The pro-Iranian Hizbullah movement's grip on southern Lebanon was almost complete last night, as the Israeli-backed South Lebanon Army collapsed, and Israel agonised over how to get its remaining soldiers and equipment safely back across the border.
Having held the so-called "security zone" along the foot of southern Lebanon for 15 years, Israel has lost control over it in barely three days, and its military chiefs said yesterday they had not expected the 2,500-strong SLA to capitulate so rapidly in the face of the guerrilla fighters.
SLA officers, in turn, accused Israel of having betrayed them - "vanished in the night", as one put it, "and left us to our fate".
As of last night, Israeli troops still occupied about eight outposts in the zone, caught up in occasional gun battles with Hizbullah.
Some of the bullets fired at and from the Karkom outpost landed inside Israel, at the northern village of Zarit.
The last SLA fighters were holding on to a handful of positions, having abandoned more than two dozen in the course of the day; Hizbullah captured SLA tanks, huge supplies of Israeli ammunition, even Israeli drinks and other provisions.
Many residents of northern Israel had fled south, to avoid feared Hizbullah rocket attacks; the rest were spending the night in underground bomb-shelters.
Israel deployed extra tanks on its northern border - to reassure locals, perhaps in anticipation of Hizbullah attack.
The jubliant Hizbullah leader, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, hailing "a day of celebration", threatened to continue the struggle against Israel until all Lebanese prisoners held by Israel are released, and until Israel completes its withdrawal from Lebanon to Hizbullah's, rather than the UN's, satisfaction.
Israel's Prime Minister Mr Ehud Barak responded, as he has done consistently these past few days, by warning of a harsh response against Hizbullah and, implicitly, against Syria, should the violence spread into northern Israel.
While hundreds of Lebanese families, escorted by Hizbullah guerrillas and by members of the Amal militia, returned south to homes last seen two decades or more ago in villages in the security zone, other Lebanese were fleeing out of the zone - to Israel. More than 2,000 members of the SLA and their families were sleeping last night in an impromptu tent city beside the Sea of Galilee, on the very site where Pope John Paul II celebrated Mass for vast crowds just a few short weeks ago.
The Israeli Interior Ministry says it is giving them the same grants and privileges it extends to new immigrants.
In a day of total victory for Hizbullah, and abject humiliation for the SLA - and, by extension, Israel - the 140-plus prisoners at Khiam jail, a notorious SLA-run prison, were freed by the International Red Cross. Their SLA jailers simply turned and fled when local villagers converged on the jail.
With steadily growing success, Hizbullah battled through the 1980s and 1990s to force Israel out of the security zone, gradually gaining the upper hand in a mini-war where Israel's ultra-sophisticated weaponry was impotent and Hizbullah's familiarity with the territory, support from local residents and willingness to sustain losses proved decisive.
Mr Barak, who had hoped to complete an orderly withdrawal from southern Lebanon by July 7th, said he now expected the last Israelis soldiers to pull out within a week. It seems more likely, though, that the last troops will be back inside Israel within days, if not hours.
One concern in Israel now is to avoid too much more weaponry falling into Hizbullah hands. The other, and prime, concern is that the withdrawal will not coincide with a cessation of Hizbullah hostilities.
Reuters adds:
Israeli troops began pulling out of a key base in their south Lebanon occupation zone late yesterday under cover of heavy artillery fire and air power, witnesses and security sources said.
Israeli political sources said the Israeli army could complete its withdrawal from south Lebanon today. Witnesses reported massive explosions from the area of the Crusader-era Beaufort castle used by Israel as a major post.