#gaza health ministry

[alwaysbewoke]

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

The Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health said on April 6 that it had “incomplete data” for 11,371 of the 33,091 Palestinian fatalities it claims to have documented. In a statistical report, the ministry notes that it considers an individual record to be incomplete if it is missing any of the following key data points: identity number, full name, date of birth, or date of death. The health ministry also released a report on April 3 that acknowledged the presence of incomplete data but did not define what it meant by “incomplete.” In that earlier report, the ministry acknowledged the incompleteness of 12,263 records. It is unclear why, after just three more days, the number fell to 11,371 — a decrease of more than 900 records.

Prior to its admissions of incomplete data, the health ministry asserted that the information in more than 15,000 fatality records had stemmed from “reliable media sources.” However, the ministry never identified the sources in question and Gaza has no independent media.

Expert Analysis

“The sudden shifts in the ministry’s reporting methods suggest it is scrambling to prevent exposure of its shoddy work. For months, U.S. media have taken for granted that the ministry’s top-line figure for casualties was reliable enough to include in daily updates on the war. Even President Biden has cited its numbers. Now we’re seeing that a third or more of the ministry’s data may be incomplete at best — and fictional at worst.” — David Adesnik, Senior Fellow and Director of Research

“It is important to recognize that Hamas is deeply invested in shaping the narrative that emerges from Gaza, particularly regarding the number of casualties in the war. Moreover, this control of data extends beyond the statistics provided by the Hamas-controlled health ministry, as there is also a deliberate effort to downplay the number of terrorists who have been killed by Israel in the war, potentially numbering more than 10,000.” — Joe Truzman, Senior Research Analyst at FDD’s Long War Journal

[nigesakis]

via nowinpalestine on IG & Al Jazeera

[vyorei]

Live coverage of the 22nd of November 2023 has resumed

Here are the latest updates, oldest at the top, most recent at the bottom

[girlactionfigure]

[theinconvenientlifestyle]

[its-zaina]

This truck was supposed to be used by Gazans to put bags of flour on it, But the Israeli army had a different opinion. Where this truck returned loaded with bodies!

The terrorist Israeli occupation army opens fire on Palestinians waiting for the arrival of flour trucks in the northern Gaza Strip, killing more than 109 martyrs and wounding others..

|

[eretzyisrael]

Source

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

Source:

https://www.ochaopt.org/content/hostilities-gaza-strip-and-israel-reported-impact-day-215

Disclaimer: The UN has so far not been able to produce independent, comprehensive, and verified casualty figures; the current numbers have been provided by the Ministry of Health or the Government Media Office in Gaza and the Israeli authorities and await further verification. Other yet-to-be verified figures are also sourced.

--

By: M.J. Koch

Published: May 10, 2024

The United Nations is reporting lower revised figures on the confirmed number of Palestinian Arab deaths in the Israel-Hamas war, calling into question the death toll that has been provided by the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry.

In March, the director of the United Nations Children’s Fund, Catherine Russell, cited data from the Hamas-run health ministry when she said that more than 13,000 children have died since October 7, “an astronomically horrifying number.”

On Thursday, though, the UN released new figures, noting a difference between the total deaths “reported” by the health ministry in Gaza and a lower number of fatalities that had been “identified.” 

The difference between the numbers is attributed in the report to the fact that some Gazans have been reported missing or are buried under debris of buildings damaged during the war and unable to be accounted for.

The new data show that 7,797 children have been “identified” as having died in Gaza since the war began, substantially lower than the “reported” number of deaths. Neither the UN report, though, nor the Gaza Health Ministry specifies what age is considered the cutoff between children and adults in their death counts.

Out of the more than 34,000 “reported fatalities” — a figure that has been repeated across numerous press outlets, including in the New York Times on Friday — the UN Office for the Coordination of Human Affairs asserts as of May 8 that 24,686 are “identified.” 

Of those 24,686 identified as having died, the UN reports, 10,006 were men, 4,959 were women, 1,924 were elderly, and the remainder were children. The report notes that the tally does not include “more than 10,000 reported missing or under the rubble.” 

Asked by a reporter on Friday how the death numbers were revised, the deputy spokesman for the UN secretary-general, Farhan Haq, said, “In the fog of war, it’s difficult to come up with numbers. We get numbers from different sources on the ground, and then we try to crosscheck them. As we crosscheck them, we update the numbers, and we’ll continue to do that as that progresses.” 

The UN report includes a disclaimer that the agency “has so far not been able to produce independent, comprehensive, and verified casualty figures.”

The global body added that “the current numbers have been provided by the Ministry of Health or the Government Media Office in Gaza and the Israeli authorities and await further verification.”

Gaza’s health ministry does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count. It has repeated that women and children have made up about two-thirds of those killed. The Israeli military said in February it has killed more than 10,000 Hamas terrorists through air strikes and ground operations launched in response to October 7. 

