Similar pleas have fallen on deaf ears for the last week; the United States, Israel's most powerful ally, has opposed an immediate cease-fire.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan pushed to station international troops in southern Lebanon to quell the violence. But John R. Bolton, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., said such a buffer force was premature.
"I think it's the cart before the horse to talk about applying force before we know what the overall military or political resolution is likely to be," he told reporters at U.N. headquarters in New York.
Spain, France and Italy on Wednesday urged prompt action to end the fighting, implicitly criticizing the muted response of the Bush administration to the intensity of the Israeli bombardment.
"The silences of today in light of what is happening in the Mideast could become the regrets of tomorrow, because waiting for time to pass costs human lives," Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero told a gathering of Socialists in Alicante, Spain.
French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, in an interview to be published today, said, "All means to result in a cease-fire must be exploited."
In Italy, the center-left government of Prime Minister Romano Prodi, which came to office two months ago, said that Hezbollah's cross-border raid was unacceptable but that Israel's response had "exceeded all reasonable proportion" and was "dangerous."
Germany and Britain, however, hewed closer to the U.S. line, saying conditions were not right for an immediate cease-fire.
In Washington, several members of Congress urged the Bush administration to change course.
"I'm calling for a cease-fire.... All parties are calling for a cease-fire," U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista), said during an emergency meeting called by the Arab American Institute, an advocacy group in Washington.
Israel has conditioned any cease-fire on the retreat of Hezbollah forces from the border region, and the return of the soldiers; Iran, a Hezbollah supporter, has called for a cease-fire followed by a prisoner exchange between the militant group and Israel.
Looking on in Beirut, desperate Lebanese officials echoed pleas for a halt to the Israeli offensive.
"The ferocity and inhumane aggression has reached unbelievable proportions," said Sami Haddad, Lebanon's minister of economy and trade. "Things are getting worse."
