Satellite photos and casualty figures show more damage from Israel's three-week war on Gaza
Marian Houk
March 14, 2009
It had been predicted -- Israeli bombing could breach the earthen walls one of the ponds used to collect sewage in the Gaza Strip, and cause a large and potentially catastrophic sewage overflow.
And, it is now clear that something of this nature did happen.
There was, indeed, a breach in one of earthen embankment walls of a sewage containment lagoon in Gaza, caused by some form of Israeli military activity.
Not reported until now, but evident from a United Nations analysis of satellite photos, is an overflow from a sewage pond in the Sheikh Eijlin area in Gaza. sometime in early January.
The overflow was "violent", with "indications of severe land erosion", according to a United Nations analysis of satellite photos plus photographs taken on the ground by a UN Environment Program (UNEP) team in Gaza.
Sari Bashi, Executive Director of GISHA, the Israeli human rights organization that has gone to Israel's Supreme Court to try to stop Israeli military-administered sanctions against the entire Gaza Strip, said on Friday 13 March that her office had received an affadavit confirming damage from an IDF attack that hit Gaza's sewage infrastructure.
Maher Najjar, the Deputy Director of Gaza's Coastal Municipalities Water Utility, confirmed in a telephone interview from his home in Gaza on Friday 13 March that "one of the earthen shoulders of a sewage lagoon of the main treatment plant in Gaza City had received two hits from F-16s, the shoulder was damaged, and 500,000 cubic meters of raw sewage spilled out". He said this had happened in the first ten days of January.
Najjar said that "The main problem is we are afraid of the pollution from this spill into Gaza's underground water aquifer [n.b. the only source of water in the coastal strip, which was already not only too saline from over-pumping, but also already polluted.]"
Najjar explained that the land in the area around the sewage lagoon was rather sandy, so "the flood of spilled sewage infiltrated quickly into the aquifer".
The damage, the UN analysis says, happened "before 10 January".
The Israel's Operation Cast Lead in Gaza lasted over three weeks -- from 27 December until 18 January. The IDF ground operation started on 3 January.
The damage to the retaining wall was probably caused by IDF bombing - or perhaps Israeli artillery shelling. There is also a possibility that Israeli bulldozers were operating in that area, and somehow caused this harm ... The UN map analysis does not speculate on this.
A spokesperson for Israel's Ministry of Defense did not return a phone call on Friday.
But the UN map analysis does say that "This map illustrates damages to the sewage treatment plant ... in Sheikh Ejlin area. A single impact crater (occurring sometime before 10 January 2009) to the eastern section of a holding pond (70m x 150m) caused a massive outflow of sewage, moving an estimated distance of 1.2 kilometers. The estimated area affected by the outflow is approximately 5.5 hectares. An area affected by a suspected secondary flow further west has also been marked as well as damage guildings and impact craters in the region".
The UN's map analysis -- entitled "Sewage Treatment Plant Damage and Outflow Detection, Sheikh Ejlin. Damage Analysis with QuickBird Satellite Imagery Recorded 16 January 2009 - Ground Survey Photos by UNEP 30 January 2009" -- was released on 10 March.
Indications on the accompanying UNEP photos show:
"Sewage pond level very low" [ the sewage flooded out after bombing or some other form of attack destroyed embankment walls ]...
"Wall breach is 22m"
"Indications of severe land erosion due to violent sewage flow"
"Sewage standing in cultivated fields".
This is in addition to the damage caused by Israeli military-imposed sanctions that have been in place since late 2007. Because of restrictions on the provision of the special industrial diesel fuel needed to run Gaza's only power plant, it was feared that sewage overflows from such sewage ponds could endanger human lives, and million liters of raw or only-partially-treated sewage has been run off into the Mediterranean sea, every day, for more than the past year.
The satellite map and some illustrative ground photos can be found here or here.
