleezza Rice, US secretary of state, urged Israel to exercise restraint and demanded Syria restrain Hizbollah guerrillas.

The escalation of violence sent oil prices to a fresh high and helped trigger falls on global equity markets.

Prices for US crude hit $76.70 a barrel. More rises are expected, with futures contracts indicating a price of nearly $80 a barrel by February. The Dow Jones fell 1.52 per cent, to end at 10,846.29.

In New York, the US vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution tabled by Qatar, that would have called on Israel to halt its operations in Gaza, and release all detained Palestinian ministers and officials.

It would also have called for the release of Corporal Gilad Shalit, whose abduction prompted the Gaza offensive, and for the Palestinian Authority to take action to end the firing of rockets on Israeli territory.

Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian observer to the UN, claimed the resolution’s failure would “only encourage the aggressors and lengthen the duration of the cycles of violence”.

Dan Gillerman, the Israeli ambassador, said Hamas and Hizbollah were “merely the fingers of the bloodstained hands of the leaders of the world’s most prominent axis of terror, Syria and Iran”.