There were many casualties in the 2006 Lebanon War , leading to condemnation of both sides, however the exact distribution of casualties has been disputed. The Lebanese Higher Relief Council (HRC), [1] UNICEF, [1] and various press agencies and news organizations have stated that most of those killed were Lebanese civilians, [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] however the Lebanese government does not differentiate between civilians and combatants in death toll figures. The Israeli government identified 43 Israeli civilians killed by Hezbollah rocket attacks, including four who died of heart attacks during rocket attacks. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) death toll ranges from 118 to 121, depending on the source and whether or not casualties that occurred after the ceasefire are included. The figures for the Hezbollah fighters killed are the most varying, with Hezbollah claiming 250 of its fighters killed, while Israel claimed to have identified 530 dead Hezbollah fighters. The IDF estimates 600–700 dead Hezbollah fighters. Sources can be conflicting.
Entity | Civilian | Military |
---|---|---|
Amal Movement | 20 dead [7] | |
Hezbollah | Deaths: ≈250 fighters KIA reported by Hezbollah, [8] ≤500 estimated by Lebanese Government, Military, and Intelligence officials, [9] ≈500 estimated by UN [10] ≈600 estimated by IDF, [11] 450 bodies identified by Israel and up to 700 estimated by Amidror [12] | |
Israel | 45 dead [13] [14] 35 seriously wounded [15] 70 moderately wounded [15] 1,390 lightly wounded [15] 2,775 treated for shock and anxiety [15] [16] | 120 IDF soldiers were killed in the war, including the two soldiers whose bodies were seized in the Zar'it-Shtula incident that started the war, whose fates weren't confirmed until their bodies were exchanged for Lebanese prisoners in 2008. [15] [17] 1,244 IDF soldiers wounded [18] |
Lebanon | Not known for certain. 1,200 Lebanese dead in total (including combatants and foreign civilians in Lebanon) [19] [20] 4,410 injured [19] [20] | 50 dead ~100 wounded |
LCP | 15 dead [21] | |
PFLP-GC | 2 dead [22] | |
United Nations | 1 dead | 5 dead 125 wounded. See main article |
Total | 1,233+ dead, including militants 5,089+ wounded | 438-888+ dead 512+ wounded |
A report [51] on August 4, documenting Iran's financial help to the families of Hezbollah fighters, claimed Hezbollah had already lost 500 men, plus 1,500 wounded. The report said that the wounded were being treated in Syria to make the wounded harder to count.
Soldiers | Civilians | Rockets fired | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Killed | Wounded | Captured | Killed | Wounded | on Israel | ||
12 July | 8 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 22 | ||
13 July | 2 | 2 | 67 | 125 | |||
14 July | 4 | 2 | 2 | 19 | 103 | ||
15 July | 4 | 16 | 100 | ||||
16 July | 17 | 8 | 77 | 47 | |||
17 July | 28 | 92 | |||||
18 July | 1 | 1 | 21 | 136 | |||
19 July | 2 | 15 | 2 | 18 | 116 | ||
20 July | 5 | 8 | 16 | 34 | |||
21 July | 1 | 3 | 52 | 97 | |||
22 July | 7 | 35 | 129 | ||||
23 July | 2 | 45 | 94 | ||||
24 July | 4 | 27 | 17 | 111 | |||
25 July | 10 | 2 | 60 | 101 | |||
26 July | 8 | 31 | 1 | 32 | 169 | ||
27 July | 6 | 38 | 109 | ||||
28 July | 10 | 19 | 111 | ||||
29 July | 7 | 10 | 86 | ||||
30 July | 8 | 81 | 156 | ||||
31 July | 12 | 25 | 6 | ||||
1 August | 3 | 12 | 4 | ||||
2 August | 1 | 41 | 1 | 88 | 230 | ||
3 August | 4 | 22 | 8 | 76 | 213 | ||
4 August | 3 | 25 | 3 | 97 | 194 | ||
5 August | 2 | 70 | 4 | 59 | 170 | ||
6 August | 12 | 35 | 4 | 150 | 189 | ||
7 August | 3 | 35 | 12 | 185 | |||
8 August | 6 | 74 | 10 | 136 | |||
9 August | 15 | 186 | 36 | 166 | |||
10 August | 2 | 123 | 2 | 21 | 155 | ||
11 August | 1 | 76 | 26 | 123 | |||
12 August | 24 | 131 | 24 | 64 | |||
13 August | 9 | 203 | 1 | 105 | 217 | ||
14 August | 37 | 2 | |||||
15 August | 2 | ||||||
Total | 119 | 1244 | 2 | 43 | 1384 | 3990 |
UN personnel were subjected to dozens of attacks and near misses from both sides during the present conflict, most prominently the 25 July Israeli bombing of a UNTSO position, [56] which killed four UNTSO unarmed observers (Austrian, Canadian, Chinese and Finnish). [57] Diplomats familiar with the probe say that the strike was carried out with a precision-guided missile. [56]
Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a statement from Rome that he was "shocked and deeply distressed by the apparently deliberate targeting by Israeli Defence Forces." [58] On 26 July 2006, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert phoned Kofi Annan and expressed his deep regret over the death of the four UN observers. He promised that Israel would thoroughly investigate the incident and would share the findings with Annan, but says he was taken aback by secretary general's statement saying that the Israeli attack on the UN post was "apparently deliberate". [59]
After the attack, Dan Gillerman, Israel's UN representative, said Israel would not allow the UN itself to participate in an investigation of the airstrike that killed the four UN observers. [60]
Just before the end of bombing, on 14 August, the IDF targeted what it said was a Palestinian faction in the Ein el-Hilweh refugee camp in Saida. Two missiles were fired into a civilian residential area and killed UNRWA/UN staff member Abdel Saghir. [61] Few days before two civilians were killed.
