31 July 2006
Blog Home : July 2006 : Permalink
“Today’s strike on Qana, killing at least 54 civilians, more than half of them children, suggests that the Israeli military is treating southern Lebanon as a free-fire zone,” said Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch. “The Israeli military seems to consider anyone left in the area a combatant who is fair game for attack.”
Kenneth Roth clearly does not understand what indiscrimminate bombing and free fire zones look like. If the IDF were actually operating a free fire policy then I imagine the casualties in S Lebanon would be 10-100 times the current ones. The fact of the matter is that even "discriminate" fire is not 100% reliable 100% of the time and this is especially true when the enemy seems determined to fire his weapons from the middle of populated areas.Human Rights Watch has also documented Hezbollah’s deliberate and indiscriminate firing of Katyusha rockets into civilian areas in Israel, resulting in 18 civilian deaths to date. These serious violations of international humanitarian law are also war crimes.
