UN Warns Israeli Attacks On Lebanon May Violate International Humanitarian Law

The United Nations human rights office (OHCHR) warned that recent deadly Israeli attacks on Lebanon and Hezbollah rocket fire into Israel may amount to serious violations of international humanitarian law.

“Recent deadly Israeli attacks on Lebanon and Hezbollah rocket fire into Israel may amount to serious violations of international humanitarian law, the United Nations human rights office (OHCHR) says”

Al Jazeera

The OHCHR findings come from a UN report released on Friday, covering the first three weeks of the latest escalation between Israel and Hezbollah that began on March 2.

Al Jazeera

The UN report says Hezbollah fighters launched rockets at Israel in response to the US-Israeli attacks on Iran, prompting a large-scale military offensive from Israel.

OHCHR spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan said the report documented cases in which Israeli strikes hit, and in some instances destroyed, multi-storey residential buildings in Lebanon, killing entire families, which “may constitute serious violations of international humanitarian law.”

The report cited an example of an Israeli strike on March 8 that hit a multi-storey residential building in the town of Sir el‑Gharbiyeh, in the Nabatieh governorate, killing at least 13 civilians inside the building, including five women, five men, two boys and a girl.

The UN also identified incidents where Israeli forces gave ineffective warnings, or no warnings at all, that strikes were going to take place in Lebanon.

In parallel, the UN found that Hezbollah fired unguided rockets that lacked the precision needed to hit desired military targets, instead damaging buildings and other civilian infrastructure in Israel, which the UN said likely violated international humanitarian law.

The UN report described an escalation that began on March 2, with Hezbollah rocket fire into Israel and a subsequent large-scale military offensive from Israel.

Al Jazeera reported that more than 2,400 people have been killed in Lebanon since Israel launched its bombardment and subsequent invasion of southern Lebanon, and that Israel seized a belt of territory at the border where its troops remain.

International Centre of Justice for Palestinians

The same report said there is currently a fragile ceasefire in place, with US President Donald Trump announcing on Thursday that the truce would be extended for another three weeks.

Al Jazeera also described how the OHCHR report focused on attacks targeting populated areas and residential buildings in Lebanon and Israel, including cases where strikes destroyed multi-storey residential buildings and killed entire families.

It also said the OHCHR identified incidents where Israeli forces gave ineffective warnings, or no warnings at all, that strikes were going to take place in Lebanon.

In addition to the UN’s legal framing, the Al Jazeera report included a specific casualty and displacement snapshot from Lebanon: “in Lebanon, since the Israeli war began on March 2, more than 2,483 killed and 7,707 injured, in addition to more than one million displaced, according to the latest official figures.”

The same Al Jazeera report also referenced the scale of the Gaza war, stating that “The Israeli offensive on Gaza has left more than 72,000 dead and more than 172,000 wounded Palestinians, most of them women and children, according to the Health Ministry in the territory.”

The OHCHR report also addressed attacks on journalists, saying such attacks could amount to war crimes if they were deliberate.

“ByPalestine Chronicle Staff The UK Foreign Office has closed the unit responsible for tracking potential breaches of international law by Israel in Gaza and, more recently, Lebanon, the Guardian reported on Friday”

Palestine Chronicle

Al Jazeera reported that an Israeli air strike on Wednesday killed journalist Amal Khalil and wounded her colleague Zeinab Faraj in the village of at-Tiri in southern Lebanon.

The report said Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam accused Israel of crimes against humanity in response to the killing.

It further described that rescue workers initially tried to reach the veteran Al Akhbar journalist, but came under Israeli fire and were forced to withdraw, according to Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health.

Al Jazeera said Khalil was the ninth journalist killed in Lebanon this year.

These statements were paired with the OHCHR’s broader legal concerns about attacks on populated areas and residential buildings, including the March 8 strike in Sir el‑Gharbiyeh.

The UN’s framing of journalist attacks as potentially war crimes if deliberate added a second legal dimension to the escalation narrative described in the report.

While the UN report focused on alleged violations in Lebanon and Israel, other reporting described a parallel shift in how evidence of international law breaches is tracked by the UK government.

The Guardian reported that the Foreign Office unit tracking potential breaches of international law by Israel in Gaza and more recently Lebanon has been closed because of cuts within the department.

Al-Jazeera Net

The Guardian said the decision to shut the international humanitarian law cell followed a review by Olly Robbins, the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office dismissed last week by the prime minister over the Peter Mandelson scandal.

The Guardian also reported that the decision means funding for the Conflict and Security Monitoring Project run by the Centre for information Resilience (CIR) will end.

The Guardian described the CIR as doing “the world’s largest open-source monitoring of incidents across Israel, Palestine and Lebanon,” and said it is the only programme in the UK that collects, verifies and analyses human rights and conflict incidents in Israel and the occupied territories.

The Guardian warned that officials were warned the closure would mean the Foreign Office will lose access to a database of 26,000 verified incidents in the Middle East, with information stretching back to 7 October 2023.

In a separate report, Al Jazeera’s Arabic-language outlet said the closure came after a review by Oliver Robbins and that it also meant a halt to funding for the Conflict and Security Monitoring project run by the Center for Information Resilience (CIR).

Rights advocates and campaigners criticized the UK decision as undermining accountability and evidence collection, with multiple outlets quoting named figures.

“The British government has closed a unit within the Foreign Office dedicated to monitoring potential Israeli violations of international law in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon, amid budget cuts within the ministry, according to The Guardian”

Al-Jazeera Net

The Guardian quoted Yasmine Ahmed, the UK director of Human Rights Watch, saying it was damning that the government was choosing to cut the unit at a time when there were “continued significant violations of international law and atrocity crimes being committed across the world.”

Al Jazeera

The Guardian also quoted Katie Fallon of Campaign Against Arms Trade saying closing the IHL cell would protect ministers and senior Foreign Office officials “who know that they have been manipulating the data on potential violations of IHL, beyond any logical interpretation, to obscure unimaginable violations and crimes committed against the most vulnerable people in conflict and sustain arms sales at any cost.”

In the Palestine Chronicle report, Yasmine Ahmed was also quoted as saying it was damning that the government was cutting the unit while there were “continued significant violations of international law and atrocity crimes being committed across the world,” and Katie Fallon was quoted with the same line about manipulating data.

The International Centre of Justice for Palestinians described the closure as “a “farce” and deeply misguided,” and said it would end funding for the Conflict and Security Monitoring Project run by the Centre for Information Resilience (CIR).

ICJP said the centre supported the Foreign Office with “the world’s largest open-source monitoring of incidents across Israel, Palestine and Lebanon” and that it was the UK Government’s only programme dedicated to collecting, verifying and analysing human rights and conflict incidents in Israel and the occupied territories.

ICJP’s Head of Public Affairs Jonathan Purcell said: “It was already a farce that the government wouldn’t release the legal advice they received to make a decision on banning arms exports to Israel – but now they are scrapping the evidence as well? How can the general public have any faith that our government is avoiding complicity in war crimes when it is scrapping the unit that monitors them?”