A/HRC/2/7 page 11 decision to stay put — freely taken or due to limited options — in no way diminishes a civilian’s legal protections. It is categorically and absolutely prohibited to target civilians not taking a direct part in hostilities. 42. As regards the destruction of high-rise buildings in the south-eastern suburbs (Dahiye) of Beirut, Israeli bombing destroyed about 150 apartment buildings and damaged approximately the same number. Because the buildings, which would normally have housed between 30,000 and 60,000 persons,48 had been nearly entirely evacuated before they were struck, the loss of life was limited. Because the mission was not able to obtain from the Lebanese authorities disaggregated data about the geographical distribution within Lebanon of the overall 1,191 deaths, a more precise statement is not possible at this stage. It also remains, moreover, unclear how many of those killed were Hezbollah fighters.49 43. The IDF position is that each building targeted constituted a specific military target according to the definition of Hezbollah infrastructure outlined above, the most important being the Hezbollah headquarters and the bunkers with alleged long-range rocket launch sites. They argue that the fact that individual buildings remain standing next to others completely destroyed shows that IDF targeting was appropriately selective. The mission’s requests for specific information as to the military objective pursued with the destruction of each building and the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated at the time of attack, however, remained unanswered on the grounds that such information must remain classified. This response is inadequate, however, in light of the evidence available.50 44. In South Lebanon,51 thousands of buildings were destroyed and many others damaged by IDF attacks.52 The mission did not obtain any precise data as to the overall number of persons killed in South Lebanon during the conflict although it is clear that a great many civilians were killed. As to the number of Hezbollah fighters among the dead, figures contained in Hezbollah statements vary widely from those provided by the Government of Israel. 53 45. The mission drove through a stretch of South Lebanon from Tyre to Ayta ash-Shab through Qana and Bint Jbeil and its members witnessed the destruction of hundreds of houses, some of which had been bulldozed. 46. According to Israel, buildings were targeted in the “air war” primarily on the basis that they served as launching or storage sites for rockets or other materiel, and secondarily on the basis that they hosted Hezbollah fighters. Video footage provided by Israel shows instances of rockets being fired from residential buildings and thus confirms instances of Hezbollah abusing civilian objects in its military operations. But this cannot be dispositive justification for the destruction of hundreds of civilian houses in South Lebanon, nor other distant houses or infrastructure. In order to show that the attacks did not violate the principles of distinction and proportionality and the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks Israel would need to provide substantially more and qualitatively different information relating to questions such as the kind of information on the basis of which specific houses and villages were targeted, the time lapse between the firing of a rocket from a house or village and the IDF attack in response, and the estimate by IDF of civilian presence in and around the target at the time of the strike. In the absence of such information the mission cannot conclude that the widespread targeting of civilian houses by IDF complied with international humanitarian law. In the absence of