HRW Urges No Cluster Bombs to Israel

"Harm to civilians is inevitable if Israel uses M 26rockets in Lebanon," HRW executive director, Kenneth Roth, in a statement posted on the group's website on Friday, August 11 .

Israel has asked the Bush administration to speed the delivery of short-range anti-personnel rockets armed with cluster munitions to strike what it said Hizbullah posts in Lebanon, The New York Times reported on Friday.

The M- 26artillery rockets are fired in barrages and carry hundreds of grenade-like bomblets that scatter and explode over a broad area.

"These weapons killed or wounded hundreds of civilians in Iraq in2003 ," Roth said.

"Washington has a duty not to assist in replicating that death toll in southern Lebanon."

Hundreds of Iraqi civilians had been killed when the United States used M- 26rockets in widely populated areas in Iraq in2003 .

The United States approved a license with a value of $615, 496for the commercial sale of1 , 300M 26rockets to Israel in Fiscal Year2005 , according to State Department records.

The Israeli request for a swift delivery of the cluster munitions is being weighed by the US State Department, the NYTimes said.

The United States maintained a moratorium on selling cluster munitions to Israeli in the1980 s following the killing of hundreds of Lebanese civilians with the weapons during the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

But the moratorium was lifted late in the Reagan administration. Since then, the United States has sold Israel some types of cluster munitions, a senior administration official told the Times.

Washington drew rebuke across the Arab and Muslim world for shipping arms and leaser-guided bombs to Israel to be used during the Lebanon war, which started on July12 .

Unreliable

The New York-based group refuted the Israeli claims that the cluster munitions would not be used in populated areas.

"The M 26rocket epitomizes a retreat from precision targeting," said Roth.

"It kills civilians across wide areas and leaves volatile sub-munitions scattered across the countryside that can kill civilians for years to come. This deadly weapon should never be used anywhere near civilians."

"Israel’s persistent failure to recognize the reality that many civilians remain in southern Lebanon makes its promise not to use cluster munitions in civilian areas unreliable," Roth added.

Human Rights Watch on August 3 accused Israel of committing war crimes and deliberately targeting civilians in its ongoing blitz in Lebanon.

Up to1 , 060Lebanese people, third of whom are children, have been killed since Israel launched a wide-scale blitz in Lebanon on the pretext of seeking the release of two soldiers captured by Hizbullah.

The hard-won infrastructure of the Arab country has been left in ruins, with Israel knocking out Beirut international airport, bombing ports, destroying bridges, setting power stations ablaze and reducing houses to rubble.

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