Report: Israel Fired Over 1.2 Million Cluster Bombs at Lebanon
Israel's army fired more than 1.2 million cluster bombs into Lebanon during the month-long conflict, the liberal Haaretz newspaper reported Wednesday citing a senior Israeli army officer.
The unnamed officer described his unit's use of the controversial bomblets during Israel's 34-day offensive against Hizbullah fighters as "crazy and monstrous."

"We covered entire villages with cluster bombs," the newspaper quoted the commander as saying.

The 1.2 million cluster bombs cited by the commander only included those bomblets fired by a Multiple Launch Rocket System. Additional cluster bombs were fired by 155 mm mortars or dropped from the air, he said.

There was no immediate comment on the report from the Israeli army.

Israeli officials have previously said its forces only used arms allowed by international law during the Lebanon offensive.

Other soldiers cited in the article said the army fired phosphorous shells to start fires in Lebanon.

The International Red Cross says international law prohibits the use of phosphorous against humans.

Human rights organizations have long advocated a ban on cluster bombs because of their disproportionate and indiscriminate nature and because their high dud rate creates vast minefields.

In the first 15 days after the August 14 ceasefire in the Israel-Hizbullah war, 52 Lebanese civilians were killed by unexploded cluster bombs, according to the United Nations.

UN chief Kofi Annan has condemned Israel's use of cluster bombs and the world body estimates that as much as 40 percent of the apple-sized bomblets fired into Lebanon failed to explode on impact.

Marc Garlasco, a senior military analyst for the New York-based Human Rights Watch, said that Israel's cluster bomb use in Lebanon had "been taken to a new level", during a visit to southern Lebanon in the war's immediate aftermath.

"I've never been anywhere where I saw these numbers of duds lying around," Garlasco, a former Pentagon analyst, told AFP in mid-August.

The Geneva Conventions ban the use of the weapons that do not pass the proportionality test, under which civilian harm cannot outweigh military advantage.

In February, Belgium became the first country to ban cluster munitions on these grounds. Norway declared a moratorium on their use four months later. --AFP