Operation Grapes of Wrath, known in Lebanon as the April Aggression, was a seventeen-day campaign of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) against Hezbollah in 1996 which attempted to end the Iran-backed group's rocket attacks on northern Israeli civilian centres by forcing the group north of the Litani River, out of easy range of these civilian centres. Prior to the operation, Hezbollah had launched 151 rockets from Lebanon into Israel, killing two Israeli civilians and seriously wounding 24 other Israeli civilians.
On July 25, 1993, Israeli forces launched a week-long attack against Lebanon named Operation Accountability in Israel and the Seven-Day War in Lebanon. Israel specified three purposes to the operation, to strike directly at Hezbollah, to make it difficult for Hezbollah to use southern Lebanon as a base for striking Israel, and to displace Lebanese and Palestinian civilians in the hopes of pressuring the Lebanese government to intervene against Hezbollah. The affected civilian population included both Lebanese and Palestinian people.
This is a timeline of events related to the 2006 Lebanon War.
Military operations of the 2006 Lebanon War refer to armed engagements initiated by Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah during the 2006 conflict.
The South Lebanon conflict was an armed conflict that took place in Israeli-occupied southern Lebanon from 1982 or 1985 until Israel's withdrawal in 2000. Hezbollah, along with other Shia Muslim and left-wing guerrillas, fought against Israel and its ally, the Catholic Christian-dominated South Lebanon Army (SLA). The SLA was supported militarily and logistically by the Israel Defense Forces and operated under the jurisdiction of the Israeli-backed South Lebanon provisional administration, which succeeded the earlier Israeli-backed Free Lebanon State. Israel officially names the conflict the Security Zone in Lebanon Campaign and deems it to have begun on 30 September 1982, after the end of its "Operation Peace for Galilee". It can also be seen as an extension of the Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990).
The Battle of Bint Jbeil was one of the main battles of the 2006 Lebanon War. Bint Jbeil is a major town of some 20,000 inhabitants in Southern Lebanon. Although Brig.-Gen. Gal Hirsch announced on 25 July that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had "complete control" of Bint Jbeil, this statement was later discredited. In spite of three sustained attempts by the IDF to conquer the town, it remained in the hands of Hezbollah until the end of the war. The town was the scene of some of the fiercest fighting of the war, with both sides taking heavy losses. Three senior Israeli officers, including Major Roi Klein, were killed in the battle. Hezbollah similarly lost several commanders, most notably Khalid Bazzi, commander of the Bint Jbeil area.
During the 2006 July War, a number of international incidents occurred in Lebanon, largely involving United Nations personnel who have come under a number of attacks by Israeli forces.
The 2006 Qana airstrike was an airstrike carried out by the Israeli Air Force (IAF) on a three-story building in the small community of al-Khuraybah near the South Lebanese village of Qana on July 30, 2006, during the 2006 Lebanon War. The strike killed 28 civilians, 16 of whom were children. Israel halted airstrikes for 48 hours following the attack, amid increasing calls for a ceasefire in the conflict between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah guerrillas.
During the 2006 Lebanon War, Operation Sharp and Smooth, also known as the Baalbek operation, was an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) raid on a hospital in the city of Baalbek, which was being used as a Hezbollah headquarters, and a neighbourhood of the city. The precise objectives of the raid remain classified, but it is known that a number of Lebanese, including Hezbollah and armed Lebanese Communist Party members, were killed, and five Lebanese civilians were arrested and detained in Israel as suspected Hezbollah members, but released after three weeks. The casualty figures for the raid vary. According to inquiries by Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Lebanese authorities 16 Lebanese residents, most of them civilians, were killed. According to IDF ten Hezbollah militants were killed in the attack.
