Civilian Casualties

The rebels targeted churches on Christmas Day. Men were killed first, often stripped of shirts and pants, and then bound with their arms behind their backs. Rather than waste bullets, the attackers hacked victims in the back of the neck with machetes or shattered their skulls with sticks. "It happened step by step," said Joseph Kpayajadia, 58, a farmer who hid in the grass and saw his son being killed.

The road to Bala Baluk district stretches arrow-straight ahead, with heat-shimmered cucumber fields on either side. But determining exactly what transpired nearly two weeks ago in a hamlet called Garani takes a far more twisted path. A battle raged. Bombs fell. Afghan officials say at least 140 civilians died, two-thirds of them children and teenagers, in what may prove the most lethal episode of civilian casualties since the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. Days of interviews with U.S.

It was a voice of anguish that pierced a nation. Israeli TV broadcast a father's heartbreak Friday night when a Palestinian doctor living in Gaza made a frantic phone call to a newscaster saying an Israeli tank had shelled his home, killing three of his daughters and injuring other family members. Izz el-Deen Aboul Aish, who speaks Hebrew, worked as a gynecologist in an Israeli hospital.

She was the strongest among them, the natural leader. So when the shelling stopped and the Israeli soldiers announced through loudspeakers that all residents should come out of their homes and head for the center of town, neighbors turned to Rawhiya Najar for guidance. Emptying the cupboards of sheets and tablecloths -- anything white -- she led a procession of 20 women and children into the streets holding a white flag in each hand, residents say.

The new U.S. military commander in Afghanistan will limit the use of airstrikes in order to help cut down on civilian casualties, his chief spokesman said Monday. In a "tactical directive" to be issued in coming days, Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal has ordered new operational standards, including refraining from firing on structures where insurgents may have taken refuge among civilians unless Western or allied troops are in imminent danger, said spokesman Navy Rear Adm. Gregory J. Smith.

A Sudanese official said Thursday that hundreds of people were killed early this year when foreign warplanes bombed three convoys smuggling African migrants through Sudan along with weapons that apparently were destined for the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert hinted at his air force's possible involvement in the attacks. They came after Israel ended a 22-day assault on Gaza without fully achieving one of its aims: to choke off Hamas' weapons supply.

The number of civilian deaths in Sri Lanka has risen sharply in the last month, Human Rights Watch said Friday, calling on both sides in the protracted civil war to stop firing at civilians or shelling areas where they are concentrated. The government has been battling the Tamil Tiger rebel group, which wants a homeland for the Tamil minority, for the last 25 years. In recent weeks the army has stepped up its offensive, boxing in the rebels in a smaller area in the north.

President Obama's pick to lead U.S. forces in Afghanistan warned Tuesday that casualties are likely to increase as the military steps up its campaign against insurgents. Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal also voiced skepticism that Taliban guerrillas could be persuaded to sever their ties with Al Qaeda; a similar strategy was crucial in McChrystal's success as commander of special operations forces in Iraq.

Even in a country that has endured so much suffering, few images could more tragically convey the senseless violence gripping Somalia today than the expressionless stare of a 5-year-old boy named Omar. As he slept next to his mother one recent morning, a stray bullet from a nearby gun battle struck him in the back of the head. He made no movement or sound, so his family members didn't even notice at first. Later they saw blood oozing from a small hole in his head and thought it was a snakebite.

A former Marine counter-intelligence sergeant testified Tuesday that special operations Marines fired into oncoming civilian traffic in Afghanistan last March even though he saw no evidence that their convoy was fired upon. Appearing before a rare military court of inquiry, Nathaniel Travers, a former staff sergeant, said Marines in his convoy were rushing back to their base after a car bombing when Marine Humvee gunners fired into civilian vehicles on a highway in eastern Afghanistan.