Death toll surpasses 1,000 in Lebanon as Israeli bombardment continues 

More than 1,000 people have been killed in intensified Israeli attacks across Lebanon this month, according to local authorities, as the United Nations and other rights groups say Israel’s bombardment of the country may amount to war crimes.

The Lebanese Ministry of Health said on Thursday that Israeli attacks have killed 1,001 people in Lebanon since March 2, including 79 women, 118 children and 40 healthcare workers. More than 2,584 people have been wounded.

Israeli attacks on Lebanon intensified in early March after Lebanese armed group Hezbollah launched rockets into northern Israel in response to the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on February 28, the first day of the US-Israeli war on Iran.

The Israeli bombardment has forced more than one million people out of their homes across the country’s south and several parts of the capital, Beirut.

Israel’s military has bombed residential buildings and other infrastructure, and launched a widening ground operation in southern Lebanon, in a campaign that it says is targeting Hezbollah.

The Lebanese armed group has responded by firing barrages of rockets into northern Israel and engaging Israeli forces on the ground in the south.

Earlier this week, a spokesperson for UN human rights chief Volker Turk said some of the Israeli attacks may amount to war crimes.

“International humanitarian law demands distinction between military targets and civilians and civilian objects and insists on feasible precautions being taken to protect civilians. Deliberately attacking civilians or civilian objects amounts to a war crime,” the spokesperson said.

That message was echoed on Thursday by Amnesty International, which urged Israel to halt its attacks on Lebanese healthcare workers and facilities.

“Healthcare workers are risking their lives to save others, and hospitals, other medical facilities and ambulances are specifically protected under international humanitarian law,” said Kristine Beckerle, the rights group’s deputy regional director for the Middle East and North Africa.

Beckerle also noted that Israel’s claim, without evidence, that Hezbollah has been using ambulances for military purposes “does not justify treating hospitals, medical facilities or medical transport as battlefields or treating doctors and paramedics as targets”.

“Deliberately striking medics performing their humanitarian functions is a serious violation of international humanitarian law and could constitute a war crime,” she said in a statement.