Israeli army admits civilians make up 80 percent of those killed in Gaza since March
Israel privately relies on the Palestinian Health
Ministry's figures for the total death toll, while publicly dismissing the data
as unreliable
MAY 14, 2025
The Israeli military has admitted that more than 80
percent of the people killed in the attacks on Gaza since Israel breached the
ceasefire two months ago are uninvolved civilians, Hamakom reported on
13 May.
In response to a request from the Hebrew magazine, the
office of the Israeli military's spokesperson stated that 500 of the 2,780
killed in the Gaza Strip as of Tuesday are “terrorists.” In contrast, the
remaining 2,280 people killed by Israeli forces were “not suspected
terrorists.”
The data shows that approximately 4.5 civilians were
killed for every Palestinian resistance fighter supposedly killed by the
Israeli forces. For comparison, the ratio of combatants to civilians killed in
the Russia–Ukraine war is one to 2.8, while the ratio during the US war against
ISIS in Syria was one to 2.5.
Hamakom wrote that the total number of deaths in Gaza was
taken from data compiled by the Palestinian Ministry of Health, whose figures
were found credible by the Israeli military itself.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed
that the ratio is just one civilian killed for each combatant killed.
However, many estimates of the death toll in the strip
are much higher than the number documented by the Health Ministry.
According to the Euro-Med Monitor, for every
Palestinian resistance fighter killed, 14 civilians have been killed – many of
them women and children.
Even in comparison with previous campaigns waged by
Israel, including those in the Gaza Strip, it appears that the ratio of
civilians to combatants killed has soared in the current war.
For example, in Israel's Operation Protective Edge in
2014, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimated that
for every Hamas fighter killed, about three non-involved people were killed.
When journalists from Hamakom asked
the Israeli military for the total number of fatalities, they were told that
the army was not monitoring the matter. Throughout the war, the military has
only published the number of “terrorists” killed, even though it admits that it
has no way of knowing or estimating their number.
The Israeli military spokesman's announcements of the
number of Palestinian resistance fighters killed are intended to undermine the
credibility of the data published by the Gaza Health Ministry, Hamakom added,
even though army officials have stated they are the official figures on which
the military relies.
“In practice, the army's publications on the matter of
fatalities in the Gaza Strip are often blatant lies for propaganda purposes,”
the magazine concluded.
When the Israeli military attacked Nasser Hospital in
Khan Yunis to assassinate Palestinian journalist Hassan Aslih, it claimed that
“steps were taken to reduce the chance of harming civilians, including the use
of precision weapons, aerial observations, and additional intelligence
information.”
However, an investigation conducted by Hamakom found
that 31 people were killed in the attack.
Since the start of the war, Israeli forces have killed
at least 52,908 people and wounded 119,721, according to the Gaza Health
Ministry. Thousands more are missing and presumed to be dead, buried under the
rubble of buildings destroyed by Israeli strikes.
Since 18 March, when Israel breached the ceasefire
agreement and resumed its bombing of the enclave, at least 2,780 have been
killed and 7,680 injured.
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