Possible Use of Depleted Uranium Munitions Adds New Dimension to the Human Toll in Mid-East War
Ignored in the blitzes of both Gaza and Lebanon is the fact that the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) has fired hundreds of thousands of munitions supplied by the US that are typically made with depleted uranium (DU). Also disregarded is the fact that while the IDF targets Gaza, the uranium oxide dust which falls from the blasts is nomadic. This means it can float hundreds of miles to Israel, Jordan, Egypt and even farther. Thus, those who survive the bombs and others in the Mid-East will inherit a toxic wasteland: the air they breathe, the food they eat and the water they drink will be laced with the ash for years.
These blasts create intense heat and plumes of smoke that soar 1,000 to 2,000 feet in the air and carry the ash for miles. Dai Williams, a British weapons researcher, says that “when the U.S. bombed Baghdad in 2003, uranium dust was found 2,500 miles away in the U.K. Atomic Weapons Establishment’s air sampling filters about 10 days later.”
Journalists and concerned scientists who have tried to establish the wider public health hazards posed by the use of DU-equipped munitions have been consistently stonewalled by military and industry officials. Moreover, both US and Israeli authorities have refused to acknowledge that the munitions deployed by Israel in its attacks on Gaza and Lebanon contain depleted uranium.
As recently as 2023, Pentagon spokesman Marine Corps Lt. Col. Garron Garn assured PBS that DU munitions are “conventional,” which means non-nuclear. Back in 2012, John Kirby, President Biden’s national security advisor, who was a rear admiral in the U.S. Navy and its chief spokesperson, peddled a similar narrative: “Health studies have been done on depleted uranium munitions and it is not a radioactive threat.”
But conventional they are not. In 2012, the United Nations International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) labeled uranium a “Class 1 human carcinogen” and noted that DU shells produce both “radiation and heavy metal (chemical) hazards.”
The uranium munitions names are an alphabet soup of letters and numbers that are mostly meaningless to the non-military public. And the labels are frequently fanciful—such as SPICE bombs, Apache gunships, Warthog jets that fire Avenger guns, and BLU 109 bombs (nick-named bunker-busters)—which disguise their deadliness. But whether the bombs are smart (guided) or dumb (non-guided), 2,000 pounds or fewer, they are fitted with warheads made with DU penetrator rounds.
The U.S. has said little about the munitions it has sent to Israel since the October 7 Hamas attack. But the November 16, 2023 Haaretz Daily Newspaper reported that since the war started, Israel has asked for and received tens of thousands of 30mm, 120mm mortars and 155mm shells for its helicopters and tanks. Haaretz’s source was the U.S. Air Force.
Although the U.S. doesn’t broadcast that the shells are made with depleted uranium, the Museum of Radiation and Radioactivity in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, stated that “30mm and 120mm shells use DU penetrators.”
When this reporter asked the DOD if the U.S. sent these munitions to Israel, Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Bryon McGarry answered, “we don’t comment on specific cases.” Also, a former U.S. official said they can be produced without DU and noted that though the U.S. sent 155mm DU rounds to Ukraine, as the BBC reported on September 7, 2023, DU penetrators aren’t needed in Israel because “unlike Ukraine, this is not a tank war.”
Others disagree. Researchers who’ve studied the weapons since the 1990s say the only munitions that can collapse the tall buildings in Gaza which sit atop Hamas tunnels are those made with DU penetrator tips.
Why DU Is Dangerous
Depleted uranium is a waste product of the process to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons and nuclear reactor fuel. Dr. Keith Baverstock, a radiation and public health advisor to the World Health Organization (WHO) from 1991 to 2003, said that “when DU shells explode, they create colossal grayish-black clouds of uranium oxide dust that stick to everything.
“People breathe the dust, which lodges in their lungs. From there it seeps into their blood and lymph systems, flows throughout their bodies and binds to genes, causing them to mutate. Within just a few years, the dust can trigger birth defects and in five or more years, lymphoma and leukemia, especially in children. Organs, such as the kidneys, fail, due to the uranium particles that penetrate there. Other cancers develop later.”
https://washingtonspectator.org/possible-use-of-depleted-uranium-munitions-in-mid-east-war/