By Hana Namrouqa
AMMAN - Environmentalists and human rights activists demanded Israel halt its use of the internationally banned white phosphorus munitions, which result in indiscriminate effects and long-term environmental and health hazards.
White phosphorus is a chemical weapon used in wars to carry out a total annihilation; the substance is a lethal pesticide and destroys environmental ecosystems, the Jordanian Environment Society (JES) said on Sunday.
The chemical is a colourless to yellow translucent wax-like substance with a pungent garlic-like smell. The form used by the military is highly energetic, active and ignites once it is exposed to oxygen, causing fire and dense white smoke, according to web sources.
“When exposed to a certain area, white phosphorus contaminates various environmental elements, including water, air, soil and living creatures… the air becomes polluted with toxic hazardous chemicals,” JES Executive Director Ahmad Kofahi told The Jordan Times.
“Breathing white phosphorus causes respiratory and nervous diseases, while exposure to the substance causes skin burns which only leave bones…,” Kofahi said.
People can also be harmed from the substance after swimming in or consuming fish from water contaminated with white phosphorus, or from soil as the white phosphorus sticks to particles, he added.
Web sources indicate that breathing white phosphorus for long periods causes a condition known as "phossy jaw" which involves poor wound healing of the mouth and breakdown of the jaw bone, while eating or drinking small amounts of white phosphorus may cause liver, heart or kidney damage, vomiting, stomach cramps, drowsiness and death.
“This is what Palestinians in Gaza are being exposed to, children are being burned with this lethal chemical and no one is doing anything to stop that. Pictures and TV broadcast show Israel using white phosphorus bombs,” he added.
Meanwhile, the Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Saturday Israel should stop using white phosphorus in military operations in densely populated areas of Gaza.
On Friday and Saturday, the HRW researchers in Israel observed multiple air bursts of artillery-fired white phosphorus over what appeared to be the Gaza City/Jabaliya area, according to a HRW press statement received on Saturday.
Israel appeared to be using white phosphorus as an “obscurant” [a chemical used to hide military operations], a permissible use in principle under international humanitarian law. However, white phosphorus has a significant, incidental, incendiary effect that can severely burn people and set structures, fields and other civilian objects in the vicinity on fire, the statement said.
The potential for harm to civilians is magnified by Gaza’s high population density, among the highest in the world, according to HRW.
“White phosphorous can burn down houses and cause horrific burns when it touches the skin,” said Marc Garlasco, senior military analyst at HRW. “Israel should not use it in Gaza’s densely populated areas.”
The watchdog believes that the use of white phosphorus in densely populated areas of Gaza violates the requirement under international humanitarian law to take all feasible precautions to avoid civilian injury and loss of life.
This concern is amplified given the technique evidenced in media photographs of air-bursting white phosphorus projectiles. Air bursting of white phosphorus artillery spreads 116 burning wafers over an area between 125 and 250 metres in diameter, depending on the altitude of the burst, thereby exposing more civilians and civilian infrastructure to potential harm than a localised ground burst, said the statement.
Since the beginning of Israel’s ground offensive in Gaza on January 3, there have been numerous media reports about the possible use of white phosphorus by Israeli occupation forces. The army told both HRW and news reporters that it is not using white phosphorus in Gaza, according to the press statement.
On January 7, a spokesman for the Israeli army told CNN: “I can tell you with certainty that white phosphorus is absolutely not being used.”
