SOHMOR, Lebanon -- The massacre of 13 Shiite Moslems by Israeli-backed militiamen could delay the withdrawal of Israeli troops from south Lebanon, a senior Israeli army officer said today.
'Situations such as yesterday will probabably reverse the clock,' the officer, who declined to be identified, told foreign journalists at the site of the slaughter.
Druze Moslem militiamen of the Israeli-supported South Lebanese Army fired guns and hurled hand grenades at men rounded up for questioning in Sohmor, killing 13 Shiites and wounding 28, a military spokesman said.
The killings are believed to have been revenge for a guerrilla ambush of a Druze patrol in the village in which four militiamen were killed and another five wounded.
'I saw how they suddenly, as if by order, pointed their rifles at us,' villager Salman Armaz told the Maariv newspaper from his hospital bed in northern Israel. 'Then they suddenly shot us, screaming 'this is for what you did to the patrol last night'.
'It was a real slaughterhouse,' he said. 'Bodies lay in puddles of blood. People were in shock and others cried out in pain.'
Israeli leaders have said they hoped the 1,500-man SLA would be able to take over security duties in south Lebanon to enable Israel to start bringing its troops home. But the massacre has raised doubts whether the militia can be molded into a disciplined military force.
'These things are bound to happen,' Uri Lubrani, Israel's 'coordinator' in Lebanon told Israel Radio. 'We shall have to do our damndest to prevent that as long as we are in the area, but they are bound to happen.'
In Sohmor, young men who survived the slaughter picked through torn and bloody bits of clothing as the army escorted foreign journalists through the Shiite Moslem village. Women and children watched from the balconies of their stone houses.
The Israeli military regards the village of 6,000, 30 miles southeast of Beirut as extremely anti-Israeli.
Several of the men told reporters they saw Christian SLA militiamen and Israeli soldiers also fire on villagers, a charge Israel has denied.
The press tour ended abruptly after women began to shout hysterically, 'Get out of here. Go look for somebody else. Leave us alone.' Late Thursday, they had buried their dead.
It was unclear how the militiamen -- wearing red headbands, a traditional symbol of vengeance -- got past a roadblock at the entrance to Sohmor and into the village.
Israeli military spokesmen said Israeli officers and troops were in Sohmor at the time of the killings, declining to disclose numbers.
Israeli officers said 15 SLA soldiers believed responsible for the massacre were detained at their base and would be courtmartialed.
