2006 Baalbek hospital raid

Israeli military operation in the 2006 Lebanon War yes Operation Sharp and Smooth 2006 Lebanon War August 1, 2006 – August 2, 2006 Baalbek, Lebanon Israeli victory Israel Israel Hezbollah22px|border LCP Israel Eliezer ShkediIsrael Emmanuel MorenoMarch 29, 2007 Yakov Katz http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-137363792.html https://web.archive.org/web/20150924172938/http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P1-137363792.html usurped September 24, 2015 Sayeret Matkal celebrates 50 years of courage, secrecy The Jerusalem Post subscription HighBeam Research Unknown Unit 269 "Sayeret Matkal"Unit 5101 "Shaldag" 200 commandos Unknown None 19 Hezbollah fighters and 2 armed Communist party members killedHRW, pp.124-129 10 killed (IDF claim)http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-3285428,00.html כך התנהל מבצע הקומנדו בבעלבק Ynet 2 August 2006 February 19, 2012 19 June 2018 https://web.archive.org/web/20180619170401/https://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-3285428,00.html live According to HRW 11 civilians killed. 5 civilians detained but released after three weeks During the 2006 Lebanon War, Operation Sharp and Smooth (he מבצע חד וחלק), 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 Israeli Secret Services and the Struggle Against Terrorism 2009 Columbia University Press 978-0231140423 132 https://books.google.com/books?id=jhKCiqvUDkEC&pg=PA132 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.IDF: We'll control security zone by Thursday http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3285464,00.html Avi Cohen 2 August 2006 Ynet 29 June 2012 21 November 2018 https://web.archive.org/web/20181121084517/https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3285464,00.html live Background Operation Sharp and Smooth was one of a number of raids carried out by the IDF during the 2006 Lebanon War ("Operation Change of Direction") against Hezbollah operated medical facilities that the IDF said served primarily as operations bases where "guerrillas planned attacks together with Iranian instructors". By August 2, when the Baalbek operation was over, 15 to 20 similar raids had been carried out according to the IDF. Air strikes on Baalbek, a Hezbollah stronghold, by the Israeli Air Force on July 17 had destroyed petrol stations, Hezbollah offices, a dairy processing plant and resulted in residents fleeing the town. Those that remained reportedly expected another attack. The operation The operation began between 9:30 and 10:15 p.m. on August 1 with intensive bombardment around the Dar al-Hikma hospital to cut off all the access roads.HRW, p. 124 The hospital was one of several medical facilities that the IDF believed may have been used to treat or hold the two captured soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, after their abduction by Hezbollah the previous month. Approximately 200 elite commandos fast-roped from helicopters which previously refuelled over the Mediterranean Sea. The operation involved two commando units: Shaldag of the Israeli Air Force, and Sayeret Matkal of the IDF Branch of Intelligence (Aman).https://www.jpost.com/Israel/Article.aspx?id=30380 Raid 'sends message' to Hizbullah Jerusalem Post 2 August 2006 30 June 2012 4 October 2012 https://web.archive.org/web/20121004141242/http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Article.aspx?id=30380 live Air cover was provided by attack helicopters, jet fighters and unmanned drones. At least 10 bombing runs were carried out around the hospital and on hills east and north of Baalbek according to witness reports. Upon landing, the two units split up. The Sayeret Matkal unit proceeded to the Dar al-Hikma hospital in the Jamaliyah suburb of Baalbek, known for its connections to Hezbollah and believed by Israeli Military Intelligence to be a base for Iranian Revolutionary Guards. According to local residents, the Hezbollah-run hospital was financed by an Iranian charity, the Imam Khomeini Charitable Society.Israel makes deepest push into Lebanon http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2003168930_lebanon02.html The Seattle Times 2 August 2006 Hussein Dakroub The Associated Press The hospital was empty at the time, the patients having been transferred to other hospitals, or sent home four days earlier. http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1222201,00.html#ixzz1wp9gTr5m https://web.archive.org/web/20071031042744/http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1222201,00.html?