The new fatality figures are about one-third lower than what was initially reported by the UN, yet Mr. Haq said that people “can consider them reliable from the fact that we’re continually checking them.” 

Mr. Haq added that “numbers get adjusted many times over the course of a conflict. Once a conflict is done, we’ll have the most accurate figures. But we’re just going with what we can absolutely confirm, which will always be the low end of what the numbers are.”

Critics of the death statistics put forward by the UN and Gaza Health ministry, noting the lack of specifics on the age cutoff between child and adult fatalities, suspect that some young men in their late teens, many of whom are active Hamas combatants, could be among those counted as child deaths in reports.

The UN’s press office did not immediately respond to the Sun’s request for comment on the matter. 

==

Who would have thought that the numbers from a literal Islamic terrorist organization would be unreliable propaganda? It truly is shocking.

Note carefully that point about children. When it says "7,797 children (32%)," what they're actually saying is "Hamas uses child soldiers."

[workersolidarity]

🇵🇸 🚨 GAZA'S MINISTRY OF HEALTH SOUNDING ALARMS OVER THE CONDITIONS FOR PREGNANT WOMEN IN GAZA

🚑🏥 Health Ministry of Gaza:

50,000 pregnant women are in shelter centers without food, water or health care, with approximately 180 women giving birth every day in unsafe and inhumane conditions.

Via@PalestineTV

#source

@WorkerSolidarityNews

[alwaysbewoke]

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by David Harsanyi

The reaction to the rescue of four Israeli hostages from Gaza is a microcosm of the past 70 years of this conflict. Every time Palestinians pay the price for acting out in some horrific, irrational, self-destructive, violent way, their defenders want to rewind history to a more convenient moment — this time to Oct. 6, 2023.

Sorry, that’s not how life works. Hamas, the chosen political entity of Gaza — the overwhelming choice of Palestinian civilians, in fact — launched this round of the conflict by massacring, sexually torturing, and kidnapping Israelis whose only sin was attending a music festival. Palestinians took hundreds of these hostages back to the Gaza Strip — a place Arabs have political autonomy over for nearly 20 years — and held them in the middle of densely populated areas hoping to dissuade Israel from liberating them, or, if it did, to create as many martyrs as possible.

Critics of Israel now ask the usual dishonest question: Are four lives worth the alleged 200-plus Arabs that were lost rescuing them?

Israel is the only nation on earth that is tasked with protecting its own people and its enemies. Every innocent lost life is, of course, a tragedy. But if you don’t want to be placed in harm’s way, don’t hold hostages in your homes and neighborhoods, and don’t cheer and support a government that puts your life in constant danger for a lost cause. This is the reality of the world.

Now, if reports are correct, Hamas — and perhaps “civilians” (it’s difficult to tell because terrorists are often dressed as noncombatants) — opened fire on the rescuers. The Israelis, who do not indiscriminately target civilians, fired back, as they should. Whatever the specifics, every lost life is Hamas’ fault.

But, as always, it also needs to be stressed that the casualty numbers that are endlessly repeated by the establishment media are fiction — as everyone in those newsrooms is surely aware. So, we must assume outlets like The Washington Post and CNN — which also detestably contends that the hostages had been “released” — are fellow travelers. One BBC interviewer even asked an IDF spokesman if Israel had warned Palestinians of their sting operation.

Then again, even if there were over 200 dead, it is also surely the case that many of the dead were members of Hamas or holding hostages of their own volition or helping those holding hostages. Avoid doing so if you value your life.

The “Health Ministry” makes no distinction between terrorists and civilians, and in this case there might be little difference. Among those holding the Israelis hostage in their homes in Nuseirat, for instance, were a “journalist” (who apparently worked for Al Jazeera and the U.S.-based Palestine Chronicle, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit) and a “doctor.” The entire neighborhood was ostensibly under UN control. We already know that UN workers had likely participated in the Oct. 7 kidnappings and UNRWA schools are used by Hamas bases of operation.

Even now, there’s a (terrible) ceasefire deal on the table being pushed by Joe Biden (still chumming for antisemitic votes) that Hamas continues to reject. Would we not expect the United States to act the same way as Israel if some homicidal cult had our people?

In the end, of course, this could all end today if the hostages were returned and Hamas would unconditionally surrender. Israel haters, who fashion themselves peaceniks, will blame everyone — Netanyahu, Biden, colonialism, racism, etc., etc. — but the Islamists who are the cause of this war.

Then again, the entire conflict could end if the Palestinians would stop turning to nihilistic theocrats to lead them and accept Israel’s existence.  

[news4dzhozhar]

[phaon1]

Gaza’s health ministry said 40,005 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s military offensive on Gaza after the 7 October attack by Hamas last year.

[kp777]

By Jon Queally

Common Dreams

May 30, 2024

Experts said a military assault of this kind by the Israelis would unleash "a slaughter of civilians." It did. They also predicted it would result in a "tragedy beyond words." It has.

