How a Lebanese researcher is using visual data to map Israeli military’s use of white phosphorus

Shells that appears to be white phosphorus from Israeli artillery explode over Dahaira, a Lebanese border village with Israel, south Lebanon, on Oct. 16, 2023. (AP)
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Updated 11 November 2024
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How a Lebanese researcher is using visual data to map Israeli military’s use of white phosphorus

  • White phosphorus is used to create smokescreens on battlefields, but its misuse has many public health implications
  • Ahmad Baydoun maps Israel’s use of the chemical compound in southern Lebanon to document its environmental impact

DUBAI: When Ahmad Baydoun left Lebanon in 2022 to pursue a PhD on weaponized environments in Amsterdam, he did not anticipate his research would soon become essential in documenting devastation in his homeland.

His work has gained significance in the wake of escalating violence in Lebanon’s south, where reports allege Israeli forces have used white phosphorus in populated areas with severe consequences for the environment and public health.

White phosphorus is an incendiary substance known for emitting bright light, intense burning and thick smoke.




A view of M825 and M825A1 artillery shells labeled D528, the US Department of Defense Identification Code for "white phosphorus-based munitions" in Sderot, Israel on October 09, 2023. (Photo by Mostafa Alkharouf/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Although it is permissible under international law to use phosphorus to obscure military movements, the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons prohibits deploying it near civilians.

Using geolocated visual data to trace the environmental impact of military tactics, Baydoun has been documenting Israel’s use of white phosphorus in southern Lebanon, both to bear witness and to demand accountability.

“Geolocation humanizes those affected and gives precision,” Baydoun told Arab News. “It’s hard to look away when you see the impact on people’s homes and landscapes.”

FASTFACTS

• White phosphorus is a chemical substance that ignites upon exposure to oxygen, creating intense, long-lasting flames and thick smoke.

• It is used militarily to obscure movement, mark targets and create smokescreens on battlefields.

• Contact with white phosphorus causes severe burns, respiratory damage and eye irritation, and it can be fatal if inhaled or absorbed.

• Residual chemicals seep into soil and water, contaminating crops and harming biodiversity, with lasting ecological damage.

• International law restricts white phosphorus use in civilian areas under the Chemical Weapons Convention and Geneva Protocol.

Baydoun’s journey from academia to advocacy was unexpected. His fascination with architectural policies and conflict initially revolved around how built environments could be manipulated for control and exclusion during wartime.

However, when cross-border exchanges between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militia began on Oct. 8, 2023, the situation demanded a response.




Wounded Lebanese child Haidar Hijazi, 5, rests at hospital in Sidon on September 27, 2024, after he was injured following an Israeli airstrike that targeted his home village of al-Sharkiyah in southern Lebanon. (AFP)

Hezbollah began firing rockets into populated areas of northern Israel in solidarity with Hamas, prompting Israel to retaliate.

In northern Israel, the conflict has forced some 96,000 people to leave their homes. To date, 68 Israeli security personnel and 43 civilians have been killed, according to official tallies.

Israel’s campaign of airstrikes and “limited” ground operations have displaced more than a million Lebanese from their homes, while the death toll has surpassed 3,000, according to health officials.




Members of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) patrol the southern Lebanese Marjayoun district, near the border with Israel, on October 16, 2024. (AFP)

Baydoun shifted from theoretical work to real-time monitoring, using satellite imagery, social media, and data verification to map alleged phosphorus attacks on Lebanese villages.

The Lebanese National Council for Scientific Research estimates that 117 phosphoric bombs have been fired into southern Lebanon, a Hezbollah stronghold, since October 2023. Many of these have reportedly sparked fires, engulfing fields, forests and villages.

Lebanon’s Ministry of Environment has previously said some 462 hectares of forests and farmland were destroyed between October and November 2023. The Ministry of Health has also called on the international community to condemn the use of white phosphorus and to intervene.




The devastation and destruction of many villages along the Blue Line, and even beyond, is shocking, says Andrea Tenenti, UNIFIL spokesperson

Despite Israel’s insistence that its use of phosphorus serves only as a smokescreen to shield its soldiers’ movements, local Lebanese officials say the weapons are part of a larger strategy to render the area uninhabitable, pushing residents to evacuate en masse.

The use of white phosphorus in populated areas is not just a violation of international law, but a public health threat. When it comes into contact with the skin, it causes extreme, often fatal, burns. It also produces thick fumes that irritate the eyes and respiratory system.

Wounds caused by phosphorus burns can continue to inflict damage days after exposure, requiring extensive medical care — often unavailable in the midst of conflict.




Ahmad Baydoun. (Supplied)

Mental health issues also proliferate among survivors, with conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and insomnia becoming prevalent. The persistent psychological impact, especially for children, is immense and underreported.

