The Israeli Army says that a new push in southern Lebanon is not planned to exceed the current area of military operations, playing down a media report that an expanded sweep against Hezbollah was under way.
A military spokesman said the new operation fell within the geographical framework already established.
It comes after Israel's security cabinet approved the expansion of its ground offensive in southern Lebanon.
A statement from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office earlier today said the move was aimed at striking a harder blow against Hezbollah and curbing its cross-border rocket attacks.
It is thought the decision could result in troops being sent as far as the Litani River in Lebanon, up to 20 kilometres north of the Israeli border.
So far, at least 10,000 troops have been fighting just inside the border, meeting fierce resistance from Hezbollah.
A deeper Israeli advance into Lebanon could step up pressure for a deal on terms that suit Israel and its ally Washington.
Seven more Israeli soldiers killed: report
Seven more Israeli soldiers are reported to have been killed in clashes with Hezbollah in south Lebanon, raising the death toll today to 11 Israeli soldiers.
The Dubai-based Al Arabiya Television earlier said four Israeli soldiers were killed in a rocket attack in the southern Lebanese village of Aita al-Shaab.
It said the other seven were killed in clashes in another village in the south, without giving further details.
Meanwhile, Israeli air strikes have killed at least nine people in raids on Beirut and southern Lebanon.
The Israeli military said its air force had carried out over 100 raids overnight on what it said were 'Hezbollah buildings'.
A member of the political wing of Hezbollah was killed along with his wife and five children in an attack on the town of Mashghara in the Bekaa valley.
The four-storey building in which the family lived collapsed after being targeted in an Israeli air strike.
And two people were killed and 15 wounded in an Israeli strike on Ain al-Hilweh, a Palestinian refugee camp in southern Lebanon.
The camp is the largest in Lebanon and home to some 50,000 people.
In what was the first such attack on the camp, two shells struck the home of the leader of the Fatah movement in Lebanon.
The refugee camp lies close to Sidon, the main city in southern Lebanon.
