In its harshest condemnation of Israel since last summer's war, Human Rights Watch charged that most of the Lebanese civilian casualties came from "indiscriminate Israeli airstrikes," according to a report to be released Thursday.

In a statement issued before the report's release, the human rights organization said there was no basis to the Israeli claim that civilian casualties resulted from Hezbollah guerrillas using civilians as shields. Israel has said it attacked civilian areas because Hezbollah set up rocket launchers in villages and towns.

More than 1,000 Lebanese were killed in the 34-day conflict last summer, which began after Hezbollah staged a cross-border raid, killing three Israeli soldiers and capturing two others. They are still being held.

Israeli warplanes targeted Lebanese infrastructure, including bridges and Beirut Airport, and heavily damaged a neighborhood in Beirut known as a Hezbollah stronghold, as well as attacking Hezbollah centers in villages near the border. Hezbollah fired nearly 4,000 rockets at northern Israel, killing 119 civilians. In the fighting, 40 Israeli soldiers were killed.

Human Rights Watch executive director Kenneth Roth said in the statement, "Israel wrongfully acted as if all civilians had heeded its warnings to evacuate southern Lebanon when it knew they had not, disregarding its continuing legal duty to distinguish between military targets and civilians."

He added, "Issuing warnings doesn't make indiscriminate attacks lawful."

The full report was being released Thursday at a news conference in Jerusalem. Human Rights Watch had to cancel a similar news conference in Beirut last month because of threats of Hezbollah protests. That report accused Hezbollah of firing rockets indiscriminately at civilian areas in Israel.

Human Rights Watch said it investigated 94 cases of Israeli air, artillery and ground attacks "to discern the circumstances surrounding the deaths of 510 civilians and 51 combatants," about half the death toll in Lebanon in the conflict.

The group said simple movement of vehicles or people, "such as attempting to buy bread or moving around private homes," could trigger a deadly Israeli attack. The group charged that Israeli aircraft targeted vehicles carrying fleeing civilians.

The report said the investigation "refutes the argument made by Israeli officials that most of the Lebanese civilian casualties were due to Hezbollah routinely hiding among civilians." It said Hezbollah "did at times fire rockets from, and store weapons in, populated areas and deploy its forces among the civilian population."

However, the human rights group said it "found no evidence in these cases of separate legal violation of shielding, which is the deliberate use of civilians to render combatants immune from attack." Also, it said, Hezbollah conducted most of its activities and stored most of its weapons away from civilians.

PHOTO CAPTION

A Lebanese woman walks with her son amid the wreckage of destroyed buildings in Beirut, 2006. (AFP)

AP (summarized)