On April 8, less than one day after the Trump administration agreed to a two-week ceasefire deal with Iran, Israel struck Lebanon in its heaviest and deadliest attack on the country since the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran began. At least 250 deaths have been reported. Israeli and U.S. authorities are insisting that the ceasefire proposal did not include Lebanon, where Israel says it is targeting Hezbollah. Iran and Pakistan, which brokered the deal, say the agreed-upon pause in hostilities applied to both countries. Since Israel’s genocide of Gaza, “the silence of states and the continued flow of weapons has only emboldened Israel,” says Beirut-based Human Rights Watch researcher Ramzi Kaiss. “The response from the international community has been limited by words of condemnation, but no effective action has been taken yet in order to stop these atrocities from happening.”
Transcript
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AMY GOODMAN: Lebanon has declared a day of mourning after Israeli attacks on Wednesday killed over 250 people and injured 1,000 others. At one point, Israel launched a hundred strikes in just 10 minutes. Lebanon’s President Joseph Aoun condemned the attacks as “barbaric” and accused Israel of carrying out a new massacre.
The strikes came as the Israeli government and the Trump administration claim the Iran ceasefire does not extend to Lebanon, but top diplomats have disagreed. When the ceasefire was first announced, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said, quote, “Iran and the United States of America, along with their allies, have agreed to an immediate ceasefire everywhere, including Lebanon and elsewhere, effective immediately,” unquote.
The Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot was in Beirut on Wednesday. He said Israeli missiles struck just a few hundred meters from where he was at the Belgian Embassy. He wrote, quote, “Just before I was commending President Aoun for offering to open official negotiations with Israel towards a ceasefire, Israel launched, with no previous warning, one of the most massive strikes since the beginning of the hostilities … This must stop. The ceasefire between the US, Israel and Iran must include Lebanon!” the Belgian foreign minister wrote.
Iran’s deputy foreign minister told the BBC that the Israeli attacks on Lebanon were a “grave violation” of the U.S.-Iran ceasefire.
Residents of Beirut expressed shock at the Israeli assault.
BEIRUT RESIDENT: [translated] There’s something unbelievable, destruction, very massive destruction. I mean, even someone who isn’t afraid would become afraid. I feel fear and anxiety. Where is this country headed? What are we going to do with our lives? Where are we staying? Where are we going? No one knows what’s going to happen. We have children, livelihoods, property. People want to live. Enough. We’ve had enough of war.
AMY GOODMAN: The Israeli strikes on central Beirut hit Shia Muslim and Christian communities not affiliated with Hezbollah.
Meanwhile, southern Lebanon has been effectively cut off from the rest of the country after Israel bombed seven key bridges. Lebanese officials closed the last remaining bridge in the area after Israel threatened to destroy that one, as well. On Wednesday, an Israeli military spokesperson said the area south of the Litani River was disconnected from Lebanon. Israel has threatened to keep occupying large areas of southern Lebanon, where more than 1 million people have been displaced.
We go now to Beirut, where we’re joined by Ramzi Kaiss, Lebanon researcher at Human Rights Watch.
We thank you so much for being with us. Can you talk about what’s happened in just the last 24 hours, the areas hit, the massive damage, the number of lives lost, Ramzi?
RAMZI KAISS: Thanks, Amy, and thank you for having me.
So, yesterday morning, many people across the country woke up to the news shared in the early morning by Pakistan’s prime minister that Lebanon was indeed part of the ceasefire agreement. This was a sigh of relief to millions across the country, and particularly to the hundreds of thousands, over 1 million, people that had been displaced since March. And in the early-morning hours, we began to see videos and photos circulating on social media and WhatsApp groups showing displaced people packing up their cars and heading back south of the Litani to their homes.
But then, shortly afterwards, at 6 a.m., Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, issued a statement indicating that Lebanon was not part of that agreement. And soon people in the country discovered that by fire. There had been strikes in the early-morning hours on the southern Lebanese city of Saida that killed eight people. There were reports of strikes on medical vehicles in southern Lebanon. And strikes continued throughout the day.
A few hours after Netanyahu’s statement, Israel’s Arabic military spokesperson issued what is now, you know, a typical, overbroad displacement order, ordering all residents south of the Zahrani River—this is an area that’s approximately 15 percent of Lebanon’s territory—to evacuate north of that river.
