Ongoing cluster bomb deaths in Lebanon
September 20th, 2006
The Independent reports that every day, cluster bombs used indescrimitely by the Israelis on Lebanese border villages kill 4 and injure many more.
Some Israeli officers are protesting at the use of cluster bombs, each containing 644 small but lethal bomblets, against civilian targets in Lebanon. A commander in the MLRS (multiple launch rocket systems) unit told the Israeli daily Haaretz that the army had fired 1,800 cluster rockets, spraying 1.2 million bomblets over houses and fields. “In Lebanon, we covered entire villages with cluster bombs,” he said. “What we did there was crazy and monstrous.” What makes the cluster bombs so dangerous is that 30 per cent of the bomblets do not detonate on impact. They can lie for years – often difficult to see because of their small size, on roofs, in gardens, in trees, beside roads or in rubbish – waiting to explode when disturbed.