A Tale of Two Bridges

Yesterday, on BBC Radio 4's Facebook page:

“You don’t hit schools, you don’t hit energy sources, you don’t hit bridges: those are war crimes.”

UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher criticises [criticizes] actions in the Iran war and says leaders have chosen ‘game show gambling’ over humanity by hitting civilian infrastructure.

Many years ago, when the Allied Air Forces conducted a massive campaign to destroy rail and road bridges in France and Belgium, before and after D-Day, no one called it a massive war crime. Has anyone ever called it a war crime? Probably some Nazi sympathizers did. And when the Ukrainians hit the Crimea bridge and the Ukrainian government tweeted "Sick burn," Russia's foreign ministry reacted by saying that it was a crime:

"The Kiev [Kyiv] regime's reaction towards destruction of civilian infrastructure is a testament to its terrorist nature."

It is hard to exaggerate the significance, and symbolism, of seeing the bridge on fire. Ukrainian authorities said it was a legitimate target, as they vow to retake the peninsula.

That was from BBC News, 8 October 2022. So, we have a UN humanitarian chief siding with Russia and Iran (and probably some Nazi sympathizers) when it comes to hitting bridges; is it any wonder that Israel did not trust a UN humanitarian agency to supply Gaza with aid?