In addition to the Gaza sewage overflow -- now visible from outer space, as news stories reported -- the just-released UN analysis also included satellite photos of "Rafah Building Destruction along the Egypt-Gaza Border" (presenting a satellite-based damage assessment along the Egypt-Gaza border, in which damaged buildings, infrastructure and impact craters have been identified); as well as 13 maps showing damage assessment overviews for the entire Gaza Strip; and a satellite photo of the UNRWA headquarters.
The UNOSAT websites say that "These maps have been produced or facilitated by UNOSAT for the humanitarian community from public sources. We ask you to kindly credit UNOSAT and/or the original source if this information is used in a report, project etc. Additional products including satellite images (for example from Ikonos, SPOT, LANDSAT or ENVISAT) and thematic maps (for example land cover, digital elevation models (DEMs) and environmental change analyzes) can be provided by UNOSAT on request".
Meanwhile, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), based in Gaza, has just released the latest of the casualties and damage in Gaza resulting from the Israeli military operation. "Only now is the true extent of the devastation becoming apparent", PCHR says. "Confirmed figures reveal the true extent of the destruction inflicted upon the Gaza Strip; Israel´s offensive resulted in 1,434 dead, including 960 civilians, 239 police officers, and 235 fighters".
Many international humanitarian law experts say that police officers -- particularly those who were killed during their graduation ceremony -- are not combatants, and are not legitimate military targets.
The PCHR report itself clarifies, a few lines down, that "Over the course of the 22 day Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip, a total of 1,434 Palestinians were killed. Of these, 235 were combatants. The vast majority of the dead, however, were civilians and non-combatants: protected persons according to the principles of IHL. PCHR investigations confirm that, in total, 960 civilians lost their lives, including 288 children and 121 women. 239 police officers were also killed; the majority (235) in air strikes carried out on the first day of the attacks. The Ministry of Health have also confirmed that a total of 5,303 Palestinians were injured in the assault, including 1,606 children and 828 women".
The PCHR report charges that "The offensive took place in the context of an ongoing international armed conflict and belligerent occupation. International humanitarian law (IHL) lays down stringent, legally-binding, obligations regulating the conduct of hostilities. Of primary relevance is the principle of distinction, which obliges all Parties to the conflict to distinguish between combatants and non-combatants (including civilians). Civilians and civilian objects must be spared the effects of any hostilities to the greatest extent possible. This is the core premise on which IHL is founded. Consequent to this fundamental obligation, IHL also regulates the methods and means used in an attack. In short, all precautions must be taken to restrict any damage and destruction beyond that absolutely required by military necessity. [But] The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights´ investigations reveal that throughout the course of the assault, Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) used excessive, indiscriminate force, in violation of the principle of distinction. This claim is evidenced by the disproportionately high rate of death amongst the civilian population, when compared to that of resistance fighters. IOF also willfully violated the principle of distinction as a result of their illegal classification of law enforcement officials as combatants. Uniformed units of law enforcement agencies are not considered members of armed forces (combatants), unless explicitly recognised as such".
The report charge that "the cases documented by PCHR constitute grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions, and war crimes. The widespread and apparently systematic violations of customary IHL witnessed in the Gaza Strip may also amount to a crime against humanity. PCHR call on all States to fulfill their legal obligations, as codified in Article 146 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, to prosecute any persons suspected of committing grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions. All States must enact appropriate legislation to ensure that such persons may be tried in national courts, in accordance with the principle of universal jurisdiction".
The PCHR stated that now, in the war's aftermath, "borders must be opened: aid and reconstruction material must be allowed into the Gaza Strip".
But, that is not happening yet. This is being held hostage to developments in political negotiations between Palestinian factions now taking place in Cairo which aim at agreed restoration of Palestinian Authority control in the Gaza Strip, and separate political efforts being expended by Egypt to arrange an agreed cease-fire, and the release of captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who has been held somewhere in Gaza since late June 2006.
