A Lebanese woman inspects a shop destroyed by Israeli air strikes in southern Beirut. (Reuters)

BEIRUT — Israel battered roads, flyovers and fuel tanks in Lebanon early on Friday, July 14, for the second straight day, inflicting further devastation on the country's infrastructure and leaving more civilians dead.

Black smoke billowed from a burning fuel depot at the Jiyyeh power plant south of Beirut and from fuel tanks set ablaze earlier at the capital's international airport, Reuters reported.

Israeli forces bombarded fuel tanks at Beirut's international airport after nightfall Thursday in the second air raid against the facility in less than 24 hours.

Lebanese television stations showed flames rising from a section of the airport, the country's only international airport which was shut down earlier Thursday after the first pre-dawn air strikes hit the runways.

Lebanese officials had announced earlier that the airport, named after slain former premier Rafiq Hariri, would remain shut for at least 48 hours, disrupting air traffic at a peak time for the country's tourist season.

A Beirut airport official estimated the closure had cost the airport five million dollars in lost revenue on Thursday alone, not including damage.

Israeli jets also blasted the main Beirut-Damascus highway overnight, tightening an air, sea and land blockade of the country, and bombed Beirut's suburbs, killing at least three people and wounding some 50 others.

The latest deaths brought to 60 the number of Lebanese killed since Israel began its bloody offensive after Hizbollah took prisoner two Israeli soldiers and killed eight others.

In total some 20 bridges across Lebanon have been bombarded by Israel since the start of its offensive on the country, according to a count by Agence France-Presse (AFP).

After the closure of Beirut airport and a sea blockade by Israel, the road border crossing with Syria was the sole remaining option for entering or exiting the country.

Lebanese queued for petrol and panicky families hoarded food and drink as the Israeli-Hizbollah confrontation exploded, rattling financial markets in Lebanon and Israel. Beirut shops and restaurants stayed mainly shut and tourists fled.

Foreign governments scrambled to evacuate tourists and other nationals while a number of international airlines ceased all flights to Beirut until further notice following the first direct attack on the airport by Israel in nearly 40 years.

"Fierce Response"

A road is damaged by Israeli air strikes several miles west of Lebanon's border with Syria. (Reuters)

In Tehran, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad warned Israel not to attack Syria, saying such action would be considered an assault on the whole Islamic world that would bring a "fierce response", state television reported.

"If Israel commits another act of idiocy and aggresses Syria, this will be the same as an aggression against the entire Islamic world and it will receive a stinging response," the Iranian leader said in statements carried by the official news agency IRNA.

"The Israeli aggressions are a result of the weakness of a puppet regime that is on its way towards disappearing," he told the Islamic republic's chief regional ally.

Ahmadinejad also told Lebanese President Emile Lahoud that "Iran would put all its potential at the service of Lebanon."

"Iran will stay by the side of the Lebanese in the delicate circumstances in their homeland," he said in a seperate phone conversation, according to a statement from the Lebanese presidency.

Hizbollah waged Thursday two unprecedented missile strikes on the port of Haifa in response to the Israeli escalation. No one was hurt in the attack.

US President George W. Bush, on a visit to Germany, failed anew to criticize Israel.

"Israel has the right to defend herself," he said.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, also speaking in Germany, urged Israel to exercise restraint but demanded that Syria put pressure on Hizbollah to stop its attacks on Israel.

Syria's ambassador to the United States urged Washington to restrain its ally Israel and push for renewed peace talks.

The European Union and Russia criticized Israel's strikes in Lebanon as a dangerous escalation of the Middle East conflict.

The Israeli offensive coincided with a major Israeli incursion into the Gaza Strip, which has killed up to 53 Palestinians, including women and children, and left the tiny territory's infrastructure in debris.