In 1982 the Reagan Administration suspended exports to Israel of the Lockheed-Martin manufactured M26 cluster bomb after a congressional inquiry found the weapon had been used against the civilian population in Lebanon. The suspension ended in 1988.
During the most recent invasion of Lebanon, Israel once again used cluster munitions, drawing a harsh rebuke from United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland. He called the Israeli military leadership "completely immoral" and said: "It's an outrage that we have 100,000 unexploded bombs among where children, women, civilians, shop keepers and farmers are now going to tread."
Human Rights Watch has a good introductory primer on cluster munitions that can be found here.
The video below is a CBC National news report on the Bush Administration's horrifying use of cluster bombs in Iraq.
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1 comment:
I agree with much of your sentiment, though Israel is a parliamentary democracy and not a theocracy.
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