Haaretz's Gideon Levy wrote this week that "The recent war in Gaza was a failure. The bon ton now is to list its flaws. Flip-floppers say its 'achievements' were squandered; leftists say the war 'should never have started' and rightists will say the war 'should have lasted longer'. But on this they all agree: It was a blunder. Because we consider the war to have been almost cost-free, with just 13 Israeli dead, it will be the first in 36 years without a Commission of Inquiry formed in its wake. Of course, the war's blunder was just as serious as its predecessors, but because we did more killing than being killed, because we caused more damage than we sustained, there's nothing deemed worthy of investigation. It was all in vain: no progress made, no goal achieved, nothing. Deterrence wasn't reestablished, arms smuggling into Gaza was not stopped, Hamas was not weakened and abducted Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit was not freed. On these facts we all agree" ...
In his article, Levy reserved particular scorn for the mainstream Israeli media's coverage of the Gaza war: "And what of the cheerleaders who sat on the sidelines of this hellish nightmare? Perhaps we should at least hold them accountable? They sat in their television studios and at their newspaper desks. Oh, how the commentators were excited and stirred excitement. They goaded and urged, pushed and applied pressure, begging for more and more war. For months they had been clamoring for their 'wide-scale operation', their hearts' desire. When their wish came true they cheered in support and whistled in excitement. Do not take their actions lightly. They could have had an immense influence over the feeble politicians and graying officers. 'Strike out at them', their baritone voices echoed from one part of the country to the other. They asserted it was a just and successful war without peer. They covered the brilliant military maneuvers with gusto, iniquitously hid the horrors, presented an unrestrained offensive against a non-existent enemy as a two-sided war, described troops' unchallenged advances as real combat and a military maneuver carried out on the back of a helpless population as a success ... Showing no remorse and much vanity, they now shamelessly admit that the war whose praises they sang has failed. Why did it fail? Because we didn't kill enough people, they explain. If we would have given it a little push and killed 200 more children or massacred 500 more women, then we would have achieved victory. None of them are asked what would have happened had the war continued..."
Gideon Levy's article in Haaretz can be read in full here.
And, it is now clear that something of this nature did happen.
There was, indeed, a breach in one of earthen embankment walls of a sewage containment lagoon in Gaza, caused by some form of Israeli military activity.
Not reported until now, but evident from a United Nations analysis of satellite photos, is an overflow from a sewage pond in the Sheikh Eijlin area in Gaza. sometime in early January.
The overflow was "violent", with "indications of severe land erosion", according to a United Nations analysis of satellite photos plus photographs taken on the ground by a UN Environment Program (UNEP) team in Gaza.
Sari Bashi, Executive Director of GISHA, the Israeli human rights organization that has gone to Israel's Supreme Court to try to stop Israeli military-administered sanctions against the entire Gaza Strip, said on Friday 13 March that her office had received an affadavit confirming damage from an IDF attack that hit Gaza's sewage infrastructure.
Maher Najjar, the Deputy Director of Gaza's Coastal Municipalities Water Utility, confirmed in a telephone interview from his home in Gaza on Friday 13 March that "one of the earthen shoulders of a sewage lagoon of the main treatment plant in Gaza City had received two hits from F-16s, the shoulder was damaged, and 500,000 cubic meters of raw sewage spilled out". He said this had happened in the first ten days of January.
Najjar said that "The main problem is we are afraid of the pollution from this spill into Gaza's underground water aquifer [n.b. the only source of water in the coastal strip, which was already not only too saline from over-pumping, but also already polluted.]"
Najjar explained that the land in the area around the sewage lagoon was rather sandy, so "the flood of spilled sewage infiltrated quickly into the aquifer".
The damage, the UN analysis says, happened "before 10 January".
The Israel's Operation Cast Lead in Gaza lasted over three weeks -- from 27 December until 18 January. The IDF ground operation started on 3 January.
