The U.S.-made precision-guided bombs can be aimed at specific targets, ideally limiting civilian casualties, and in airstrikes in Gaza, it has killed dozens of Palestinians, including women and children.
The weapon, GBU-39, or small diameter bombs, Used in attacks Thursday at a former United Nations school Strike in Rafah on May 26In both incidents, the Israeli military defended its actions, saying the strikes were aimed at militants who were using civilians as human shields. Gaza health authorities said civilians had also been killed, with videos and photos showing women and children among the dead.
Two weapons experts told The New York Times that Israel appears to have increased its use of bombs since the beginning of the year, compared with just 10% of its airstrikes on the Gaza Strip in the early days of the war. As a series of recent Israeli attacks have shown, even relatively small bombs can cause severe civilian casualties.
“The problem is that even if you use small arms or use precision-guided weapons, it doesn’t mean you’re not killing civilians, and it doesn’t mean that all your attacks are suddenly legal,” said Brian Kastner, weapons expert at Amnesty International.
Early in the war, the Israeli military launched a full-scale invasion of Gaza cities using tanks, artillery and 2,000-pound bombs, drawing international condemnation for causing heavy civilian casualties.
Analysts say Israel, at the urging of the Biden administration, has shifted its combat strategy toward low-intensity operations and targeted raids and now relies more heavily on the GBU-39, a 250-pound bomb that includes 37 pounds of explosives and is launched by warplanes.
Ryan Brobst, a military analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said the shift appears to have begun in January or February, “which may explain the change in munitions used.”
last month, Unexploded The GBU-39 was found at a school in Jabaliya in the northern Gaza Strip. Unique rear fins for the same type of bomb Appear on the scene May 13 Attack further south Family homes and schools in Nuseraat As many as 30 people were killed.
The wreckage of the GBU-39 was also found outside a civilian home that was hit in the Israeli airstrike. Rafa exist Aprilin an undisclosed location in Gaza in March, and tar al-sultan Analysts said in January.
Experts estimate that Israel has launched tens of thousands of airstrikes in total, using a small fraction of the various weapons. But several analysts said the debris found after the strikes and Israel’s requests to replenish its stockpile showed that Israel had clearly stepped up its use of the GBU-39.
“We’ve seen more and more GBU-39 scrap in the last few months,” Mr. Kastner said. “The trend is from large to small.” (However, he said, Amnesty investigators continue to see evidence of large munitions like the Mark-80 series, which weigh up to 2,000 pounds and were fired into populated areas early in the war.)
Israel says only its military has an accurate list of how often and where the GBU-39 has been used since the war began last October, when Hamas militants killed 1,200 Israelis and took 250 hostages. Israeli military officials did not respond to questions about the use of the GBU-39 in Gaza, but they said in a written statement to The New York Times on Thursday that “the IDF prefers to use lighter ammunition when the target type and combat environment allow.”
The statement continued, “The IDF selects munitions by matching the type of munition to the specific target, with the goal of achieving military objectives while taking into account environmental factors and minimizing harm to civilians.”
In the first six weeks of the war, Israel routinely dropped 2,000-pound bombs on southern Gaza, where civilians were told to evacuate for safety. A December Times investigation concluded that the attacks, which blasted apartment buildings into giant craters, killed thousands.
November, U.S. officials urge Israel Use smaller bombs to better protect civilians. Just a month ago, Boeing, the manufacturer of the GBU-39, accelerated the delivery of 1,000 weapons from a 2021 order, but the order has not yet been completed.
By December, President Biden warn Israel said it was losing global support for the war because of the “indiscriminate bombing that was taking place”.
“We have made it clear to the Israelis, and they know it, that the safety of innocent Palestinians remains a concern.” Biden said on December 12“The actions they take must therefore be consistent with the principle of doing everything possible to prevent innocent Palestinian civilians from being harmed, murdered, killed and disappeared.”
But even small bombs can cause collateral damage.
The first known One expert said the first use of GBU-39 bombs in the current war was on October 24 in Khan Yunis, when two homes were hit by four bombs.
In January, Israel struck the top two floors of a five-story residential building in Rafah at around 11 p.m., killing 18 civilians, including four women and 10 children. Amnesty International investigation It was concluded that the bomb used in the attack was a GBU-39. In the example Amnesty International in April compiled data on Israel’s possible illegal use of U.S.-made weapons dating back to January 2023.
this State Council Summary In May, the U.S. State Department said Israel’s failure to protect civilians in Gaza was “highly likely” a violation of humanitarian standards, but it had found no specific case that would justify withholding military aid from the United States.
Current and former U.S. officials said Israel does not typically share information with Washington about its use of the GBU-39, and a system set up by the State Department in August to track civilian deaths caused by U.S.-made weapons in foreign conflicts has struggled to compile a comprehensive list. A U.S. official said the May 26 airstrike in Rafah was being investigated as part of a new process to determine whether the use of U.S. weapons violated humanitarian law.
Israel has been deploying GBU-39 Since 2008use them Gaza, Syria and LebanonThe bombs have a range of at least 40 miles and are GPS-guided, with the coordinates of a specific target set before launch. Experts say the GBU-39 is so accurate that it can hit specific rooms inside a building.
The United States has delivered at least 9,550 GBU-39s to Israel since 2012, including 1,000 shipped last fall under an expedited order, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which tracks arms transfers. Mr. Brobst of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies said more may have been sent since then.
Most attack aircraft can carry eight GBU-39s at a time, each of which can be independently guided to different targets. NR Jenzen-Jones, director of the Armament Research Service, said this made them an effective weapon for the Israeli military.
However, “it’s not a panacea” when it comes to limiting civilian casualties, Mr. Johnson-Jones said. “It may be smaller in size relative to other aerial bombs, but the Small Diameter Bomb is still very powerful.”
Myra Novick Reporting from Jerusalem, Eric Schmidt From Washington.
