Gaza death toll may be 41% higher than official figures, study finds

[endgenocide]

This discussion thread was locked as off-topic by Omaha Steve (a host of the Latest Breaking News forum).

Source: NBC News

Researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine said the death toll in Gaza may be at least around 41% higher than official records suggest. The number of people killed in Gaza during Israel's deadly offensive in the Palestinian enclave is significantly higher than the figures reported by local health authorities, researchers at a leading health university in Britain have found.

In a peer-reviewed study published Thursday in The Lancet journal, researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine said they estimated that as many as 64,260 people were killed in "traumatic injury deaths" in Gaza between Oct. 7, 2023 and June 30, 2024. The authors of the study estimate that the death toll for the first nine months of the war was around 41% higher than the figure of 37,877 reported by the Palestinian health ministry.

Women, children under the age of 18 and people over 65 accounted for 59.1% of the 28,257 deaths for which age and sex data were available. Researchers did not provide an estimate of the number of Palestinian combatants killed. Health authorities in Gaza also do not publish data on militants killed.

Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/gaza-death-toll-may-higher-official-figures-study-finds-rcna187100

[AZLD4Candidate]

1. From the article:

n order to estimate the number of those killed in Gaza, the study's authors used a statistical sampling technique that is often used to estimate population size as well as death tolls during conflicts in Guatemala, Colombia and Sudan.

They also analyzed data from health ministry morgue records, online obituaries and an online health ministry survey, among other sources.

All conjecture using comparisons and not actual numbers. So this is nothing more than poorly researched clickbait. Second paragraph says they relied on the Hamas run Gaza government, which we all know has no reason to lie.

I guess Hamas using its people as human shields has worked well for good PR for those who don't really care about the Palestinians, but only care about attacking Israel because of that star on their flag.

You know, civilians die in war. If you don't want civilians to die in war, don't start one with a terrorist attack that kills 1200 non-military targets at a music festival and then take hostage which you proceed to torture and butcher.

But I guess Oct 7th was also Israel's fault. And, as I have been told my entire life, Hamas uses terrorism because it's the only weapon they have.

[hlthe2b]

2. This kneejerk dismissive response is quite telling. Enough said...

[endgenocide]

8. Agreed

It's as if they somehow believe that fourteen months of relentless bombings from the air and 155mm artillery shells from the land into a densely civilian populated area somehow couldn't possibly create the death and destruction being reported. I suspect that many of the deniers have never seen the destruction that a single155mm shell will create much less tens of thousands of shells along with tens of thousands of bombs some as large as two thousand pounds dropped from the air. Or maybe they think that the 18,000 or so children are Hama's fighters? I have a hard time understanding the callousness.

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. The peer reviewed article is not "clickbait". Your "actual numbers" can't be obtained because Israel forbids

journalists and researchers from entering Gaza, on pain of death, and classes those who would normally process the information about deaths as enemies who can be shot if found. So the techniques the medical professionals used are the best that anyone in the world can do - used in war zones. Israel has ensured that.

This is an objective look at the consequences of Israeli policy. That may pain supporters of Israel, but they should be adult enough to face up to what their desires have caused.

[endgenocide]

9. Enough Said, thank you!

[AZLD4Candidate]

12. Desires? Not be subjected to terrorist attacks? Not to be butchered going to musical festival

Again, I would have hated to see people on here after Pearl Harbor.

[Oopsie Daisy]

5. Thank you! "If you don't want civilians to die in war, don't start one..."

>> If you don't want civilians to die in war, don't start one with a terrorist attack that kills 1200 non-military targets at a music festival and then take hostage which you proceed to torture and butcher.

And don't hide among civilians in places of worship, schools, hospitals, markets. Don't build tunnels and conduct military operations in residential neighborhoods, or in residential buildings. Don't stockpile weapons where civilians gather or travel.

You are correct. Hamas is murdering their own for PR purposes.

[moniss]

13. Your "logic" turns on itself

because it would be just as viable to say that the radical right government of Israel is using the militants mixed in with the population as a handy excuse for killing more civilians with impunity.

[sarisataka]

4. Two questions

-How many of the 46,000-300,000 deaths were Hamas members?

-How many deaths have there been in Gaza during the same time frame that were natural causes?

[muriel_volestrangler]

7. Hamas membership cannot be captured in a medical analysis, but we have an idea about question 2

The annualised crude death rate was 39·3 per 1000 people (95% CI 35·7–49·4), representing a rate ratio of 14·0 (95% CI 12·8–17·6) compared with all-cause mortality in 2022, even when ignoring non-injury excess mortality.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(24)02678-3/fulltext

So expected natural cause deaths were on the order of a fourteenth (there may have been more deaths from "natural causes" due to increased malnutrition, lack of needed medicines and so on).

[moniss]

14. Some of what could be called "natural causes"

may well be people who could no longer get treatment for ongoing medical conditions like cancer, heart disease etc. I doubt Gaza City has a local functioning 24 hour Walgreens where someone can just pop in and get their meds. The ones who have frozen to death are also part of the "natural causes". The tonnage of bombs dropped on this small, penned in area with a large population has been enormous. The IDF and the radical right government of Israel took the easy choice of dropping bombs on entire buildings rather than having troops go in to root out a few militants mixed in with the people.

The government of Israel and much of the IDF are pure scum along with Hamas. We can always count on both to shove the consequences of their actions on the rest of the world to clean up. When you blow the arms and legs off of children you should have to pay to take care of that child for life. But it will be the rest of the world paying for surgeries and prosthetics and counseling. Israel and Hamas will not contribute a dime or a moment's concern.

[ZRB]

6. Thanks for the frequent updates on the situation

comrade!

[endgenocide]

10. Your Welcome

There is so little attention paid to this human tragedy in our corporate media I feel it is important to shine on a light on it when they finally do!

[Lonestarblue]

11. From what I've read, the Gaza government officials have only counted actual bodies.

We’ve all seen numerous photos of most of Gaza’s apartment buildings and other structures bombed to rubble. The bodies of the people buried under that rubble have not been excavated and thus have not been counted. I’ve seen no estimates of how many thousands may still be buried, but given these were homes, schools, and businesses, the likelihood is that the death toll is considerably higher than reported.

In some areas, the IDF bulldozed the rubble without even attempting to excavate the bodies or allowing Palestinians to do so.

[moniss]

15. The "clean-up" is a tactic used for decades even before

now. Militants would come into Palestinian villages and lay waste to the place and many would run away to save their lives. The ones who couldn't would get killed. Then an "official" force would come in "unofficially" and see what "needed to be done" and then the "official force" would withdraw for a day or so while the "clean-up" took place aka dispose of bodies. Then the "official" "official" force comes in to write a report about the matter and says that claims of hundreds dead was exaggerated because they only found 20 and they would claim the rest must have run away.

[Omaha Steve]

16. AFTER a review by forum hosts LOCKING

May be is Speculation/Analysis.

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