The damage to the retaining wall was probably caused by IDF bombing - or perhaps Israeli artillery shelling. There is also a possibility that Israeli bulldozers were operating in that area, and somehow caused this harm ... The UN map analysis does not speculate on this.
A spokesperson for Israel's Ministry of Defense did not return a phone call on Friday.
But the UN map analysis does say that "This map illustrates damages to the sewage treatment plant ... in Sheikh Ejlin area. A single impact crater (occurring sometime before 10 January 2009) to the eastern section of a holding pond (70m x 150m) caused a massive outflow of sewage, moving an estimated distance of 1.2 kilometers. The estimated area affected by the outflow is approximately 5.5 hectares. An area affected by a suspected secondary flow further west has also been marked as well as damage guildings and impact craters in the region".
The UN's map analysis -- entitled "Sewage Treatment Plant Damage and Outflow Detection, Sheikh Ejlin. Damage Analysis with QuickBird Satellite Imagery Recorded 16 January 2009 - Ground Survey Photos by UNEP 30 January 2009" -- was released on 10 March.
Indications on the accompanying UNEP photos show:
"Sewage pond level very low" [ the sewage flooded out after bombing or some other form of attack destroyed embankment walls ]...
"Wall breach is 22m"
"Indications of severe land erosion due to violent sewage flow"
"Sewage standing in cultivated fields".
This is in addition to the damage caused by Israeli military-imposed sanctions that have been in place since late 2007. Because of restrictions on the provision of the special industrial diesel fuel needed to run Gaza's only power plant, it was feared that sewage overflows from such sewage ponds could endanger human lives, and million liters of raw or only-partially-treated sewage has been run off into the Mediterranean sea, every day, for more than the past year.
The satellite map and some illustrative ground photos can be found here or here.
In addition to the Gaza sewage overflow -- now visible from outer space, as news stories reported -- the just-released UN analysis also included satellite photos of "Rafah Building Destruction along the Egypt-Gaza Border" (presenting a satellite-based damage assessment along the Egypt-Gaza border, in which damaged buildings, infrastructure and impact craters have been identified); as well as 13 maps showing damage assessment overviews for the entire Gaza Strip; and a satellite photo of the UNRWA headquarters.
The UNOSAT websites say that "These maps have been produced or facilitated by UNOSAT for the humanitarian community from public sources. We ask you to kindly credit UNOSAT and/or the original source if this information is used in a report, project etc. Additional products including satellite images (for example from Ikonos, SPOT, LANDSAT or ENVISAT) and thematic maps (for example land cover, digital elevation models (DEMs) and environmental change analyzes) can be provided by UNOSAT on request".
************************
Meanwhile, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), based in Gaza, has just released the latest of the casualties and damage in Gaza resulting from the Israeli military operation. "Only now is the true extent of the devastation becoming apparent", PCHR says. "Confirmed figures reveal the true extent of the destruction inflicted upon the Gaza Strip; Israel´s offensive resulted in 1,434 dead, including 960 civilians, 239 police officers, and 235 fighters".
Many international humanitarian law experts say that police officers -- particularly those who were killed during their graduation ceremony -- are not combatants, and are not legitimate military targets.
The PCHR report itself clarifies, a few lines down, that "Over the course of the 22 day Israeli assault on the Gaza Strip, a total of 1,434 Palestinians were killed. Of these, 235 were combatants. The vast majority of the dead, however, were civilians and non-combatants: protected persons according to the principles of IHL. PCHR investigations confirm that, in total, 960 civilians lost their lives, including 288 children and 121 women. 239 police officers were also killed; the majority (235) in air strikes carried out on the first day of the attacks. The Ministry of Health have also confirmed that a total of 5,303 Palestinians were injured in the assault, including 1,606 children and 828 women".
