Daily death toll in Gaza surpasses any other in 21st century: Oxfam
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The occupation is "killing Palestinians at an average rate of 250 people a day."
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Palestinians try to rescue a woman stuck under the rubble of a destroyed building following the IOF's airstrikes in Khan Younis refugee camp, Gaza, Dec 7, 2023 (AP)
Oxfam, the Britain-based charity, stated yesterday that the daily death toll of Palestinians in the brutal Israeli war on Gaza surpasses that of any other major war in the 21st century, while survivors remain at high risk due to hunger, diseases, and cold, as well as ongoing Israeli bombings.
The occupation is "killing Palestinians at an average rate of 250 people a day, which massively exceeds the daily death toll of any other major conflict of recent years,” Oxfam said in a statement. They provided a list of average deaths per day in other cases of aggression since the turn of the century: 96.5 in Syria, 51.6 in Sudan, 50.8 in Iraq, 43.9 in Ukraine, 23.8 in Afghanistan, and 15.8 in Yemen.
According to Oxfam, Palestinians are at serious risk of starvation due to the occupation's restrictions on the entry of aid into Gaza as only 10% of the weekly food aid that is needed gets in.
Human Rights Watch agrees
Meanwhile, the United States-based rights group Human Rights Watch (HRW) released its World Report 2024, which stated that Palestinians in Gaza have been “targeted, attacked, abused, and killed over the past year at a scale unprecedented in the recent history of Israel and Palestine."
In its report, HRW noted that the occupation's war on Gaza is based on “acts of collective punishment that amount to war crimes and include the use of starvation as a method of warfare," including preventing the reach of essential needs, such as water and electricity, and blocking the entry of most critical humanitarian aid.
Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, HRW said since the United Nations started recording in 2006, incidents of settler violence against Palestinians and their property reached the highest daily average during the first eight months of 2023. At least 3,291 Palestinians were held in administrative detention without charge or trial, according to Israeli Prison Service figures.
“Israeli authorities’ repression of Palestinians, undertaken as part of a policy to maintain the domination of Jewish Israelis over Palestinians, amount to the crimes against humanity of apartheid and persecution,” HRW said.
The deadliest war in history
The war on Gaza is now considered one of the deadliest and most destructive wars in history, according to experts in mapping damage during wartime.
The war has killed more people than the US-led coalition did in its alleged three-year campaign against ISIL (also known as ISIS or Daesh), according to an analysis of Copernicus Sentinel-1 satellite data by the CUNY Graduate Center and Oregon State University.
In addition, according to a report by the Associated Press, researchers found that the aggression on Gaza has wreaked more destruction than the Allied bombing of Germany in World War II, to cite an example.
According to satellite data they collected, it has likely either damaged or destroyed more than two-thirds of all structures in Northern Gaza and a quarter of buildings in the Southern area of Khan Younis, including tens of thousands of homes, as well as schools, hospitals, mosques, and stores. About 70 percent of school buildings across Gaza have been damaged, based on UN monitors.
More than 23,000 Palestinians killed
According to Gaza's Ministry of Health, at least 23,469 Palestinians have been killed and 59,604 injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since October 7.
In the most recent 24-hour reporting period, IOF carried out 10 mass killings in the Gaza Strip, causing 112 deaths and 194 injuries, the Ministry added. About 7,000 people remain missing under the rubble and are presumed dead.
