JERUSALEM (AP) – Israel’s Security Cabinet overwhelmingly decided Wednesday to send troops deeper into Lebanon in a major expansion of the ground war _ an attempt to further damage Hezbollah before a cease-fire is imposed.

The planned offensive would boost pressure on the United Nations to work out a rapid cease-fire to stop the offensive and prevent further casualties and destruction in Lebanon.

A minister at the Cabinet meeting, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to give details of the plan, said the offensive might be held back for two or three days so as not interfere with cease-fire negotiations in the U.N. Security Council.

However, senior military officials said it would begin far quicker than that, and soon after the Cabinet decision, a column of Israeli tanks and armored vehicles crossed the border and took up positions inside Lebanese territory.

“Israel is still working for a diplomatic solution, preferably in the Security Council,” Cabinet Minister Isaac Herzog said, adding that the new offensive would run parallel to the negotiations. “We cannot wait forever. We have a million civilians living in bomb shelters, and we have to protect them.”

The decision came as fierce fighting was reported overnight with Hezbollah militants, and Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera reported 11 Israeli soldiers had been killed in what would be the deadliest day for Israeli troops in Lebanon in four weeks of fighting.

The Cabinet decision was risky. Israel could set itself up for new criticism that it is sabotaging diplomatic efforts, particularly after Lebanon offered to deploy its own troops in the border area.

A wider ground offensive also might do little to stop Hezbollah rocket fire on Israel, while sharply increasing the already-high number of casualties among Israeli troops.

Since the fighting began, at least 700 people have died on the Lebanese side. The Israeli toll stood at 103 killed _ including 36 civilians.

In the six-hour meeting, Cabinet officials were told a new offensive could mean 100 to 200 more military deaths, a participant said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief reporters. At least 67 Israeli soldiers have been confirmed killed.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert spoke by telephone for a half-hour during the meeting. Olmert told the ministers the offensive will be accompanied by a diplomatic initiative, based on a U.S.-French truce proposal that would take Lebanon’s concerns into account, a participant in the meeting said.

Under the army’s plan, troops would push to Lebanon’s Litani River, about 18 miles from the border. Olmert and Defense Minister Amir Peretz will decide on the timing of the new push, said Trade Minister Eli Yishai, a member of the Security Cabinet.

“The assessment is it will last 30 days,” Yishai said afterward. “I think it is wrong to make this assessment. I think it will take a lot longer,” added Yishai, who had abstained in the vote.

More than 10,000 Israeli troops are in Lebanon. They are fighting in a four-mile stretch, and have encountered fierce resistance from Hezbollah.

The decision on the wider offensive came a day after the commander of Israeli forces in Lebanon was sidelined in an unusual midwar shake-up _ another sign of the growing dissatisfaction with the military, which has been unable to stop Hezbollah’s rocket barrages.

The army denied it was dissatisfied with Maj. Gen. Udi Adam, but military commentators said the commander was seen as too slow and cautious. The deputy chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Moshe Kaplinski, was appointed to oversee the Lebanon fighting.

At least six missiles fired from Israeli ships slammed into Beirut’s southern suburbs as Israel continued its sporadic attacks on Shiite neighborhoods and Hezbollah strongholds, police said. Smoke and dust rose over several square blocks.

About a mile away, some 400 people marched in a funeral for 30 of the 41 killed in an Israeli airstrike earlier this week. They carried the bodies draped in Lebanon’s green, red and white flag and chanted, “Death to America! Death to Israel!”

The Israeli military has declared a no-drive zone south of the Litani and threatened to blast any moving vehicles. Country roads and highways were deserted. In the Lebanese coastal city of Tyre, only pedestrians ventured into the streets.

Al-Jazeera said 11 Israeli soldiers were killed in heavy fighting with Hezbollah guerrillas near the border. The Israeli army declined to comment on the report but had said earlier that 15 soldiers were wounded in overnight clashes.

A Hezbollah statement said it killed or wounded 10 Israeli soldiers and destroyed a tank as it advanced toward the village of Qantara, north of the border.

The column of Israeli tanks, bulldozers and armored vehicles crossed into Lebanon from the Israeli town of Metulla under covering artillery fire and airstrikes, witnesses in the village of Bourj al-Mulouk said. The armor took positions about three miles inside Lebanon.

Israel also struck Lebanon’s largest Palestinian refugee camp, killing two people and wounding five. Lebanese and Palestinian officials said an Israeli gunship shelled the Ein el-Hilweh camp, but Israel’s military said the attack was an airstrike that targeted a house used by Hezbollah guerrillas. The camp is home to about 75,000 Palestinian refugees and their descendants who were displaced by the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.

Airstrikes also leveled a building in the Bekaa Valley town of Mashghara, trapping seven family members in the rubble. Five bodies were pulled out and the remaining two relatives were feared dead, officials said.

Israeli warplanes dropped leaflets over Tyre and Beirut that criticized Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, saying he was “playing with fire” and that the Lebanese people were “paying the price.”

At least 19 Lebanese civilians were killed by airstrikes Tuesday. Rescuers also pulled 28 more bodies from the wreckage, raising the death toll to 77 Lebanese killed Monday, the highest since the war began.

Hezbollah fired more than 160 rockets at Israel on Wednesday. Since the fighting began July 12, a total of 3,333 have been fired at Israel, officials said.

Diplomatic efforts moved slowly. Israel is skeptical of a Lebanese proposal to dispatch 15,000 soldiers to south Lebanon after a cease-fire and the withdrawal of Israeli forces.

“We will not agree to a situation in which the diplomatic solution will not promise us stability and quiet for many years,” Peretz told visiting German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

Lebanon’s proposal to deploy troops on the border appeared to have taken Israel by surprise.

Israel has long demanded a deployment of Lebanese forces in the border area, but only coupled with a serious effort by Lebanon to disarm Hezbollah. Israel believes Lebanese forces are not strong or determined enough to do the job alone, and would like to see a multinational force in the area, as well.

Assistant Secretary of State David Welch carried a message to Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora from Israel that it would not pull its troops out of the country until an international peacekeeping force was in place, a senior Lebanese government official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information.

Saniora has praised Hezbollah’s resistance, but said it was time for Lebanon to “impose its full control, authority and presence” nationwide _ as directed in previous U.N. resolutions that also called for the government to disarm Hezbollah.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the Lebanese proposal was significant, but President Bush warned against leaving a vacuum into which Hezbollah and its sponsors are able to move more weapons.

While Bush said a U.N. resolution was needed quickly, the Security Council put off voting on a U.S.-French cease-fire proposal for at least a day. The delay was to allow three Arab envoys to present arguments that the resolution was heavily tilted in favor of Israel and did not “take Lebanon’s interest and stability into account.”

In a televised speech, Nasrallah called the U.S.-French draft cease-fire plan “unfair and unjust,” but said he supports deploying the Lebanese army in south Lebanon.

Both the U.S. and French envoys to the U.N. indicated there might be room for limited compromise.

“Obviously we want to hear from the Arab League … and then we’ll decide where to go from there,” U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said.

French President Jacques Chirac appealed to Washington to speed up its response to Arab nations’ demands for changes to a resolution, saying that giving up the push for an immediate cease-fire would be the “most immoral” response.