And then, shortly after 2 p.m., we began hearing loud, very loud, Israeli fighter jets roaring in the skies and strikes happening across the country. I was in Beirut at the time, and we didn’t know where those strikes were taking place. They came without any warning in advance of the strikes, and they took place in densely populated neighborhoods in the middle of the day. Strikes brought down entire buildings that were packed with people. They happened while people were in the streets going around their business. I was driving across the city and could see smoke rising from various places across Beirut and see ambulances streaming into hospitals. Chaos ensued across Beirut.
And as you noted, the Lebanon Ministry of Health has announced that there’s been over 203 people killed thus far—this is not a final toll—and over a thousand people injured. The Lebanese Civil Defense has published a higher number: 254 killed. And until now, people are still being dug from the rubble. Photos are circulating on WhatsApp groups of people that are missing, still under the rubble in the city. Yesterday, with 203 people killed, was the deadliest day in the hostilities since March 2. More than 10 percent of everyone that has been killed in Lebanon in Israeli attacks since March 2 was killed in the last 24 hours. Israeli strikes also—Israel, by its own admission, also said that it was striking areas populated with civilians, but those strikes have not happened with any warning.
They also conducted strikes on bridges, significantly damaging the Qasmiyeh Bridge, which is the main crossing point into the area south of the Litani River. This comes on the back of repeated strikes on bridges across — bridges across the Litani, which threaten to sever the area south of the Litani from the rest of the country. Photos and videos circulating today show that the bombing of the Qasmiyeh Bridge had targeted the crossing right next to it, with the crossing literally flying over and landing on the bridge, cutting off access on one side. Tens of thousands of people are still located in the area south of the Litani River, and bridge by bridge, they’re being cut off from the rest of the country. This Qasmiyeh Bridge is the only lifeline for these tens of thousands of people who depend on it for access to humanitarian aid, to food. Hospitals depend on it for medical supplies and health aid.
And so, by all means of the word, yesterday was a catastrophic day for Lebanon. It was disastrous. And unfortunately, we are seeing the humanitarian catastrophe unfold with various threat of it increasing. Israel’s Arabic military spokesperson had issued a statement also indicating that Israel intends to conduct more strikes on central Beirut, accusing Hezbollah members of fleeing or leaving the southern suburbs of Beirut and going into Beirut. And so, there’s no, you know, end in sight yet to the strikes and to the unlawful patterns that we’ve repeatedly documented since October 2023 to date.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about the communities hit in central Beirut, from Muslims to Christians not affiliated with Hezbollah?
RAMZI KAISS: Yeah, these strikes happened on densely populated areas. They targeted—they happened all across the city. The Israeli military said they conducted over a hundred strikes. They happened on the southern suburbs of Beirut, but they also took place in central Beirut, in areas such as Ain Al Mraiseh or Barbour or Tallet El Khayat. These are areas that are spread out across Beirut, where they’re densely populated, where tens of people live.
And by the Israeli military’s own admission, they were conducting strikes on areas populated with civilians. But under the laws of war, parties to a conflict are required to take all feasible precautions to protect civilian harms. But there was no effective or advanced warning ahead of these strikes.
And the damage that was done to civilians could be felt on the streets, with continuous ambulances streaming into hospitals, with chaos as people tried to find their missing loved ones, as people struggled to pull people out of the rubble, with children still being stuck in the rubble. It was—it was a disaster that was felt across the city and across the country.
AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to go back to that quote of the Belgian foreign minister. His name is Maxime Prévot. He had just arrived in Lebanon. He wrote on X, “Just before I was commending President Aoun for offering to open official negotiations with Israel towards a ceasefire, Israel launched, with no previous warning, one of the most massive strikes since the beginning of the hostilities, allegedly causing hundreds of civilian victims. We were at the embassy with my delegation, just a few hundred metres from where the missiles struck. This must stop,” the Belgian foreign minister said. “The ceasefire between the US, Israel and Iran must include Lebanon!” he said. That was the Belgian foreign minister, Ramzi.
RAMZI KAISS: I mean, indeed, all of that took place. And I think that what we witnessed yesterday in terms of the large amount of civilian suffering, of the attacks happening on densely populated areas, coming without warning, the scale of it was massive. It was the most—you know, it was the most deadly day since March 2 in Lebanon.
