BBC NEWS | In Depth | Lebanon guide

BBC NEWS | In Depth | Lebanon guide

Fighting between Hezbollah and Israel has brought widespread bombing and destruction to Lebanon.

It is not the first time the country has been mired in violence. Between 1975 and the early 1990s a civil war killed as many as 100,000 and left much of Lebanon and its economy in ruins.

Regional powers were drawn in, with the Palestine Liberation Organisation, Syria and Israel all involved.

Syria finally withdrew its troops in 2005, after it was accused of assassinating former prime minister Rafik Hariri. In 2000 the last Israeli troops left its self-declared 'security zone' in the south