BEIRUT, Lebanon - Israeli warplanes carried out intensive mock air raids at low altitude over Beirut and southern Lebanon Tuesday in violation of a UN-monitored ceasefire, Lebanese police said.

The aircraft began their overflights early in the morning, concentrated over the capital's impoverished Shiite-dominated southern suburbs that were devastated by Israel's summer war with Hezbollah, and lasted around 45 minutes.

In the south of the country, where a beefed-up UN force is policing a ceasefire that ended the fighting on August 14, the war planes also carried out low-altitude mock raids, police said.

A number of aircraft also made sonic booms over the southern port city of Tyre, an AFP correspondent reported.

When questioned by AFP, an Israeli military spokesman in Tel Aviv refused to comment. "We do not elaborate on operational activity," the spokesman said.

Earlier this month, a senior UN official said the Israeli overflights "really hurt" the multinational peace force's mission in the country and that "they should not happen".

France, which currently leads the UN peacekeeping force in south Lebanon, has said it might open fire on the intruding aircraft.

But Israeli Defence Minister Amir Peretz has vowed the flights will continue because of alleged arms smuggling to Hezbollah since the war ended.

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