The environmental damage is equally far-reaching. When the chemical compound seeps into the soil, it contaminates vegetation and crops, potentially rendering large areas of farmland unusable.

Additionally, chemicals can leach into rivers and water systems, destroying biodiversity and threatening communities reliant on these resources.




People watch as a smoke cloud erupts after a rocket fired by an Israeli war plane hit a building in Beirut's southern suburb of Shayah on October 22, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and Hezbollah. (AFP)

“We’re not just talking about Lebanon,” said Baydoun. “If these areas aren’t detoxified, we’ll see consequences across the region. Lebanese agricultural exports could carry these toxins, affecting ecosystems and markets beyond our borders.”

Agriculture makes up a significant part of Lebanon’s economy. The contamination of farmland in Lebanon’s south — an area once responsible for much of the country’s crop production — could deal a severe blow to the local economy and food security.

Farmers in southern Lebanon, many already impoverished, face the loss of homes and livelihoods. The destruction of olive groves, citrus orchards and wheat fields reduces local sustenance and regional exports, deepening Lebanon’s economic crisis.




Fire sweep over the Marjayoun plain in southern Lebanon near the border with Israel after being hit by Israeli shelling on August 16, 2024, amid the ongoing cross-border clashes between Israeli troops and Hezbollah fighters. (AFP)

While Baydoun works from Amsterdam, his research methods allow him to follow developments closely.

He employs techniques such as geolocation, where he uses digital imagery and coordinates to pinpoint attacks, and chronolocation, a process of using environmental cues like shadow lengths to estimate times.

These tools help him cross-verify incidents with reliable satellite data, providing accurate, real-time assessments.




A farmer collects his dead livestock which was killed by Israeli bombardment that hit a farm along the hills of the village of Jezzine in southern Lebanon early on July 8, 2024 amid ongoing cross-border tensions as fighting continues between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. (AFP)

“Verifying attacks can be complex given how rife misinformation and AI manipulation have become,” said Baydoun. “But every precise verification adds to a larger story — one that’s too compelling to ignore.”

He is not alone in his commitment to these methods. Collaborating with digital investigative platforms, Baydoun joins a global community of researchers dedicated to documenting environmental violence.

Together, they expose patterns of harm that may otherwise remain concealed.




Medical staff care for victims after the Israeli military struck a Beirut's southern suburb, on July 30, 2024, at Bahman hospital. (AFP)

Baydoun also works closely with Lebanese journalist-activists, who help him obtain localized information from remote areas that journalists can no longer access due to safety concerns.

“No one is there to report on what is happening in the south anymore,” said Baydoun. “There is only the UN Interim Force in Lebanon and satellite imagery as sources of information.

“I have previously worked on a map showing how close Israel was bombing near the UN peacekeepers in the area. The peacekeeping forces suffered from gastrointestinal complications, and skin irritations; both are unique effects of exposure to white phosphorus.”

UNIFIL is a UN peacekeeping mission established in 1978 to administer the Blue Line demarking the border between Israel and Lebanon.

Despite spokesperson Andrea Tenenti previously saying that an investigation had found “possible traces of the use of white phosphorus” in close proximity to a UNIFIL base, a confidential report recently published by the Financial Times has been more damning.

The report mentions various incidents where Israeli forces have mounted attacks on or near UNIFIL bases in Lebanon. In one incident, the Israel Defense Forces reportedly used white phosphorus at close range, injuring 15 UN peacekeepers in the process.

The report details the attack of Oct. 13, in which two Israeli tanks breached the main gate of a UNIFIL base and remained inside for 45 minutes. Shortly after, the IDF fired shells approximately 100 meters north of the base, emitting “suspected white phosphorus smoke,” which injured UNIFIL personnel.

“Despite putting on protective masks, 15 peacekeepers suffered effects, including skin irritation and gastrointestinal reactions after the smoke entered the camp,” the report said.

Israel denied directly striking the compound and said the IDF was using the smokescreen for cover as it attempted to evacuate soldiers.

Israel had previously demanded the withdrawal of the UNIFIL peacekeepers from 31 of their bases along the Israeli-Lebanese border, as the areas had become “active combat zones.”

The international community has faced criticism for its muted response to Israel’s use of white phosphorus in Lebanon.

Human rights organizations, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have condemned the use of white phosphorus in densely populated regions in previous conflicts, but statements from world leaders have yet to directly address the allegations in Lebanon.

For Baydoun, his work on the subject serves as both documentation and advocacy. His research could prove critical, providing an account of Lebanon’s suffering that would otherwise go unseen. But the toll is personal, too.

“I’ve had my share of sleepless nights,” he said. “Emotions run high when attacks happen close to loved ones. You’re working for your country, and it’s hard to stop.”

