A new Explosive Weapons Monitor report finds civilians are continuing to bear the brunt of explosive weapons in populated areas, with Israel’s armed forces responsible for the majority of recorded civilian fatalities in 2025.

While the overall number of civilians killed by explosive weapons decreased by 21 per cent last year, largely due to Israel scaling back attacks on the Gaza Strip and Lebanon in response to ceasefire deals, “the majority – 56 per cent – of all global civilian fatalities in 2025 could be attributed to Israeli armed forces, most of which occurred in Palestine,” according to an annual report released Wednesday.

Jessica Corbett

The report is the latest publication from the Explosive Weapons Monitor, a research initiative of the International Network of Explosive Weapons, whose members include nongovernmental organisations around the world such as Action on Armed Violence, Center for Civilians in Conflict, Human Rights Watch, Humanity & Inclusion (HI), PAX, and Save the Children.

Based on data from Armed Conflict Location & Event Data as well as Insecurity Insight, the monitor found that there were at least 22,616 civilian fatalities from explosive weapons across 65 countries and territories last year.

In addition to Lebanon and Palestine, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Iran, Iraq, Myanmar, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Ukraine, and Yemen were “heavily impacted,” the publication says. Countries’ armed forces were responsible for the vast majority – 85 per cent – of all incidents that reportedly affected civilians or civilian infrastructure last year.

“The number of attacks in which explosive weapons affected humanitarian aid operations, aid workers, and camps increased by 52 per cent,” to 2,541, last year – and while they were documented in 17 countries and territories, “about 90 per cent of all incidents were recorded in Palestine,” the report notes.

Attacks on education increased by 64 per cent, to 1,416; they occurred in 27 places, but were most common in Myanmar, Palestine, and Ukraine. The report also highlights continued attacks on healthcare facilities and workers (1,272 incidents in 22 places), and on food and water systems (1,082 incidents in 15 places).

“Every destroyed school, hospital, market, water system, or humanitarian convoy represents far more than damaged infrastructure—it represents opportunities lost, futures disrupted, and communities pushed further from recovery,” said Alma Taslidžan, HI’s disarmament advocacy manager, in a statement.

“Long after the explosions end, civilians continue to live with the consequences of disrupted healthcare, interrupted education, damaged livelihoods, and the daily challenge of rebuilding their lives,” Taslidžan emphasised. “For many, the consequences of explosive weapons become part of everyday life and suffering for years to come.”

Explore the report’s data and view country-specific analysis in a new interactive dashboard:

explosiveweaponsmonitor.org/global-figur…

— Explosive Weapons Monitor (@weaponsmonitor.bsky.social) June 10, 2026 at 10:29 PM

The report argues that “it remains a critical humanitarian priority” to bring the 2022 Political Declaration on Strengthening the Protection of Civilians from the Humanitarian Consequences Arising From the Use of Explosive Weapons in Populated Areas into greater effect.

The publication also calls out eight countries – Cambodia, Kenya, Morocco, Nigeria, Somalia, South Korea, Turkey, and the United States – that endorsed the declaration but whose armed forces reportedly used explosive weapons that caused civilian harm in 2025.

“The devastating impact of explosive weapons on civilians is both foreseeable and preventable. Yet across numerous conflicts, their continued use has entrenched a pattern of civilian harm that is increasingly treated as routine rather than exceptional,” said Katherine Young, the report’s lead author and the monitor’s research and monitoring manager, in a statement.

“When explosive weapons are used in populated areas, civilians suffer,” Young stressed. “What is particularly alarming is that this harm has become persistent across conflicts worldwide, risking the normalisation of civilian suffering on a massive scale.”

The release of the report comes amid renewed Israeli attacks on Lebanon – which intensified after the United States and Israel launched an illegal war on Iran in February, and have continued despite a new ceasefire agreed to in April – as well as on Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.

“This weekend, eight children were reported killed and a further 17 injured in five different locations in the Gaza Strip, while in the West Bank, a seven-month-old boy died after being shot by Israeli forces in the Tel Rumeida area of Hebron,” said Edouard Beigbeder, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) regional director for the Middle East and North Africa, on Wednesday.

“We cannot let this become the new normal – children losing their lives to violence should cause global outrage and must be condemned at every level,” he continued. “UNICEF calls on the Israeli authorities to take decisive action to protect all Palestinian children. Authorities must ensure transparent, credible, and robust investigations, as well as accountability whenever children are killed or maimed.”

Since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, Israeli forces have slaughtered at least 72,991 Palestinians in Gaza – an assault widely condemned as genocide. That includes 981 people killed since the ceasefire reached last October, according to local health officials. Israeli attacks on Lebanon have left thousands more dead, including at least 3,666 since early March, per the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health.

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