The PCHR report charges that "The offensive took place in the context of an ongoing international armed conflict and belligerent occupation. International humanitarian law (IHL) lays down stringent, legally-binding, obligations regulating the conduct of hostilities. Of primary relevance is the principle of distinction, which obliges all Parties to the conflict to distinguish between combatants and non-combatants (including civilians). Civilians and civilian objects must be spared the effects of any hostilities to the greatest extent possible. This is the core premise on which IHL is founded. Consequent to this fundamental obligation, IHL also regulates the methods and means used in an attack. In short, all precautions must be taken to restrict any damage and destruction beyond that absolutely required by military necessity. [But] The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights´ investigations reveal that throughout the course of the assault, Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) used excessive, indiscriminate force, in violation of the principle of distinction. This claim is evidenced by the disproportionately high rate of death amongst the civilian population, when compared to that of resistance fighters. IOF also willfully violated the principle of distinction as a result of their illegal classification of law enforcement officials as combatants. Uniformed units of law enforcement agencies are not considered members of armed forces (combatants), unless explicitly recognised as such".
The report charge that "the cases documented by PCHR constitute grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions, and war crimes. The widespread and apparently systematic violations of customary IHL witnessed in the Gaza Strip may also amount to a crime against humanity. PCHR call on all States to fulfill their legal obligations, as codified in Article 146 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, to prosecute any persons suspected of committing grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions. All States must enact appropriate legislation to ensure that such persons may be tried in national courts, in accordance with the principle of universal jurisdiction".
The PCHR stated that now, in the war's aftermath, "borders must be opened: aid and reconstruction material must be allowed into the Gaza Strip".
But, that is not happening yet. This is being held hostage to developments in political negotiations between Palestinian factions now taking place in Cairo which aim at agreed restoration of Palestinian Authority control in the Gaza Strip, and separate political efforts being expended by Egypt to arrange an agreed cease-fire, and the release of captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who has been held somewhere in Gaza since late June 2006.
************************
Haaretz's Gideon Levy wrote this week that "The recent war in Gaza was a failure. The bon ton now is to list its flaws. Flip-floppers say its 'achievements' were squandered; leftists say the war 'should never have started' and rightists will say the war 'should have lasted longer'. But on this they all agree: It was a blunder. Because we consider the war to have been almost cost-free, with just 13 Israeli dead, it will be the first in 36 years without a Commission of Inquiry formed in its wake. Of course, the war's blunder was just as serious as its predecessors, but because we did more killing than being killed, because we caused more damage than we sustained, there's nothing deemed worthy of investigation. It was all in vain: no progress made, no goal achieved, nothing. Deterrence wasn't reestablished, arms smuggling into Gaza was not stopped, Hamas was not weakened and abducted Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit was not freed. On these facts we all agree" ...
In his article, Levy reserved particular scorn for the mainstream Israeli media's coverage of the Gaza war: "And what of the cheerleaders who sat on the sidelines of this hellish nightmare? Perhaps we should at least hold them accountable? They sat in their television studios and at their newspaper desks. Oh, how the commentators were excited and stirred excitement. They goaded and urged, pushed and applied pressure, begging for more and more war. For months they had been clamoring for their 'wide-scale operation', their hearts' desire. When their wish came true they cheered in support and whistled in excitement. Do not take their actions lightly. They could have had an immense influence over the feeble politicians and graying officers. 'Strike out at them', their baritone voices echoed from one part of the country to the other. They asserted it was a just and successful war without peer. They covered the brilliant military maneuvers with gusto, iniquitously hid the horrors, presented an unrestrained offensive against a non-existent enemy as a two-sided war, described troops' unchallenged advances as real combat and a military maneuver carried out on the back of a helpless population as a success ... Showing no remorse and much vanity, they now shamelessly admit that the war whose praises they sang has failed. Why did it fail? Because we didn't kill enough people, they explain. If we would have given it a little push and killed 200 more children or massacred 500 more women, then we would have achieved victory. None of them are asked what would have happened had the war continued..."
Gideon Levy's article in Haaretz can be read in full here.
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