BEIRUT (AP) — An Israeli airstrike that killed three journalists and wounded others in Lebanon last month was most likely a deliberate attack on civilians and an apparent war crime, an international human rights group said Monday.
The Oct. 25 airstrike killed three journalists as they slept at a guesthouse in southeast Lebanon in one of the deadliest attacks on the media since the Israel-Hezbollah war began 13 months ago.
Eleven other journalists have been killed and eight wounded since then, Lebanon's Health Minister Firass Abiad said.
More than 3,500 people have been killed in Lebanon, and women and children accounted for more than 900 of the dead, according to the Health Ministry. More than 1 million people have been displaced since Israeli ground troops invaded while Hezbollah has been firing thousands of rockets, drones and missiles into Israel — and drawing fierce Israeli retaliatory strikes.
Human Rights Watch determined that Israeli forces carried out the Oct. 25 attack using an air-dropped bomb equipped with a U.S.-produced Joint Direct Attack Munition, or JDAM, guidance kit.
The group said the U.S. government should suspend weapons transfers to Israel because of the military’s repeated “unlawful attacks on civilians, for which U.S. officials may be complicit in war crimes.”
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the report.
The Biden administration said in May that Israel’s use of U.S.-provided weapons in the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza likely violated international humanitarian law but that wartime conditions prevented U.S. officials from determining that for certain in specific airstrikes.
The journalists killed in the airstrike in the southeastern town of Hasbaya were camera operator Ghassan Najjar and broadcast technician Mohammed Rida of the Beirut-based pan-Arab Al-Mayadeen TV, and camera operator Wissam Qassim, who worked for Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV.
Human Rights Watch said a munition struck the single-story building and detonated upon hitting the floor.
“Israel’s use of U.S. arms to unlawfully attack and kill journalists away from any military target is a terrible mark on the United States as well as Israel,” said Richard Weir, the senior crisis, conflict and arms researcher at Human Rights Watch.
Weir added that “the Israeli military’s previous deadly attacks on journalists without any consequences give little hope for accountability in this or future violations against the media.”
Human Rights Watch said that it found remnants at the site and reviewed photographs of pieces collected by the resort owner and determined that they were consistent with a JDAM guidance kit assembled and sold by the U.S. company Boeing.
The JDAM is affixed to air-dropped bombs and allows them to be guided to a target by using satellite coordinates, making the weapon accurate to within several meters, the group said.
In November 2023, two journalists for Al-Mayadeen TV were killed in a drone strike at their reporting spot. A month earlier, Israeli shelling in southern Lebanon killed Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and seriously wounded other journalists from France’s international news agency Agence France-Presse and Qatar’s Al-Jazeera TV on a hilltop not far from the Israeli border.
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FILE - A journalist observes the site where an Israeli airstrike hit a compound housing journalists, killing three media staffers from two different news agencies according to Lebanon's state-run National News Agency, in Hasbaya village, southeast Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari, File)
The Israeli ambassador to Washington says that a cease-fire deal to end fighting between Israel and the Lebanon-based Hezbollah could be reached “within days.”
Ambassador Mike Herzog told Israeli Army Radio on Monday that there remained “points to finalize” and that any deal required agreement from the government. But he said “we are close to a deal” and that “it can happen within days.”
Among the issues that remain is an Israeli demand to reserve the right to act should Hezbollah violate its obligations under the emerging deal. The deal seeks to push Hezbollah and Israeli troops out of southern Lebanon.
Israel accuses Hezbollah of not adhering to a U.N. resolution that ended the 2006 war between the sides that made similar provisions, and Israel has concerns that Hezbollah could stage a Hamas-style cross-border attack from southern Lebanon if it maintains a heavy presence there. Lebanon says Israel also violated the 2006 resolution. Lebanon complains about military jets and naval ships entering Lebanese territory even when there is no active conflict.
It is not clear whether Lebanon would agree to the demand.
The optimism surrounding a deal comes after a top U.S. envoy held talks between the sides last week in a bid to clinch a deal.
Hezbollah began attacking Israel on Oct. 8, 2023, a day after Hamas’ raid on southern Israel, setting off more than a year of fighting. That escalated into all-out war in September with massive Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon and later an Israeli ground incursion into the country’s south.
Hezbollah has fired thousands of rockets into Israeli cities and towns, including some 250 on Sunday.
