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UN & human rights groups are silent as Iranian regime blasts Israeli civilians with cluster munitions

Human Rights Watch, which has often highlighted illegal use of cluster munitions, has been silent

 
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View of the scene where a missile fired from Iran toward Israel caused damage to a house in Rishon LeZion, March 16, 2026. (Photo: Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

In recent days, the Iranian regime has markedly stepped up the use of ballistic missiles with cluster munition warheads against Israeli population centers, which is widely banned for being inherently indiscriminate.

However, rather than an international outcry, there has been a deafening silence among UN organizations and NGOs, who are usually quick to identify ostensible "war crimes" by Israel, despite attempts by the IDF and Israel’s Foreign Ministry to draw attention to the attacks on Israeli civilians.

“The Iranian regime targets civilians on purpose,” the ministry wrote in a recent post on 𝕏. “Iran is using cluster warhead missiles that explode mid-air and scatter explosives across a wide area. These weapons aren’t designed for precision. The Iranian Regime is using them to kill as many civilians as possible.”

The Jerusalem-based NGO Monitor on Sunday highlighted the suspicious silence from Human Rights Watch (HRW), which has been quick to condemn Israel for ostensible violations of international law, and has often condemned the use of cluster munitions in other instances in the past.

“The org regularly calls for a ‘global ban on cluster munitions,'” NGO Monitor President Gerald Steinberg told the Jewish News Syndicate (JNS).

“HRW’s deafening silence on Iran’s targeting of Israeli civilians with cluster munitions highlights their hypocrisy.” 

“Human rights are only important when they can be weaponized to demonize the Jewish state. HRW’s highly selective version of international law exposes the immoral objectives behind the principled facade,” Steinberg said.

Coverage by some major media outlets has not fared much better.

Rather than focusing on Iran’s tactics, The New York Times framed U.S. Central Command Adm. Brad Cooper’s criticism of Iran’s strikes as another opportunity to critique the Trump administration’s stance, headlining the article, “Admiral’s Comments Undercut Pentagon’s Cluster Munition Policy.”

Cooper stressed that the warheads that spread cluster munitions over a broad area are “an inherently indiscriminate type of munition.”

“We join countries across the region in condemning this aggression,” he added.

The article’s author, NYT journalist John Ismay, continued by noting, “The first Trump administration, however, defended the use of cluster munitions in a policy that remains in effect today.”

Cluster munitions are not banned per se. Under international humanitarian law, their use is allowed, given certain restrictions, such as a strict distinction between civilian and military targets.

Israel, Iran, the U.S., as well as Russia and China, are not party to the 2010 Convention on Cluster Munitions, which bans the use of these munitions for member states.

A potentially lawful use of the munitions came in the last known instance they were used by U.S. troops, when warships launched Tomahawk cruise missiles with explosive cluster warheads at al-Qaeda camps in Yemen. In this case, the spread of the submunitions serves to kill hostile forces in a large geographic area, like a military camp.

In past years, both the first Trump administration and the Biden administration sent large shipments of older cluster munitions to Ukraine for use in the war against Russia.

On the one hand, intercepting the cluster munitions has posed a challenge for Israeli air defenses; on the other hand, the smaller sub-munitions are less dangerous than the conventional warheads that can weigh a ton.

Most of Iran’s ballistic missiles with cluster warheads carry about 24 submunitions, each typically weighing around one-and-a-half kilograms.

When the missile approaches its target, the warhead opens, spreading the submunitions over a large radius. Israel’s long-range anti-missile systems are designed to intercept the entire missile at a greater height, while the short-range systems like Iron Dome often don’t have enough time to intercept each of the bomblets, or are overwhelmed by their number.

Sometimes, the interceptor manages to hit the main missile, but if it doesn’t precisely hit the warhead, the submunitions can still be released.

A recent CNN analysis of two separate cluster munition attacks found that the impacts were spread out across an area of seven and eight miles, respectively.

However, their explosions are much less forceful. Taken together with the curious fact that most of these attacks have come at night, when most Israelis are close to their home-base shelter, they have so far not caused many casualties and relatively slight damage.

Nevertheless, the explosion of a submunition killed two construction workers last week, who were not protected by a shelter at the time.

Another challenge posed by the cluster warheads is the fact that often, a certain percentage of the submunitions don’t explode immediately, leaving behind explosives that can go off much later, and necessitating intensive scans of a large area to rule out the danger.
Read more: CLUSTER MUNITIONS | IRANIAN MISSILE ATTACK | ISRAEL IRAN WAR | NGO | UNITED NATIONS | WAR CRIMES
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All Israel News Staff

The All Israel News Staff is a team of journalists in Israel.

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