 


UN urges more support to speed up Syria refugee returns

Updated 56 min 34 sec ago
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UN urges more support to speed up Syria refugee returns

  • According to UNHCR, some 13.5 million Syrians remain displaced internally or abroad
  • Wide scale destruction, including to basic infrastructure, remains a major barrier to returns

DAMASCUS: UN refugee agency chief Filippo Grandi has urged more international support for Syria to speed up reconstruction and enable further refugee returns after some 14 years of civil war.
“I am here also to really make an appeal to the international community to provide more help, more assistance to the Syrian government in this big challenge of recovery of the country,” Grandi told reporters on Friday on the sidelines of a visit to Damascus.
Syrians who had been displaced internally or fled abroad have begun gradually returning home since the December overthrow of longtime ruler Bashar Assad, whose brutal repression of peaceful anti-government protests in 2011 triggered war.
But the wide-scale destruction, including to basic infrastructure, remains a major barrier to returns.
Grandi said over two million people had returned to their areas of origin, including around 1.5 million internally displaced people, while some 600,000 others have come back from neighboring countries including Lebanon, Jordan and Turkiye.
“Two million of course is only a fraction of the very big number of Syrian refugees and displaced, but it is a very big figure,” he said.
According to UNHCR, some 13.5 million Syrians remain displaced internally or abroad.
Syria’s conflict displaced around half the pre-war population, with many internally displaced people seeking refuge in camps in the northwest.
Grandi said that after Assad’s toppling, the main obstacle to returns was “a lack of services, lack of housing, lack of work,” adding that his agency was working with Syrian authorities and governments in the region “to help people go back.”
He said he discussed the importance of the sustainability of returns with Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad Al-Shaibani, including ensuring “that people don’t move again because they don’t have a house or they don’t have a job or they don’t have electricity” or other services such as health.
Sustainable returns “can only happen if there is recovery, reconstruction in Syria, not just for the returnees, for all Syrians,” he said.
He added that he also discussed with Shaibani how to “encourage donors to give more resources for this sustainability.”
With the recent lifting of Western sanctions, the new Syrian authorities hope for international support to launch reconstruction, which the UN estimates could cost more than $400 billion.


Water levels plummet at drought-hit Iraqi reservoir

Updated 21 June 2025
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Water levels plummet at drought-hit Iraqi reservoir

  • Visible cracks have emerged in the retreating shoreline of the artificial lake, which lies in northern Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region and was created in the 1950s

DUKAN: Water levels at Iraq’s vast Dukan Dam reservoir have plummeted as a result of dwindling rains and further damming upstream, hitting millions of inhabitants already impacted by drought with stricter water rationing.
Amid these conditions, visible cracks have emerged in the retreating shoreline of the artificial lake, which lies in northern Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region and was created in the 1950s.
Dukan Lake has been left three quarters empty, with its director Kochar Jamal Tawfeeq explaining its reserves currently stand at around 1.6 billion cubic meters of water out of a possible seven billion.
That is “about 24 percent” of its capacity, the official said, adding that the level of water in the lake had not been so low in roughly 20 years.
Satellite imagery analyzed by AFP shows the lake’s surface area shrank by 56 percent between the end of May 2019, the last year it was completely full, and the beginning of June 2025.
Tawfeeq blamed climate change and a “shortage of rainfall” explaining that the timing of the rains had also become irregular.
Over the winter season, Tawfeeq said the Dukan region received 220 millimeters (8.7 inches) of rain, compared to a typical 600 millimeters.


Upstream damming of the Little Zab River, which flows through Iran and feeds Dukan, was a secondary cause of the falling water levels, Tawfeeq explained.
Also buffeted by drought, Iran has built dozens of structures on the river to increase its own water reserves.
Baghdad has criticized these kinds of dams, built both by Iran and neighboring Turkiye, accusing them of significantly restricting water flow into Iraq via the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
Iraq, and its 46 million inhabitants, have been intensely impacted by the effects of climate change, experiencing rising temperatures, year-on-year droughts and rampant desertification.
At the end of May, the country’s total water reserves were at their lowest level in 80 years.
On the slopes above Dukan lies the village of Sarsian, where Hussein Khader Sheikhah, 57, was planting a summer crop on a hectare of land.
The farmer said he hoped a short-term summer crop of the kind typically planted in the area for an autumn harvest — cucumbers, melons, chickpeas, sunflower seeds and beans — would help him offset some of the losses over the winter caused by drought.
In winter, in another area near the village, he planted 13 hectares mainly of wheat.
“The harvest failed because of the lack of rain,” he explained, adding that he lost an equivalent of almost $5,700 to the poor yield.
“I can’t make up for the loss of 13 hectares with just one hectare near the river,” he added.


