03-04-2007, 02:46 AM
I want a place to record links regarding DU use in Lebanon, so that is what this thread is for. To lead off, here is a piece published on Hallowe'en 2006 by Robert Fisk in the Gulf Times of Qatar.
Quote:
Was the latest Lebanon war a weapons testing ground?
By Robert Fisk
BEIRUT: Did Israel use a secret new uranium-based weapon in southern Lebanon this summer in the 34-day assault that cost more than 1,300 Lebanese lives, most of them civilians?
We know that the Israelis used American ‘bunker-buster’ bombs on Hezbollah’s Beirut headquarters.
We know that they drenched southern Lebanon with cluster bombs in the last 72 hours of the war, leaving tens of thousands of bomblets which are still killing Lebanese civilians every week.
And we now know – after it first categorically denied using such munitions – that the Israeli army also used phosphorous bombs, weapons which are supposed to be restricted under the third protocol of the Geneva Convention which neither Israel nor the United States have signed.
But scientific evidence gathered from at least two bomb craters in Khiam and At-Tiri, the scene of fierce fighting between Hezbollah guerrillas and Israeli troops last July and August, suggests that uranium-based munitions may now also be included in Israel’s weapons inventory – and were used against targets in Lebanon.
According to Dr Chris Busby, the British scientific secretary of the European Committee on Radiation Risk, two soil samples thrown up by Israeli heavy or guided bombs showed "elevated radiation signatures". Both have been forwarded for further examination to the Harwell laboratory in Oxfordshire for mass spectrometry – used by the ministry of defence in Britain – which has confirmed the concentration of uranium isotopes in the samples.
Dr Busby’s initial report states that there are two possible reasons for the contamination.
"The first is that the weapon was some novel small experimental nuclear fission devise or other experimental weapon (eg thermobaric weapon) based on the high temperature of a uranium oxidation flash...The second is that the weapon was a bunker-busting conventional uranium penetrator weapon employing enriched uranium rather than depleted uranium."
STORY CONTINUES HERE...
By Robert Fisk
BEIRUT: Did Israel use a secret new uranium-based weapon in southern Lebanon this summer in the 34-day assault that cost more than 1,300 Lebanese lives, most of them civilians?
We know that the Israelis used American ‘bunker-buster’ bombs on Hezbollah’s Beirut headquarters.
We know that they drenched southern Lebanon with cluster bombs in the last 72 hours of the war, leaving tens of thousands of bomblets which are still killing Lebanese civilians every week.
And we now know – after it first categorically denied using such munitions – that the Israeli army also used phosphorous bombs, weapons which are supposed to be restricted under the third protocol of the Geneva Convention which neither Israel nor the United States have signed.
But scientific evidence gathered from at least two bomb craters in Khiam and At-Tiri, the scene of fierce fighting between Hezbollah guerrillas and Israeli troops last July and August, suggests that uranium-based munitions may now also be included in Israel’s weapons inventory – and were used against targets in Lebanon.
According to Dr Chris Busby, the British scientific secretary of the European Committee on Radiation Risk, two soil samples thrown up by Israeli heavy or guided bombs showed "elevated radiation signatures". Both have been forwarded for further examination to the Harwell laboratory in Oxfordshire for mass spectrometry – used by the ministry of defence in Britain – which has confirmed the concentration of uranium isotopes in the samples.
Dr Busby’s initial report states that there are two possible reasons for the contamination.
"The first is that the weapon was some novel small experimental nuclear fission devise or other experimental weapon (eg thermobaric weapon) based on the high temperature of a uranium oxidation flash...The second is that the weapon was a bunker-busting conventional uranium penetrator weapon employing enriched uranium rather than depleted uranium."
STORY CONTINUES HERE...
Maybe DU is just too safe, so they had to find something more deadly to use.
Another quick quote:
Quote:
Israel has a poor reputation for telling the truth about its use of weapons in Lebanon.
In 1982, it denied using phosphorous munitions on civilian areas – until journalists discovered dying and dead civilians whose wounds caught fire when exposed to air.
I myself saw two dead babies who, when taken from a mortuary drawer in West Beirut during the Israeli siege of the city, suddenly burst back into flames.
In 1982, it denied using phosphorous munitions on civilian areas – until journalists discovered dying and dead civilians whose wounds caught fire when exposed to air.
I myself saw two dead babies who, when taken from a mortuary drawer in West Beirut during the Israeli siege of the city, suddenly burst back into flames.