#ixzz1wp9gTr5m dead October 31, 2007 Behind the Battle for Baalbek Time Andrew Lee Butters 2 August 2006 1 June 2012 The Israeli force occupied the hospital. According to HRW, IDF commandos shot and killed a nurse who was trying to flee and wounded two armed security guards during the take-over. Two armed Hezbollah fighters were killed outside the hospital while engaging the Israelis, one by a missile from an Israeli drone and the other by small arms fire from the commandos. Based on Hezbollah "martyr" posters that later appeared around the village of Al Jamaliyeh, HRW concluded that the nurse and the two militants may have been the only Hezbollah-affiliated people killed in the raid. A group of local residents were alarmed by the sound of fighting and assembled at the house of the local mukhtar. Two of the men were armed members of the Lebanese Communist Party (LCP) and a third was an unarmed member of the group. An Israeli helicopter fired a number of missiles at the group, killing all three LCP militants as well as three unarmed men. According to an assessment by Human Rights Watch the two armed militants were to be considered combatants and therefore legitimate targets. HRW further noted that the two combatants endangered the lives of the civilians by mixing with them. The unarmed men killed in the attack were faulted for mixing with combatants during an Israeli military operation. HRW thus considered them to be collateral casualties to a legitimate Israeli military strike."HRW, pp. 126-127 At approximately 3.30 a.m. on 2 August, an Israeli Apache helicopter fired a missile at a Syrian Kurdish seasonal agricultural worker and his family, one of five families of farmers who been sheltering in their tents since the raid began, when the family left their tent and ran for shelter at a Lebanese house nearby. The father Talal Chibli (40), his wife Maha Sha`ban (32) and their children Muhannad (13), Muayyad (12), Asma’ (6), and Muhammad (4) were killed or died later of their wounds. Three of the family's children, Muthana (9), Mus`ab (5), and Batul (8 months), were seriously wounded but survived. According to HRW the family "had no links to Hezbollah and were not participating in the hostilities". The second Israeli unit swept through the al-Usaira neighborhood of Baalbek, some five kilometers from the hospital. Apparently they were looking for persons related to Hassan Nasrallah, the General-Secretary of Hezbollah. The Israeli soldiers entered a house in the neighborhood and asked a shopkeeper if he was Hassan Nasrallah, which was his name, although he was unrelated to the Hezbollah leader. Nasrallah, his 14-year-old son and five other civilians were kidnapped. The prisoners were allegedly beaten and threatened by IDF soldiers. The soldiers allegedly threatened to kill 14-year-old Muhammad Nasrallah together with his father unless he told them who was in Hezbollah. The boy was released but the five adults were brought to Israel. The prisoners, two of whom were seniors, were detained for four days and nights inside a bus. An Israeli reserve soldier serving in the Military Police complained about the procedure, calling it "hard to describe it as humanitarian treatment." The reluctance of the IDF to open a formal Prisoner of War facility contravened army regulations. Around 20 Lebanese prisoners were detained there, most of whom were released after questioning.https://www.haaretz.com/news/reservists-lebanese-pows-were-kept-in-bus-for-4-days-1.195623 Reservists: Lebanese POWs were kept in bus for 4 days Haaretz Nir Hasson 22 August 2006 25 February 2012 13 October 2012 https://web.archive.org/web/20121013091157/http://www.haaretz.com/news/reservists-lebanese-pows-were-kept-in-bus-for-4-days-1.195623 dead https://www.haaretz.co.il/misc/1.1130651 שלושה אנשי חיזבאללה נפגעו בהיתקלות עם כוח צה"ל בגזרה המערבית בלבנון (Three Hezbollah men were injured in clashes with IDF troops in the western sector in Lebanon) Haaretz Nir Hasson Amos Harel amp 22 August 2006 1 June 2012 28 June 2012 https://web.archive.org/web/20120628024038/http://www.haaretz.co.il/misc/1.1130651 live The commandos were on the ground for about four and half hours from 10:30 p.m. until 3 a.m. Immediately after the raid, the IDF said ten "terrorists" had been killed, all of them armed and wearing bulletproof vests, and five Hezbollah members had been captured during a "precise surgical raid" that resulted in "no IDF or civilian casualties". http://www.unitedjerusalem.org/index2.asp?id=788256&Date=8%2F3%2F2006 Special Forces Raid in Baal-bek ISRAEL DEFENSE FORCES August 3, 2006 December 4, 2011 June 4, 2012 https://web.archive.org/web/20120604215346/http://www.unitedjerusalem.org/index2.asp?id=788256&Date=8%2F3%2F2006 