Qana death toll down to 28

2006-08-03 20:00

Beirut - Hospital officials at the southern Lebanese port city of Tyre revised the death toll from an Israeli air strike on Qana down to 28 on Thursday, a day after the Human Rights Watch organisation reported the same number of dead.

"I can now confirm that I have 28 dead bodies in the mortuary, among them the bodies of 16 children. All were found under the rubble in Qana," said a hospital official, who asked to remain anonymous, to Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa).

Last Sunday, Israeli jets struck a shelter in the southern Lebanese village.

At the time, hospital and Red Cross volunteers said 56 civilians, among them 30 children, had been killed.

Conflicting reports

Qana residents and Lebanese civil defence officials were still saying on Thursday that 11 people were missing, six of them children.

Lebanese health minister Mohammed Khalifeh told dpa that there were conflicting reports about the casualty tolls because "there are many bodies still under the rubble.

"The civil defence workers cannot reach areas to pull bodies out and take them to the hospitals to be added to the official tolls."

Human Rights Watch, with its headquarters in New York, called on Wednesday for an impartial international investigation after completing its own preliminary probe into Sunday's air strike.

The strike was the deadliest in three weeks of fighting between Israel and the Lebanese Shi'ite Hezbollah movement, and one that prompted worldwide condemnation.

"The initial estimate of 54 persons killed was based on a register of 63 persons who had sought shelter in the basement of the building that was struck," said the group in a statement.

Rescue workers had located nine survivors and therefore came to the reported number, it explained.

But, it now appeared at least 22 people escaped from the basement, the statement said, citing records from the Lebanese Red Cross and the government hospital in Tyre.

Another 13 remained missing, but rescue efforts had stopped, although some Qana residents were still feared buried in the rubble, it said.

Human Rights Watch gave a list of the 28 confirmed dead, which included 16 children and teenagers. The youngest was a nine-month-old baby.

Condemning the air strike, the group's Middle East director, Sara Leah Whitson, said the deaths were "the predictable result of Israel's indiscriminate bombing campaign in Lebanon".

Denies Hezbollah were present

The Israeli army said it targeted the house because Hezbollah fighters had launched rockets from there.

However, Human Rights Watch quoted one of the survivors, 61-year-old Muhammad Mahmud Shalhub, as vigorously denying any Hezbollah fighters were present in or around the home when the attack took place.

The group said its researchers, who visited Qana the day after the attack, did not find any destroyed military equipment in or near the home. - Sapa-dpa

- SAPA