Despite street protests worldwide, desperate pleas from humanitarian organizations, persistent demands from United Nations agencies and leaders, and standing orders from the International Court of Justice in The Hague, the military onslaught being carried out by Israel in the Gaza Strip continued on Thursday with fresh reports of innocent civilians being killed and a situation on the ground that has become synonymous with "hell on earth."

The carnage and devastation was all predicted and warned against and yet the United States and other Israeli allies have stood aside as the death toll mounts and the situation on the ground results in the slaughter of civilians in their tents, the ongoing malnutrition of children and babies, targeting of medical personnel and aid workers, and unimaginable images of carnage this week in Rafah and across Gaza for all the world to see.

The World Food Programme on Thursday said that Israel's ongoing assault on Rafah—which U.S. President Joe Biden said would be a "red line" but has continued to support—"is having a devastating impact on civilians and humanitarian operations. Adults and children are beyond exhausted from constant displacement, hunger, and fear."

On Thursday, new photos (warning: graphic) were published of a 7-month-old baby, Fayiz Abu Ataya, who died of malnutrition after he could not be saved at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al Balah, Gaza.

The people who live in Gaza, said the WFP, "are desperate for the war to end—as are humanitarian workers on the ground, who are largely displaced and dispersed along with the people they are meant to serve. There is little [our agency] can currently do in Rafah, with stocks very low and mobility severely restricted."

"Further escalation in the conflict in Gaza," said the agency, "could deepen a humanitarian catastrophe and bring aid operations to a standstill."

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) on Wednesday warned that humanitarian facilities in Rafah have been “forced to close one after another” with only one hospital in the area functional and that one only “partially.”

The flow of humanitarian aid supplies into all of Gaza—”already insufficient to meet the soaring needs” of its people, said OCHA—has fallen by 67% since May 7.

It was OCHA spokesperson Jens Laerke, speaking in Geneva on May 3, who warned that a full-scale assault on Rafah like the one now being witnessed would "mean more suffering and death" for the people trapped there.

As Common Dreamsreported at the time, not only did Laerke say the operation would unleash "a slaughter of civilians"—which has now come to pass—but also land an "incredible blow to the humanitarian operation in the entire strip, because it is run primarily out of Rafah."

Earlier that same week, U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Martin Griffiths offered this prediction: "The simplest truth is that a ground operation in Rafah will be nothing short of a tragedy beyond words. No humanitarian plan can counter that. The rest is detail."

And those dire predictions have now come to pass.

In its Thursday statement, WFP reiterated the call by many within the United Nations, including Secretary-General António Guterres, demanding an immediate cease-fire and an end to the restriction and blocking of aid by the Israeli government. "We need all border crossings and crossing points within Gaza to be open," the agency said.

The United States government has done nothing to stop the ongoing catastrophe, say critics, but continues to provide plenty of weapons and ongoing political cover.

Late Wednesday night, USAID administrator Samantha Power acknowledged publicly, that "humanitarian partners" of the U.S. "working in Gaza tell us that conditions are worse now than ever before" and that "Israeli military operations and closed crossings are making it extremely difficult to distribute aid."

Despite that, the Biden administration continues to stand aside and allow Israel to have its way in Gaza, even after a Sunday bombing of a tent encampment by Israel killed an estimated 45 people and wounded hundreds more in what analyses showed were weapons supplied by the U.S. government.

According to new figures released by the Gaza Health Ministry on Thursday, at least 36,224 Palestinians have been killed and 81,777 wounded in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7. In the last 24 hours, the ministry said, 53 people were killed and over 350 injured due to the Israeli assault.

Also on Thursday, funerals were held for some of those killed on the previous day, including two medics with the Palestine Red Crescent, Haitham Tubasi and Suhail Hassouna. PRCS said the pair were targeted by the IDF in their ambulance while in the line of duty trying to save others:

"The Israeli occupation forces deliberately bombed the ambulance vehicle despite it bearing the internationally protected Red Crescent emblem," said the PRCS. "With the martyrdom of paramedics Haitham Tubasi and Suhail Hassouna, the number of PRCS staff members killed since the beginning of the aggression on Gaza has risen to 19, all targeted by the occupation while performing their humanitarian duties."

According to the latest figures from OCHA and the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, the Israeli attack on Gaza—coupled with evacuation orders from the Israel Defense Force (IDF)—has displaced more than 940,000 people from Rafah over the last three weeks, with an additional 100,000 people forced to flee for safer conditions in northern Gaza.

"We are way past the red line," said U.S. Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman, a Democrat from New Jersey, on Wednesday.

"The recent strikes on a Palestinian refugee camp, which killed dozens—including children burned alive in their tents—are unconscionable," Coleman continued, echoing human rights voices from around the world. "We cannot continue supporting this. Nobody is safer because of this."