dead HRW, p. 124 and AI, p. 14 The operation was publicly applauded by military Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz.Israeli commando missions come out of shadows https://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2006-08-13-commando-missions_x.htm USA Today 13 August 2006 Yaakov Katz 2017-09-07 2011-05-24 https://web.archive.org/web/20110524013052/http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2006-08-13-commando-missions_x.htm live Hezbollah said that the five people captured by Israel were civilians and not members of Hezbollah.Israel resumes airstrikes on Beirut http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/08/02/mideast.main/index.html CNN 2 August 2006 dead https://web.archive.org/web/20060921182359/http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/08/02/mideast.main/index.html September 21, 2006 The captives initially described by the IDF as "known Hizbullah gunmen" were later identified as civilians and released after 3 weeks. According to Human Rights Watch and Lebanese authorities most of the fatalities were civilians.HRW, pp. 192-193 http://almustaqbal.com/article/188690/ تقرير أمني يقدّم المعلومات الرسمية عن إنزال بعلبك (A security report presents official information on the Ba'lbak landing) al-Mustaqbal August 3, 2006 December 28, 2011 dead https://web.archive.org/web/20171216094120/http://almustaqbal.com/article/188690/ 16 December 2017 The five prisoners who had been captured in the raid and taken to Israel were subjected to repeated interrogations about their relationship to Hezbollah and its leader. On August 16, they were finally allowed to see a lawyer who brought a petition to the Israeli Supreme Court to obtain their release. Instead of answering the petition the IDF released the five to UNIFIL, three weeks after being abducted. "We captured five people we thought were involved with Hezbollah," explained an Israeli official to New York Times. "Under questioning it turned out we were wrong. So we turned them over to the U.N." https://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/23/world/middleeast/23raid.html?_r=1&oref=slogin What's in a Name? Not, It Seems, a Leader of Hezbollah in Lebanon 2006-08-23 KIFNER John August 23, 2006 The New York Times 2014-02-09 https://web.archive.org/web/20140209192551/http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/23/world/middleeast/23raid.html?_r=1&oref=slogin liveHRW, pp. 128-130 Haaretz wrote that "the release of the captives again raises questions about the real value of the operations of the special units". The IDF and the government had been quick to announce significant achievements immediately after the operations. According to the investigation by Human Rights Watch 16 Lebanese residents were killed in the raid, of whom four were deemed combatants and a further two civilian members of Hezbollah or the Communist party. An official report by the Lebanese Internal Security Forces (ISF) confirm these numbers, although the names do not fully match those supplied by HRW. Two of the victims were identified as belonging to Hezbollah but the Communist party members were not mentioned in the report. The report also contained the names of the 14 Lebanese wounded in the fighting. The precise objective of the operation is unknown. The Jerusalem Post suggested at the time of the raid that the IDF may have believed that the two kidnapped soldiers, Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, were being held in bunkers below the hospital but that the raid "appeared to have been about collecting intelligence". Lebanese sources claimed that the target of the raid was Mohammad Yazbek, a well-known Hezbollah leader living in the area who had been accused by Israel of involvement in the capture of IDF Colonel (res.) Elhanan Tannenbaum in 2000. Yazbek however escaped unhurt. A spokesman for the IDF denied that the operation had a "specific target". Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz claimed that "the main goal" was to deliver a message to Hizbullah that the IDF "can operate deep inside Lebanon and wherever else we want to." According to Ami Pedahzur, Professor of Government and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Texas at Austin,Ami Pedahzur http://www.utexas.edu/opa/experts/profile.php?id=512 University of Texas at Austin 2012-06-30 2023-11-02 https://web.archive.org/web/20231102200917/https://news.utexas.edu/?id=512 live the raid was an unsuccessful attempt to kidnap Hezbollah activists for "bargaining" purposes. According to an account published in Maariv a month after the war the IDF had learnt beforehand that the intended target of the operation would not be in place. The IDF however decided to go ahead with it for "propaganda purposes". The aim had been to obtain information about the fate of the abducted soldiers but in fact none was obtained. In spite of this it was marketed as a success story. The report was denied by the IDF. http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART1/479/587.html הפעולה בבעל בק - לצרכי תעמולה (The operation in Baalbek – for propaganda purposes) Ma'ariv Amir Rappaport 2006-09-15 Jan 23, 2012 2023-11-02 https://web.archive.org/web/20231102200918/http://www.nrg.co.il/online/1/ART1/479/587.html live Assessments thumb|Israeli bombing in Baalbek Stratfor concluded in an analysis of the raid that Israel took large risks and allotted huge military resources in carrying out the raid "well in excess of its achievements." http://www.stratfor.com/sample/analysis/lebanon-israels-strategic-raid-baalbek Lebanon: Israel's Strategic Raid on Baalbek Stratfor August 2, 2006 June 1, 2012 January 15, 2016 https://web.archive.org/web/20160115114916/https://www.stratfor.com/sample/analysis/lebanon-israels-strategic-raid-baalbek live Former chief of staff Moshe Ya'alon, a sharp critic of IDF conduct during the Lebanon war, questioned whether the raid was "justified in terms of risk, cost and benefit" and whether it was not simply "an adventure." https://www.haaretz.com/no-way-to-go-to-war-1.197210 No way to go to war Haaretz Ari Shavit 2006-09-14 June 4, 2010 2013-12-30 https://web.archive.org/web/20131230230303/http://www.haaretz.com/no-way-to-go-to-war-1.197210 dead HRW concluded that "the operation appears to have been based on questionable intelligence and had a disproportionate impact on civilians". Hezbollah leader Nasrallah mocked the raid during a speech on al-Manar TV in which he said "They stormed a hospital and threw a grenade...to search for injured fighters who they didn’t capture...they kidnapped five civilians and they are hostages. This is intelligence, this is the Mossad?" http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3285976,00.html Nasrallah: We'll bomb Tel Aviv if Beirut attacked Yedioth Ahronoth Roee Nahmias August 3, 2006 February 9, 2012 March 27, 2012 https://web.archive.org/web/20120327225511/http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3285976,00.html live According to Ofer Shelach and Yoav Limor, the operation had a psychological influence on Hezbollah leadership as the attack was in the heart of their stronghold, the local commander of Bekaa area was dismissed, movement on the roads was minimized, and more energy was put on self-defense.שבויים בלבנון-Captives in Lebanon Yediot Ahronot Ofer Shelach Yoav Limor Itay Katz 2007 257July 2012 Fatalities Group of men killed by hellfire missiles fired from helicopter or drone: Maxim "'Ali" Jamal al-Din, 18 (combatant in Communist Party) 'Awad Jamal al-Din, 58 (combatant in Communist Party) Hassan Jamal al-Din, 18 Naji Jamal al-Din, 45 Muhammad Naji Jamal al-Din, 12 Malik Jamal al-Din, 22 Hussain Yusif al-Mekdad, 42 Men killed in or around Dar al-Hikma hospital: Atif Amhaz (nurse, civilian Hezbollah member) Rida Midlej (Hezbollah combatant) Wissam Ahmad Yaghi (Hezbollah combatant) Syrian Kurdish family killed by Hellfire missile strike: Talal Chibli, 40 Maha al-'Issa Sha'ban, 35 Muhanad Talal Chibli, 14 Muayyad Talal Chibli, 12 Asma Talal Chibli, 6 Muhammad Talal Chibli, 4 Civilians detained and brought to Israel These individuals included: http://www.aljazeera.com/archive/2006/08/20084916445795272.html Israel raid 'captures Hezbollah fighters' al-Jazeera 2 August 2006 February 9, 2012 29 October 2015 https://web.archive.org/web/20151029052204/http://www.aljazeera.com/archive/2006/08/20084916445795272.html live Hasan Deeb Nasrallah, 60 Bilal Nasrallah, 32 Ahmad Salih al-‘Awtah (or al-Ghawtah), 55 Hasan al-Burji, 40 Muhammad Shukr, unknown age External links Video of the operation by IAF, מבצע "חד וחלק"- חיל האוויר במלחמת לבנון השניה Sources Human Rights Watch (HRW), "Why They Died", Civilian Casualties in Lebanon during the 2006 War, September 2007 Amnesty International (AI), Israel/Lebanon Deliberate destruction or "collateral damage"?, Israeli attacks on civilian infrastructure, August 2006 References 33em Lebanon Category:Airstrikes during the 2006 Lebanon War Category:August 2006 in Lebanon Category:Baalbek Category:Attacks on hospitals in Lebanon Category:Attacks on hospitals during the Arab–Israeli conflict Category:Attacks on buildings and structures in 2006 Category:Israeli war crimes in Lebanon