JUAN GONZALEZ: Your report also raises questions about the attacks on the communications and media infrastructure of the country. You note that not only did the Israelis target the Hezbollah television station, but they also bombed the transmitters of the Lebanese Public Broadcasting Corporation and other commercial broadcasters that had nothing to do with the conflict. Could you talk about that?

MARTY ROSENBLUTH: Well, sure. And even with the targeting of the Hezbollah TV station, Al Manar, when we were in the meeting with senior Israeli defense officials in Israel, you know, what they said was, well, you know, not only are they broadcasting propaganda, but they're broadcasting instructions to the troops. And we asked for documentation. We said, “Can you give us transcripts? Can you give us audio tape? Can you give us videotape of Al Manar being used to actually broadcast instructions to Hezbollah fighters?” And they backed down on that.

And again, it's totally indiscriminate. I mean, they targeted basically the entire communications infrastructure. And again, I’m sure their claim would be, well, this has military potential, but it also has civilian use and affects civilians disproportionately to the military advantage from Hezbollah.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about hospitals and supermarkets?

MARTY ROSENBLUTH: Well, the supermarkets was actually pretty surprising to us, pretty alarming, in terms of what our mission on the ground found, is that from talking to civilians, from interviewing eyewitnesses, very often the supermarkets were the first thing that were targeted. And they were targeted in a way that the trajectory was very high, so the contents of the supermarket was destroyed. It opens up the question whether that was targeted to force the civilian population to evacuate, to force the civilian population to flee. In addition to that, we documented I think three separate cases where hospitals were targeted. And targeting hospitals is absolutely prohibited under international humanitarian law, unless it can be proven that they were being used essentially as a cover for military operations.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And when you say “targeted,” are you saying that they were deliberately hit or inadvertently hit, or did you question the Israelis about whether they actually intended to hit these hospitals?

MARTY ROSENBLUTH: Well, we didn't on the hospitals, per se, because when we were meeting with the Israeli officials in Israel, we didn't have that documentation. But the Israelis were pretty clear. The Israelis were basically claiming that they chose their targets very carefully, that they chose their targets very deliberately, and each and every target was vetted by a command chain, including an international humanitarian law trained expert. So that sets a very high bar.

And, in fact, the conclusion to our report and what we're asking for is an international investigation with experts that have the mandate and the training and the support and the financial resources and the cooperation of the parties to conduct the investigation properly. And I would think that both the Israeli government and our own government would have an interest in wanting a proper investigation. I mean, if Israel can show, if Israel can demonstrate, that these were in fact legitimate military targets, that should come out in a proper investigation. Our documentation and the documentation of other human rights organizations says that a lot of the targets were hit were not military targets. But if the Israelis can prove that they were through a proper investigation, that's what the investigation will show. And the same goes for Hezbollah.

AMY GOODMAN: Marty Rosenbluth, your report, Amnesty International's report on “Israel/Lebanon: Deliberate Destruction or ‘Collateral Damage’? Israeli Attacks on Civilian Infrastructure,” says that people guilty of war crimes should be held responsible anywhere in the world. What does that mean if you find Israeli officials responsible? For example, those that travel to this country.

MARTY ROSENBLUTH: Well, and it's not just the Israeli officials. I mean, let's be clear that this is just the first of a series of reports that are going to come out. I mean, as I was saying, I was part of the mission that went into northern Israel. We would also hold Hezbollah officials accountable. But, I mean, this is the challenge of international humanitarian law, is how is it enforced? How do you hold people accountable?

But, yes, I mean, if Israeli officials who are responsible for war crimes are in the United States or are in Europe, they can be arrested and held accountable. Look what happened with Pinochet, for example. This is more and more a tool that's being used to try to enforce international humanitarian law, by holding those individuals who are responsible accountable for those offenses. And that would go both for Hezbollah and for Israeli officials.

AMY GOODMAN: And Israel's charge that Hezbollah used people as human shields, that they embedded themselves in the civilian population so that everyone was a target?

MARTY ROSENBLUTH: Well, if it were true -- and again, we're still working on documenting that. And I’m not saying it didn't happen. Let's be really clear on that. We're still trying to investigate the extent to which Hezbollah did use civilians as human shields. And if this was true, it would, in fact, be a war crime. But that does not remove from Israel the responsibility to protect civilians. It can't be used as a blanket excuse. So if Israel says, well, there was one Hezbollah fighter in a building, that does not give them the right to level the entire neighborhood to try to target that one fighter. Again, the principle of proportionality, where you have to balance the military objective against the effect on civilians, comes into play. So, I mean, the Israelis essentially have used the argument that Hezbollah is shielding amongst a civilian population to -- in the south, to level entire villages, you know, destroying about 80%, in some cases, of the houses in the village. That's not a legitimate interpretation of the laws of war.

AMY GOODMAN: Marty Rosenbluth, I want to thank you for being with us, of Amnesty International-USA, specialist for Israel, the Occupied Territories and the Palestinian Authority. Thanks for joining us.

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