Attachments
A NOTE FROM THE EXPLOSIVE WEAPONS MONITOR
The escalation of conflict in recent years has placed civilians at increased risk of harm from the use of explosive weapons. This is true throughout the globe, where explosive weapons harmed civilians in at least 74 countries and territories throughout 2024, killing and injuring tens of thousands, destroying critical civilian infrastructure, and impeding the provision of essential services.
This issue of Fragments shows that healthcare access in fragile and conflict-affected areas throughout the world is specifically at the forefront of humanitarian concerns. Attacks on healthcare personnel, hospitals, and other vital infrastructure have surged, severely undermining the ability to provide life-saving medical care to civilians in need. In conflict-affected areas, targeting of healthcare workers, the destruction of medical infrastructure, and significant logistical barriers.
The use of explosive weapons in populated areas disproportionately affects the availability, accessibility, and quality of healthcare services both in the short and longer term due to both the direct and indirect effects of attacks on healthcare with explosive weapons. This severely compromises or prevents affected populations from accessing medical care and treatment at a time when both EWIPA-specific and other health needs increase exponentially.
This is certainly true in Lebanon, where Since 7 October 2023, the use of air- and ground-launched explosive weapons by Israeli armed forces in densely populated areas in Lebanon, in response to rocket fire from Hezbollah and other armed groups, has caused civilian death and injury, damaged critical civilian infrastructure and forced waves of displacement.
In the weeks that followed the escalation of Israeli airstrikes at the end of the September 2024, more than one million people were displaced in the largest wave of displacement in Lebanon in decades. According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA), entire communities were uprooted, and civilian infrastructure was heavily damaged or destroyed. This also greatly impacted Lebanon’s healthcare system.
Multistakeholder efforts, such as the process launched in early 2024 to develop an agenda for action to strengthen healthcare access in contexts where explosive weapons are widely used, can support the effective implementation of the Political Declaration and help mitigate this harm to civilians caused by the use of explosive weapons in populated areas.