The water shortage at Dukan has affected around four million people downstream in the neighboring Sulaimaniyah and Kirkuk governorates, including their access to drinking water.
For more than a month, water treatment plants in Kirkuk have been trying to mitigate a sudden, 40 percent drop in the supplies reaching them, according to local water resource official Zaki Karim.
In a country ravaged by decades of conflict, with crumbling infrastructure and floundering public policies, residents already receive water intermittently.
The latest shortages are forcing even “stricter rationing” and more infrequent water distributions, Karim said.
In addition to going door-to-door to raise awareness about water waste, the authorities were also cracking down on illegal access to the water network.
In the province of roughly two million inhabitants, the aim is to minimize the impact on the provincial capital of Kirkuk.
“If some treatment plants experience supply difficulties, we will ensure that there are no total interruptions, so everyone can receive their share,” Karim said.


Israel military says hit Hezbollah site in south Lebanon

Updated 21 June 2025
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Israel military says hit Hezbollah site in south Lebanon

  • The military said the site was used by Hezbollah “to advance terror attacks against Israeli civilians”

JERUSALEM: Israel’s military said Saturday its navy hit a Hezbollah “infrastructure site” near the southern Lebanese city of Naqoura, a day after Israel’s foreign minister warned the Lebanese armed group against entering the Iran-Israel war.
“Overnight, an Israeli Navy vessel struck a Hezbollah ‘Radwan Force’ terrorist infrastructure site in the area of Naqoura in southern Lebanon,” the military said in a statement.
The military said the site was used by Hezbollah “to advance terror attacks against Israeli civilians.”
In a separate statement on Saturday, the military said it had “struck and eliminated” a Hezbollah militant in south Lebanon the previous day, despite an ongoing ceasefire between both sides.
In a statement carried by the official National News Agency, Lebanon’s health ministry said late on Friday that one person was killed in a “strike carried out by an Israeli enemy drone on a motorcycle” in the same south Lebanon village.
The November ceasefire aimed to end hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, which sparked months of deadly hostilities by launching cross-border attacks on northern Israel in solidarity with Palestinian ally Hamas following its October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
Lebanon’s army, which has been dismantling Hezbollah infrastructure as part of the truce, said earlier in June that the Israeli military’s ongoing violations and “refusal to cooperate” with the ceasefire monitoring mechanism “could prompt the (Lebanese) military to freeze cooperation” on site inspections.


Israeli military kill head of Palestine corps in IRGC’s overseas arm – defense minister

Updated 21 June 2025
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Israeli military kill head of Palestine corps in IRGC’s overseas arm – defense minister

  • Veteran commander, Saeed Izadi, led the Palestine Corps of the Quds Force
  • The Quds Force built up a network of Arab allies known as the Axis of Resistance

Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Saturday that the military had killed a veteran commander in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ overseas arm, in a strike in an apartment in Iran’s Qom.

The veteran commander, Saeed Izadi, led the Palestine Corps of the Quds Force, Katz said in a statement.

There was no confirmation from the IRGC.

The Quds Force built up a network of Arab allies known as the Axis of Resistance, establishing Hezbollah in Lebanon in 1982 and supporting the Palestinian militant Islamist group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

But Iran-aligned network has suffered major blows over the last two years, as Israeli offensives since Hamas’ October 7, 2023, attacks on Israel have weakened both the Palestinian group and Hezbollah.

Katz said Izadi financed and armed Hamas during the initial attacks, describing the commander’s killing as a “major achievement for Israeli intelligence and the Air Force.”

Izadi was sanctioned by the US and Britain over what they said were his ties to Hamas and Palestinian militant faction Islamic Jihad, which also took part in the October 7 attacks.


Iran’s FM arrives in Istanbul for Arab League meeting

Updated 21 June 2025
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Iran’s FM arrives in Istanbul for Arab League meeting

  • Around 40 diplomats are slated to join the weekend gathering of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation

ISTANBUL: Iran’s foreign minister arrived in Istanbul on Saturday, Tasnim news agency reported, for a meeting with Arab League diplomats to discuss Tehran’s escalating conflict with Israel.

Around 40 diplomats are slated to join the weekend gathering of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), as Israel and Iran continue to exchange missile strikes.

“The Foreign Minister arrived in Istanbul this morning to participate in the Organization of Islamic Cooperation Foreign Ministers’ meeting,” Tasnim reported.

It comes after Araghchi met with his counterparts from Britain, France and Germany in Geneva on Friday.

“At this meeting, at the suggestion of Iran, the issue of the Zionist regime’s attack on our country will be specifically addressed,” said Iranian foreign Abbas Araghchi, according to the news agency.

Israel began its assault in the early hours of June 13, saying Iran was on the verge of developing nuclear weapons, triggering an immediate retaliation from Tehran in the worst-ever confrontation between the two arch-rivals.

Earlier on Friday, Araghchi said Tehran was ready to “consider diplomacy” again only if Israel’s “aggression is stopped.”

The Arab League ministers are expected to release a statement following their meeting, the Turkish state news agency Anadolu said.