Israeli air strikes caused most civilian deaths in Lebanon war: report

Israel has been thrown on the defensive after a new Human Rights Watch report charged that "indiscriminate air strikes" by Israeli forces caused most of the estimated 900 civilian deaths in Lebanon during last year's conflict with Hezbollah.

Drawing on findings of a five-month-long HRW study, the New York- and Washington-based monitoring group said a "simple movement of vehicles or persons -- such as attempting to buy bread or moving about private homes -- could be enough to cause a deadly Israeli air strike."

The group's 249-page report, entitled Why They Died: Civilian Casualties in Lebanon during the 2006 War, adds that at least 300 of the 510 civilians whose deaths were investigated were women and children.

"Israel wrongfully acted as if all civilians had heeded its warnings to evacuate southern Lebanon when it knew they had not," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of HRW. "Issuing warnings does not make indiscriminate attacks lawful."

"Israel, on the other hand, held itself bound to apply the principles of humanitarian law, even while facing an opponent who deliberately flouted them."

HRW disputes that Hezbollah systematically used civilians as human shields "as claimed by Israeli officials,"

Canada's Maj. Paeta Hess-von Kruedener was one of four UN observers murdered when an Israeli precision-guided missile hit their base at Khiyam on July 25, 2006.

HRW says its investigations show Israel defence forces deliberately targeted more than just the militant wing of Hezbollah, charging strikes on the group's non-military institutions in southern Lebanon would violate international humanitarian law.

One interesting note:

"To accept Israel's argument that any part of Hezbollah can be targeted because it aids the military effort would be to accept that all Israeli institutions that aid the IDF (Israel Defence Forces) can be targeted,"