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JERUSALEM — The Palestinian Health Ministry says Israeli forces killed two people, including a 13-year-old, in the occupied West Bank.
The Israeli military said the two had thrown explosives at forces overnight near the Palestinian town of Yabad and that the forces had responded by opening fire.
The Health Ministry identified the two as Mohammed Hamarsheh, 13, and Ahmad Zayd, 20. It did not disclose details about the circumstances behind their deaths.
It was the latest bloodshed in the West Bank, which has faced a surge of violence throughout the 13-month war in Gaza. The Health Ministry says nearly 800 people have been killed, with more than 160 of them 18 and younger.
Many have been killed in fighting with the Israeli military, but Palestinians throwing rocks and others not involved in confrontations have also been killed. There has also been an increase in Palestinian attacks against Israelis in the West Bank since the war in Gaza began.
JERUSALEM — The Israeli government has ordered all public entities to stop advertising in the Haaretz newspaper, which is known for its critical coverage of Israel’s actions in the Palestinian territories.
Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi said Sunday that the government had approved his proposal after Haaretz’ publisher called for sanctions against Israel and referred to Palestinian militants as “freedom fighters.”
“We advocate for a free press and freedom of expression, but also the freedom of the government to decide not to fund incitement against the State of Israel,” Karhi wrote on the social platform X.
Noa Landau, the deputy editor of Haaretz, accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of “working to silence independent and critical media,” comparing him to autocratic leaders in other countries.
Haaretz regularly publishes investigative journalism and opinion columns critical of Israel’s ongoing half-century occupation of lands the Palestinians want for a future state.
It has also been critical of Israel’s war conduct in Gaza at a time when most local media support the war and largely ignore the suffering of Palestinian civilians.
In a speech in London last month, Haaretz publisher Amos Schocken said Israel has imposed “a cruel apartheid regime” on the Palestinians and was battling “Palestinian freedom fighters that Israel calls ‘terrorists.’”
He later issued a statement, saying he had reconsidered his remarks.
“For the record, Hamas are not freedom fighters,” he posted on X. “I should have said: using terrorism is illegitimate. I was wrong not to say that.”
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Iran’s supreme leader has suggested that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be “sentenced to death” for his role in the ongoing wars in the Gaza Strip against Hamas and in Lebanon.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei made the remarks Monday during an event in which he spoke to members of the Basij, the all-volunteer arm of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard.
Khamenei referenced the International Criminal Court’s decision to issue an arrest warrant for Netanyahu and Israel’s former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
“What the Zionist regime did in Gaza and Lebanon is not a victory, it is a war crime. Now they have issued a warrant for their arrest. This is not enough!” Khamenei said, according to remarks published by the state-run IRNA news agency. “Netanyahu and the criminal leaders of this regime must be sentenced to death.”
The International Criminal Court at the Hague does not issue death sentences.
Khamenei also insisted those in Iran’s self-described “Axis of Resistance,” like the Palestinian militant group Hamas and Lebanon’s Hezbollah, would be stronger after the war.
“The idiots should not think that bombing houses and hospitals in Gaza and Lebanon is a victory,” he said. “The enemy has not become winner in Gaza and Lebanon, and it will not be winner.”
A man stands in front of a destroyed building after Sunday's Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Residents stand near to cars that were destroyed after Sunday's Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Smoke rises after an Israeli airstrike on Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Lebanese men stand outside their damaged shop, as one of them looks at the destroyed building that was hit Sunday evening in an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyieh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Smoke rises after an Israeli airstrike on Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Smoke rises after an Israeli airstrike on Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses lawmakers in the Knesset, Israel's parliament, in Jerusalem. Monday Nov. 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
A man comforts her daughter as they look at their destroyed building where they were living, which was hit Sunday night in an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A man throws debris from his damaged apartment which was resulted from Sunday's Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A woman looks through her damaged apartment which was resulted from Sunday's Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A man takes pictures by his mobile phone at his damaged apartment which was resulted from Sunday's Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Residents pass in front of destroyed building which was resulted from Sunday's Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A Civil Defense worker uses a skid loader to remove the rubble in front of a destroyed building that was hit Sunday night in an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A man checks his damaged apartment which was resulted from Sunday's Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Residents pass in front of a destroyed building that was hit Sunday night in an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A bulldozer removes the rubble in front of a destroyed building that was hit Sunday night in an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Bulldozers remove the rubble of a destroyed building that was hit Sunday night in an Israeli airstrike in Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
