BEIRUT: A United Nations special rapporteur told AFP on Friday that deadly Israeli strikes on ostensibly civilian vehicles in Lebanon since last year’s ceasefire could amount to war crimes, despite Israel’s assertion they targeted Hezbollah members.
Israel has repeatedly bombed Lebanon in spite of the November 2024 truce, which sought to end more than a year of hostilities with the Iran-backed militant group that culminated in two months of open war.
The Israeli military usually says it targeted Hezbollah operatives or infrastructure with its strikes, dozens of which have killed people traveling on Lebanese roads in cars and on motorbikes, or occasionally using excavators.
“Unless there is compelling evidence that those civilian objects have dual (military) objectives... the strikes are illegal,” said Morris Tidball-Binz, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.
“The killings resulting from the attacks violate the right to life and also the principles of precaution and proportionality and, in my opinion, also amount to war crimes,” he told AFP in a written statement.
Lebanon’s official National News Agency on Friday reported unspecified casualties in an Israeli strike targeting a car in the country’s south.
And on Thursday, some of the heaviest Israeli raids since the ceasefire hit south Lebanon, with the health ministry saying one person was killed and seven others wounded.
The Israeli military said it targeted Hezbollah infrastructure and facilities used by an NGO under US sanctions that Israel considers a cover for the militant group.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said the strikes targeted civilian facilities, condemning a ceasefire violation and “a systematic policy aimed at destroying productive infrastructure” and hindering the country’s recovery.
The south Lebanon water establishment said Friday the raids had completely destroyed its strategic fuel depot.
The stricken facility “contained half a million liters of fuel oil” used to operate electricity generators for water stations and wells, it said in a statement.
At a heavily damaged cement factory, sales manager Ali Khalifeh told AFP that “we are a 100 percent civilian complex.”
He said more than a dozen air strikes hit the site, which “produces asphalt and concrete. It’s one of the biggest asphalt mixers in Lebanon.”
An AFP correspondent overnight saw firefighters battling a huge blaze at the factory.
“We had a huge quantity of liquid tar,” Khalifeh said, adding: “That’s what blew up, in addition to the fuel oil and the diesel” and other fuel.
Last week, Israeli strikes targeted bulldozer and excavator yards in south Lebanon’s Al-Msayleh area, destroying more than 300 pieces of machinery.
UN rapporteur says deadly Israel strikes on vehicles in Lebanon could be war crimes
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UN rapporteur says deadly Israel strikes on vehicles in Lebanon could be war crimes
- “Unless there is compelling evidence that those civilian objects have dual (military) objectives... the strikes are illegal,” said Tidball-Binz
- “The killings resulting from the attacks violate the right to life “
US lawmakers press Israel to probe strike on reporters in Lebanon
- “The IDF has made no effort, none, to seriously investigate this incident,” Welch said
- Collins called for Washington to publicly acknowledge the attack in which an American citizen was injured
WASHINGTON: Several Democratic lawmakers called Thursday for the Israeli and US governments to fully investigate a deadly 2023 attack by the Israeli military on journalists in southern Lebanon.
The October 13, 2023 airstrike killed Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and wounded six other reporters, including two from AFP — video journalist Dylan Collins and photographer Christina Assi, who lost her leg.
“We expect the Israeli government to conduct an investigation that meets the international standards and to hold accountable those people who did this,” Senator Peter Welch told a news conference, with Collins by his side.
The lawmaker from Collins’s home state of Vermont said he had been pushing for answers for two years, first from the administration of Democratic president Joe Biden and now from the Republican White House of Donald Trump.
The Israeli government has “stonewalled at every single turn,” Welch added.
“With the Israeli government, we have been extremely patient, and we have done everything we reasonably can to obtain answers and accountability,” he said.
“The IDF has made no effort, none, to seriously investigate this incident,” Welch said, referring to the Israeli military, adding that it has told his office its investigation into the incident is closed.
Collins called for Washington to publicly acknowledge the attack in which an American citizen was injured.
“But I’d also like them to put pressure on their greatest ally in the Middle East, the Israeli government, to bring the perpetrators to account,” he said, echoing the lawmakers who called the attack a “war crime.”
“We’re not letting it go,” Vermont congresswoman Becca Balint said. “It doesn’t matter how long they stonewall us.”
AFP conducted an independent investigation which concluded that two Israeli 120mm tank shells were fired from the Jordeikh area in Israel.
The findings were corroborated by other international probes, including investigations conducted by Reuters, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders.
Unlike Welch’s assertion Thursday that the Israeli probe was over, the IDF told AFP in October that “findings regarding the event have not yet been concluded.”