But the patterns that we’ve seen the Israeli military follow in their conduct in Lebanon, as in Gaza, is not new. For two-and-a-half years, Human Rights Watch and other rights groups have documented repeated unlawful attacks, war crimes committed in Lebanon, crimes against humanity committed in Gaza and acts of genocide committed in Gaza.
And while all of this was happening, states that were funding Israel, or that continue to funding Israel, continued doing so. Arms kept flowing and transiting through countries that continue to provide military assistance to Israel. Other states, such as Israel’s allies, such as the United States, the U.K., Germany, the EU, they have real leverage to stop these atrocities from happening. These statements of condemnations that are typically issued by states after such horrifying days, they have no effect on the ground. But there is real leverage that states can levy. They can immediately suspend arms sales and transfer and military assistance to Israel. They can levy targeted sanctions against Israeli officials credibly implicated in abuses. The EU, for example, could suspend the trade pillar of its association — of its association agreement with Israel.
But we haven’t yet seen any effective measures being taken to stop these atrocities. In fact, the silence of states and the continued flow of weapons has only emboldened Israel, where they’re not only continuing to commit unlawful acts, but in fact boasting about it and saying that they intend to commit further atrocities. The response from the international community has been limited to words of condemnation, but no effective action has been taken yet in order to stop these atrocities from happening.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about the number of medics who have been killed in Lebanon? Do you believe medics are being targeted? What’s the number? Over 50?
RAMZI KAISS: Yes, over 57, but we don’t have the full—we don’t have the full number yet, because we don’t have a detailed list of number of medical workers that have been killed yesterday. But as of the day before that, over 57 medical workers had been killed in Lebanon in Israeli attacks since March 2. If we add that to the total number of medical workers killed since October 2023, then we’re talking about over 250 medical workers killed in Lebanon.
These medical workers have been killed in attacks on Civil Defense centers, on medical vehicles, on hospitals. As Human Rights Watch, we and others have documented apparently deliberate and repeated attacks on medical workers in their vehicles, in their Civil Defense centers, at hospitals, that we found amount to apparent war crimes. In our investigation, in Amnesty’s investigation, investigations done by international media outlets such as The Guardian, we didn’t find evidence of any of these healthcare facilities being used for military purposes in a way that would strip them of their protected status. And this is a claim that has been repeatedly made by the Israeli authorities without evidence.
The toll is high, and the damage that is conducted by Israel when it strikes medical workers isn’t just limited to the personnel that are tragically killed. It has compounding effects on the rest of the country, as access to medical — access to aid, to healthcare becomes increasingly more limited. Since March 2 in Lebanon, six hospitals have had to shut down their operations for various reasons. Three of those hospitals are located south of the Litani River, where I mentioned tens of thousands of people live. And so, increasingly, we’re seeing in some places that access to healthcare is being limited, not only by Israeli attacks, but also because strikes on bridges are limiting the abilities of hospital staff to get easy and predictable access to medical supplies that they need.
We were in Sour last week, and we spoke with a hospital official at Jabal Amel Hospital, one of the main hospitals in the city. And they’ve told us that, essentially, in order to get supplies after bridges have been struck, they’ve had to take their own cars, drive across the Litani River, go to the city of Saida, which is several kilometers away, I think approximately 30 kilometers away, get supplies and come back to the hospital, often having to do it at night at great risk to the staff themselves. Paramedic workers have told us that in order to send supplies into the area south of the Litani, they typically wait until injured people are carried into Beirut across the Litani River, so that they can send back in those transport vehicles medical supplies that are desperately needed by paramedic staff and other healthcare workers.
And so, the strikes on medical workers are taking place. We’ve documented repeated, apparently deliberate attacks on these medical workers. But there’s also an increasing — increasing attacks that are significantly limiting the ability of people to access healthcare in Lebanon. And with the attacks yesterday, I mean, we saw hospitals quickly becoming overwhelmed with people being rushed in as ambulances streamed into them, following the scale of the attacks and the number of injuries, with over a thousand people injured.
AMY GOODMAN: Ramzi Kaiss, I want to thank you for being with us, Lebanon researcher at Human Rights Watch, based in Beirut. Please remain safe yourself.
This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. Up next, we speak with professor Robert Pape of the University of Chicago, his latest piece headlined “The War Is Turning Iran Into a Major World Power.” Stay with us.
AMY GOODMAN: “War Time” by Feral Foster, performing at the Brooklyn Folk Festival.
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