The 2006 Lebanon War, also called the 2006 Israel–Hezbollah War and known in Lebanon as the July War and in Israel as the Second Lebanon War, was a 34-day armed conflict in Lebanon, northern Israel and the Golan Heights. The principal parties were Hezbollah paramilitary forces and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). The conflict started on 12 July 2006, and continued until a United Nations-brokered ceasefire went into effect in the morning on 14 August 2006, though it formally ended on 8 September 2006 when Israel lifted its naval blockade of Lebanon. Due to unprecedented Iranian military support to Hezbollah before and during the war, some consider it the first round of the Iran–Israel proxy conflict, rather than a continuation of the Arab–Israeli conflict.
The Battle of Ayta ash-Sha'b took place during the 2006 Lebanon War, when the Israel Defense Forces and the Islamic Resistance, the armed wing of Hezbollah, fought over the town of Ayta ash-Sha'b in southern Lebanon. Fighting in the general area took place throughout the war, starting with the 2006 Hezbollah cross-border raid. The town was subjected to two and a half weeks of intense bombardment by air and artillery, and fighting also took place in nearby towns. The battle for the Ayta ash-Shab itself lasted about two weeks, from late July to mid-August. The IDF deployed five brigades. The Hizbullah force in the town was estimated to consist of from little more than half a company. Still the IDF failed to capture the town and suffered relatively heavy casualties in the process.
The Operation Change of Direction 11 was the final offensive operation by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during the 2006 Lebanon War that began on August 11, 2006, and ended three days later when the ceasefire came into effect. It involved a tripling of Israeli forces inside Lebanon and aimed at encircling Hizbullah forces in south Lebanon. The plan was to advance westwards along the Litani River from the Galilee Panhandle, combined with helicopter landings behind enemy lines, intended to be the largest in IDF history, and simultaneous advances northwards in the central sector and along the Mediterranean coast. The plan was to follow up the offensive by several weeks of mopping-up operations in the surrounded territories, eliminating Hizbullah infrastructure, especially in the launching areas of Katyusha rockets.
A number of incidents of attack on civilian and UN convoys have been reported. The Israel Defense Forces has disputed involvement in some cases, and has also alleged that no prior coordination took place before some affected convoys set out. These allegations have in turn been disputed. There have also been reports that fear of aerial attack has prevented drivers from transporting humanitarian aid within Lebanon. One estimate two weeks into the conflict placed the number of Lebanese truck drivers who had died as a result of IDF/IAF air strikes on convoys as "dozens".
This is a timeline of the 2006 Lebanon War during the month of July.
This is a timeline of the 2006 Lebanon War during early August.
The 2000–2006 Shebaa Farms conflict was a low-level border conflict between Israel and Hezbollah for control of Shebaa Farms, a disputed territory located on the Golan Heights–Lebanon border. Fighting between the two sides primarily consisted of Hezbollah rocket and mortar attacks on Israel and Israeli artillery barrages and airstrikes on Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. Clashes began a few months after the 2000 Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon, which Hezbollah viewed as incomplete due to the presence of the Israel Defense Forces in Shebaa Farms. The conflict culminated in the 2006 Lebanon War; Israel retains control over the territory.
During the 2006 Lebanon War, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and United Nations officials accused both Hezbollah and Israel of violating international humanitarian law. These have included allegations of intentional attacks on civilian populations or infrastructure, disproportionate or indiscriminate attacks, the use of human shields, and the use of prohibited weapons.
The 2005 Hezbollah cross-border raid was a failed attempt by Hezbollah to abduct Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers. It was the largest operation of this type mounted prior to the 2006 Lebanon War.
Hezbollah Nature Reserves were a system of Hezbollah strongholds built in southern Lebanon between the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon 2000 and the 2006 Lebanon war. The term "Nature Reserve" was originally IDF slang and refer to the fact that they were primarily placed in the countryside away from habitation and were declared off-limits to the IDF during the war, due to fear of high casualties.
Israeli Special Forces Operations in 2006 were part of the Second Lebanon War. Several commando units of the Israel Defence Forces launched dozens of operations against Hizbullah targets in Lebanon. Most of these were never publicized and many may have consisted of intelligence-gathering probes into Lebanese territory.
The LCP...has itself been very close to Hezbollah and fought alongside it in the frontlines in the south. According to Hadadeh, at least 12 LCP members and supporters died in the fighting.
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: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)Among the dead were eight Canadians, with another six critically injured, largely from an air attack on the border town of Aitaroun, where they were vacationing, the Canadian government reported