Flooding South Lebanon - Human Rights Watch

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Four-year-old `Ali Muhammad Yaghi was playing in front of his Zawtar al-Gharbiyeh house when a submunition in his neighbor’s garden exploded. As he showed Human Rights Watch on October 23, 2006, he suffered a serious arm injury. © 2006 Bonnie Docherty/Human Rights Watch 77 Human Rights Watch February 2008
a troubling indicator of one reason why dud rates had been so high during the conflict. The Socioeconomic Effects of Cluster Munition Contamination The estimated hundreds of thousands and possibly up to one million submunition duds have greatly disrupted south Lebanon’s heavily agrarian economy. According to UNDP, submunitions have contaminated an estimated 20 square kilometers of agricultural land, which makes up more than half of the land contaminated. 232 The UN Food and Agricultural Organization reported that submunitions contaminated at least 26 percent of south Lebanon’s agricultural land, a figure MACC SL described as “very conservative.” 233 They blocked access to homes, gardens, fields, and orchards. Chris Clark, the program manager for MACC SL, told Human Rights Watch that “it’s not too much of an exaggeration to say everything is affected.” 234 An estimated 70 percent of household incomes in south Lebanon come from agriculture. Unfortunately, the submunitions remaining after the cluster strikes on south Lebanon left farmers unable to harvest or plant crops. 235 “They need help,” said Habbouba Aoun, coordinator of the Landmines Resource Center. “They cannot access anymore their source of survival.” 236 South Lebanon is heavily dependent on the olive and citrus crops harvested annually and the tobacco crops harvested twice a year. However, in the fall of 2006, unexploded duds contaminated many fields beyond use, and many groves were abandoned. Farmers could not irrigate their fields until they were cleared of duds, as the watering of the fields would cause the duds to sink into the ground and make them more difficult to detect. Many communities consequently lost their 2006 harvest of olives, citrus, and tobacco. “The cluster bombs will definitely affect next year’s crops,” Allan Poston of the UNDP said in October 2006. “At this point, the extent of the effect is not known yet. It will depend on how fast demining can take 232 UNDP, “CBU Contamination by Land Use,” current as of November 29, 2006. 233 Email communication from Julia Goehsing, program officer, MACC SL, to Human Rights Watch, July 20, 2007. 234 Human Rights Watch interview with Chris Clark, program manager, MACC SL, Tyre, October 23, 2006. 235 UNOCHA, “Lebanon: Cluster Bomb Fact Sheet,” September 19, 2006. 236 Human Rights Watch interview with Habbouba Aoun, coordinator, Landmines Resource Center, Beirut, October 19, 2006. Flooding South Lebanon 78
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Lebanon Flooding South Lebanon Isra
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Civilian Harm......................
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Acronyms BLU CBU CCW COI DPICM ICRC
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Summary The Israel Defense Forces (
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Israel’s strikes in 2006 were the
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leaving behind vast numbers of haza
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compensate for the cluster rockets
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immediately before a negotiated cea
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knowingly or recklessly indiscrimin
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production, transfer and stockpilin
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numerous men, women, and children w
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To the Secretary-General of the Uni
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Cluster Munitions and International
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At least 14 states and a small numb
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• Refraining from launching attac
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This does not just mean immediate c
Page 34 and 35: Israel is a major producer and expo
Page 36 and 37: Types of Cluster Munitions and Subm
Page 38 and 39: An unexploded M77, a US-made dual p
Page 40 and 41: This CBU-58B cluster bomb casing, s
Page 42 and 43: likely that the MZD-2s found in Leb
Page 44 and 45: contaminated by submunitions. 89 Ho
Page 46 and 47: Timing and Targets: When and How Cl
Page 48 and 49: with 500-pound bombs. The increase
Page 50 and 51: Human Rights Watch field research c
Page 52 and 53: percent, and dismissed the problem
Page 54 and 55: A UNIFIL deminer holds an Israeli-m
Page 56 and 57: Civilian Harm Cluster munitions hav
Page 58 and 59: 51 Human Rights Watch February 2008
Page 60 and 61: submunition causing it to explode.
Page 62 and 63: Dr. `Abdel Nasser Farran told Human
Page 64 and 65: Agriculture Perhaps the most danger
Page 66 and 67: exploded, and a young woman was pic
Page 68 and 69: from the war. 180 Tragedy struck wh
Page 70 and 71: injured in my legs. I still can’t
Page 72 and 73: in operation for many years, includ
Page 78 and 79: the grove of fruit trees. Though sh
Page 80 and 81: of the fighting. Although no one is
Page 82 and 83: oad to visit his cousin when his br
Page 86 and 87: place.” 237 Assessing the monetar
Page 88 and 89: especially because we needed to irr
Page 90 and 91: conflict interrupted existing clear
Page 92 and 93: An engine from a US-made M26 Multip
Page 94 and 95: duds around villages. 268 With the
Page 96 and 97: Various reasons exist as to why com
Page 98 and 99: Lack of Israeli Assistance Perhaps
Page 100 and 101: checkpoints. Similarly, UNIFIL has
Page 102 and 103: Israel’s Statements on the Use of
Page 104 and 105: This statement followed the finding
Page 106 and 107: investigations into Israel’s appa
Page 108 and 109: that would confirm that these weapo
Page 110 and 111: specific to the weapons. When conce
Page 112 and 113: disregard of that character, they g
Page 114 and 115: employed, the way that they were us
Page 116 and 117: are antipersonnel, area denial weap
Page 118 and 119: emain to take care of elderly or si
Page 120 and 121: early 2007 aimed at identifying the
Page 122 and 123: the United States, there is little
Page 124 and 125: Conclusion Israel’s use of cluste
Page 126 and 127: kidnapped IDF soldiers, and so aver
Page 128 and 129: Proportionality A further legal req
Page 130 and 131: In practice, this requires that the
Page 132 and 133: neutralization offers a definite mi
Page 134 and 135:
it is more brutal. If Hizbullah had
Page 136 and 137:
Another issue of humanitarian conce
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Acknowledgements This report was wr
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Flooding South Lebanon - Human Rights Watch

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